Making Money as a Songwriter

[paulrace]

There are basically three ways you make money.

Mechanical royalties, when someone makes CDs (or vinyl or cassette or whatever) with your song on them.

Performance royalties, when someone plays your song on the radio or streams it or plays it in concert.

Licensing, when someone uses your song in an advertisement, industrial video, television show, etc.

For the first two, the song itself is what matters, since the performer is going to record his or her version anyway.

For the third, the recording you provide is what they use, so a hockey-rink tune that is well recorded stands a better chance than a killer song with a less-than-radio-ready demo.

We'll plug content on all of these as it becomes available.