Fan-funded music is crowdfunding for music. Often, fan-funded music occurs in conjunction with direct-to-fan marketing. Fans of music have the option to donate and collectively raise money with the goal of jump-starting the career of a given musical artist. The fan-funding of music occurs primarily through web-based services using a business model for crowdfunding. Fans are typically given rewards based on their monetary contributions.
Notable platforms
Additional information
ArtistShare
ArtistShare is documented as being the first fan-funded website for music. The service lets musicians fund their projects utilizing a "fan-funding" model. In exchange for funding on a particular project, contributors receive various benefits. ArtistShare emphasizes on their website that for each project, the artist is in no way required to relinquish ownership of copyright, as this model is not a work made for hire.
Indiegogo
Indiegogo is a crowd funding portal that allows users to create a page for their funding campaign, set up an account with PayPal, make a list of "perks" for different levels of donation, then create a social media-based publicity effort. Users publicize the projects themselves through Facebook, Twitter and similar platforms. The site takes a 4% fee for successful campaigns. For campaigns that fail to raise their target amount, users have the option of either refunding all money to their contributors at no charge or keeping all money raised minus a 9% fee. Unlike similar sites such as Kickstarter, Indiegogo disburses the funds immediately, when the contributions are collected through the user's PayPal accounts. Indiegogo also offers direct credit card payment acceptance through their own portal. Those funds are disbursed up to two weeks after the conclusion of a campaign.
Kickstarter
Often described as the most successful and well-known crowd funding platform, Kickstarter has been featured on CNN, The New York Times, Time, BBC and Wired. Kickstarter is a crowd funding website that has successfully funded everything from films, games, and music to art, design, and technology. Project creators choose a deadline and a minimum goal of funds to raise. If the goal is not reached by the deadline, no funds are collected. The platform is open to backers from anywhere in the world and to creators from the US or the UK. Kickstarter takes a 5% fee and Amazon.com takes an additional 3%.
PledgeMusic
PledgeMusic was an international crowd funding platform geared specifically toward musicians. Users (pledgers) receive exclusive content in exchange for their contributions to artists fundraising campaigns. PledgeMusic does not retain any ownership or rights to any music created through the platform. Funding transactions occur only after a goal is successfully met. The site is staffed by people in the music industry and maintains partnerships with major players in the digital and physical music spheres allowing for numerous options to help record, produce, manufacture, market, and distribute artist's music, merchandise, and tickets. The site charges a 15% fee. PledgeMusic operates on two types of artist campaigns, direct-to-fan and pre-order campaigns. In a pre-order campaign, fans are charged immediately upon pledging. This type of campaign is designed for labels and artists who have already completed a recording, and are looking for a strategic way to pre-sell and market it.
RocketHub
RocketHub is an established crowd funding platform open to anyone including musicians. Project holders on RocketHub have the option to keep raised proceeds even if the fundraising pledge was not successful. RocketHub is a completely open platform, meaning that anyone can create a fan-funding campaign and there is no screening process before the project goes live. The site takes an 8% commission off successful projects.
Sellaband
Sellaband was a crowd funding platform that allowed registered artists to use a direct-to-fan approach to finance albums or concerts. Artists will pledge an amount, the minimum funding target being €3000, and the maximum funding target, €250,000. Artists may also choose if they want to integrate a revenue sharing option into their funding. The minimum incentive is a download.
Corite
Corite collects five percent of the funding fee provided to an artist, and then another five percent of the royalties that are paid by streaming services. The company has raised $6.9m from investors.