Someone wants to sync my music on a commercial website

[Blast9]

What's your opinion folks? What should I try and negotiate here?

An online surf shop wants to use our music on a vid - excerpt from email:

So, we are interested in borrow you some music to put it in this videoclip in the website.

I would put your names and the name of your band and contact in the website cause I’d like to put one diferent song in each new video clip.I think it would good for your promotion, cause many people watch this site."

This implies that they want to use several of our songs, but I've asked them to clarify this.

No offer of hard cash - free promotion for the band - My first thought is to make sure we are clearly credited on the web page and the vid clip and ensure browsers know our tune is available on iTunes etc.

But if they want several songs I reckon I should negotiate a fee

[kafka]

Never work for free. The publicity won't mean squat to you in the end. Unfortunately, if you price your work as free, the next person who comes along (assuming there will be one), will also want you to give it away for free, and will take offense at you trying to charge them. Try to get something out of them - even if it's not much - so you can truthfully tell the next customer that you do and expect to get paid for your work.

[Delayline]

"Show me the money!!!"

One of the main reasons the music industry is such a mess is because people expect music for free. If your stuff is good enough for them to want to put on their web site it's good enough to pay for!

Be fair but firm. Good luck.

[mrlouie]

one problem about all the post "dont work for free" thats great if you have a discography or many clients .... but if you haven't done anything yet and want your music out there to reach people who may never come across your band it may be worth it ...

I dont master for free, but thats because i have a nice list of album credits/clients that you can judge my work from... but say 8 years ago i'd bet i do a song for free to tryn get an album because i needed to build my mastering discography..

try this ... tell them ok i'll let you guys use 1 song(maybe no more then 1minute) for say 6 months and then i'll see if it helps my band .... if it does ..great let them use more ... if not no big deal

if they do use it .. tell them you want to be able to host the video clip with your song on your own website or myspace ... guess what you just got a cool surf video for your song.

you gotta get things started some how .... your band ever play a party or club for free??

Just make sure the song doesn't get placed in a Video for sale.

louie

[Blast9]

Thanks - very good point. We decided to more or less do that - let them use 1 track, with clear credits on their website and links to our site.

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