Having your music synced for television, movies, advertisements, or video games may be a highly profitable method to earn royalties, acquire vital exposure, and significantly develop your music career. However, securing these desirable and competitive sync licensing arrangements is no simple task. By applying the following proven tactics, you can substantially increase your chances of having your music featured across media:
The first important step is to thoroughly research suitable productions, projects, and businesses that are most suited to your specific music style, instrumentals, lyrics, and overall vibe. Identify relevant TV shows, films, commercial companies, video game franchises, and other entities to which you can directly pitch your tunes for syncs. Examine their publicly available past music and composer choices to help guide and target your outreach efforts. Consistently reading industry blogs, expanding your professional network, and utilizing sync licensing opportunity databases such as Taxi can also help you discover the latest media opportunities looking for new music like yours. Do your homework, and strategically target your personalized submissions.
With many high-level music editors, supervisors, and directors receiving dozens upon dozens of cold email submissions every day, you must create pitches that are highly specific, engaging, and customized. Begin by simply introducing yourself, outlining your music style, mentioning any notable experience or previous placements (if any), and clearly communicating why your music would effortlessly match the feel, scene, or theme of their specific project based on the information you've gathered. Importantly, provide an MP3 sample with a brief summary of the track's characteristics, instrumentation, pace, and licensing information. If appropriate, follow up politely to encourage attention and stay top of mind. Compared to large template blasts, these personalized emails and questions have significantly higher probabilities of receiving a positive response.
Providing music supervisors and editors with easily editable stem tracks (separated vocal, instrumental, bass, etc.) while being flexible with commercial licensing fees and conditions makes you immensely more sync-friendlier. Music directors frequently need to make edits and modifications to songs to ensure that they fit the duration, tempo, and atmosphere of the scenes. Having easily available stem tracks allows for easy editing without sacrificing recording quality. Keep an open mind about negotiating prices if it eventually helps drive a deal. Find a good win-win balance between your targeted prices and the great exposure that high-profile placements offer.
Expanding your professional network, both online and in person, can significantly increase your chances of landing syncs directly or via insider referrals. Consider attending industry events such as composer conferences, music supervisor panels at film festivals, and TV awards shows. Use social media to make strategic connections with composers, supervisors, and editors. By emphasizing your related interests, you can politely establish honest conversations that lead to networking opportunities. As you build even casual relationships with key sync players, more opportunities may surface through word-of-mouth recommendations. Remember, a strong network leads to more deals.
To properly collect your own sync licensing performance royalties, register all of your music with a respected performing rights organization (PRO), such as ASCAP, BMI, or SESAC. A PRO will formally license your works for use, collaboratively monitor where your music is publicly performed across all media, and appropriately pay you your licensing costs. PRO registration streamlines the full sync licensing workflow for all media production organizations. It also allows you to quickly trace specific usage and locations of your music over time, which is especially useful around tax season!
Since certain syncs demand simply instrumental tracks, make sure to include vocal-driven and stripped-down instrumental edit options for your tunes. Again, allow maximal freedom and choice in the exact types of final recordings that are readily available depending on common license requirements. Furthermore, where possible, consider adapting your tracks to distinct genres that evoke diverse emotions and tempos. The more professional edits you offer, the better your chances of landing desirable positions.
By performing extensive production research, actively networking within your music community, and effectively planning the most sync-friendly instrumental stems and licensing terms possible, you can significantly increase your chances of having your music featured in TV, film, advertising, and other media. While it is an ambitious objective that will require persistence and patience, those valuable placements may be within reach if the appropriate strategy is implemented.
It's reasonable for an independent singer, songwriter, or composer to feel overwhelmed while dealing with publishing deals, license agreements, and sync placements on their own. However, by choosing Freecords as your full-service independent music distribution partner, you receive access to an experienced team that is dedicated to accelerating your career growth and prospects at every stage.
Freecords empowers artists in a unique way by enabling entirely free distribution to all major streaming platforms while retaining full ownership of their rights and income. Our broad industry connections and relationships with music supervisors can help you proactively pitch your tracks for high-value syncs, negotiate fair licensing deals on your behalf, and resolve any publishing issues, allowing you as the artist to focus solely on creating amazing music.
Ready to unlock more global exposure, lucrative sync placements, publishing deals, and long-term independent success? Join Freecords’ rising community of empowered artists today to propel your music career to new heights completely free. The opportunities are truly endless with Freecords as your connector, ally, and champion.