There are other ways to get some dough for equipment, touring expenses, recording and
marketing. It’s a relatively new phenomenon called fan-funding, a first cousin to crowd-
funding. Fan-funding is music that is funded directly by the fans of an artist. In simpler
terms, your fans give you the money you need to entertain them.
Most fan-funding takes place online. Some of the sites are ArtistShare.com; Aucadia.-
com; PledgeMusic.com and the most popular and well known of them all, Kickstarter.-
com. Kickstarter.com isn’t any small potato. They’ve help raise millions for various cre-
ative projects, including music and recording. Their most recent p.r. coup was capturing
funding for the Pebble. Pebble is a watch that connects with a person’s smartphone, such
as an iPhone or Android. The product does a lot of stuff, such as email notifications, mes-
saging, calendars, etc. and uses apps to do it. Through Kickstarter.com, Pebble raised
over ten million dollars from just under 70,000 backers in less than thirty-seven days. Not
too shabby. Not too shabby at all.
Use Your Team
In closing, your team of business advisors can and likely will become one of your biggest
business assets. They’re as important as having reliable amps and state-of-the-art record-
ing software. Choose them with the utmost care. You’ll be spending a lot of time with
them and sharing the most intimate details about your band and yourself with them. Your
team can provide objective insights from outside your musical enterprise. These are often
insights you’d never have yourself. A musician and small business owner is often too
close to his or her music and can’t always see the forest for the trees.