How to sell sample packs (sounds, loops, kits, etc.) (2024)
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Thinking about entering the world of selling digital products like sample packs, drum kits, loops, or sound effects? In today’s music industry, talent alone isn’t always enough to stand out. As of 2024, success requires strategic positioning and effective marketing.
But don’t worry, we’re here to help. In this blog post, we’ll guide you through selling sample packs online and share insider tips on how to set yourself apart.
From crafting professional sample packs to leveraging Sellfy’s features like upselling, email marketing, PWYW pricing, print-on-demand merch (to expand your offerings), and limited downloads, we’ll show you how to turn your passion into profit. So, let’s get started!
How to sell sample packs online
Ready to elevate your music production and turn it into a profitable venture by selling sample packs?
Here’s a quick guide to get you started:
- Craft your sample pack. Create high-quality samples, ensuring they’re properly formatted and categorized for ease of use.
- Provide comprehensive documentation. Include detailed usage instructions, licensing terms, and usage rights to build trust with your customers.
- Leverage Sellfy’s platform. Customize your online store on Sellfy to reflect your brand and streamline the selling process.
- Upload your sample packs. Showcase your polished sample packs on your Sellfy store with captivating descriptions and visuals.
- Amplify your reach through social media platforms. Use platforms like SoundCloud, YouTube, and Instagram to showcase demos, engage with your audience, and drive traffic to your Sellfy store.
Each step is crucial in paving the way for your success in sample pack sales. Let’s dive deeper into each phase and unlock your potential.
1. Create your sample packs
It’s not my place to teach anyone how to create sound samples, presets, or any type of music production for that matter.
But, according to musicians and music producers that are successfully selling music products on Sellfy, there are a few things that you could at least consider including in your sample packs:
- Make sure that your samples are recorded and processed to a high standard with little to no noise or artifacts throughout.
- It makes sense to include a wider variety of samples or presets within one pack to appeal to a bigger audience. For example, you could offer loop packs and one-shot samples to maximize versatility.
- Including information about the key and tempo of each sample can be very helpful for buyers looking for specific sounds.
- Provide clear instructions and explanations on how to use the samples.
- Create audio demos to give potential buyers a clear idea of what it can be used for.
2. Open a Sellfy store
Contrary to popular opinion, marketplaces like Airbit, Splice, and Soundee were not created to help you generate sales. All they do is provide you with essential tools to list your packs for sale.
Everything else is on you.
But what if I told you that there’s a platform that can help you not only launch but also grow your sample pack business?
Sellfy is an excellent solution for everyone who wants to sell sample packs online but doesn’t like complicated setups.
Signing up for Selfy is easy and only takes a few minutes — all you need is a valid email address.
3. Customize your sample store
If you want to create a professional-looking and unique store redesign, then you’ll find Sellfy’s store editor a perfect tool. You are free to customize everything—from text color to the shape of the Buy now buttons. You can also choose the layout style of your store page, the number of products per page, etc.
But if you’re looking for an easier way to build a perfect-looking platform, you won’t even have to lift a finger — just choose one of Sellfy’s pre-designed store themes.
4. Upload audio products
Once your store is up and running, you’re ready to upload your sample pack (or any other type of product). Just go to the Products section of Sellfy’s Dashboard, choose Digital products, and click on Add new product.
Upload your beats, drum kits, samples, music production lessons, or whatever you want to sell. Add product images and all necessary info in the Product Description section, and hit Save product.
5. Generate traffic to your store
To help you generate traffic and bring in new customers, Sellfy offers a great host of built-in marketing features to help you sell more. For example:
- Discounts & coupon codes—for running sales and creating compelling offers.
- The upselling feature for offering related products as soon as your customer adds something to the cart.
- Email marketing feature for sending custom emails with links, coupon codes, product announcements, and updates to your audience.
- The cart abandonment feature allows you to retain customers with special offers.
- Pay-what-you-want (PWYW) pricing gives customers the power to decide how much they’ll pay for your beats.
- Freebies for boosting website traffic and growing your email list.
How to make sample packs
Without a doubt, sample production is a creative process. And while each of you may have a unique way of making the job done, sample pack creation comes with its own set of universally accepted techniques.
1. Don’t create sample packs, create your “sound”
Sure, as a music artist, you must understand that sample packs are the most obvious choice when you think of a product to sell online. It’s one of your biggest assets — you create them once, then sell them over and over again.
“Nowadays electronic music producers are selling their samples, they’re selling their loops, sound effects — any sound kit that they create and that they want to share with the world. This is an opportunity for you to make money,” notes music producer DECAP.
So, instead of focusing on creating music sample packs, try creating a unique “sound” by combining various types of music content in your packs:
- Sound effects
- Loops (drum, bass, melody, etc.)
- One-shots
- Synth presets and plugins
- Project plans and files
- Tutorials and guides
2. Organize your samples
It’s crucial to make sure that your sample pack is properly organized and that all files have logical names. This will help your customers quickly get a grip on your sample pack contents and find everything they need.
Here are some tips on how to organize your sample pack:
- Start by creating some empty folders to organize the project. You can sort by native instruments, BPM, file type, and more.
- Make sure that all sound file names show the necessary information like BPM, pitch/key, tempo, processing stage, etc.
- Avoid using similar names to minimize any confusion.
Here’s an example of a descriptive name for a sample:
120BPM_AcousticGuitar_C_Strumming Pattern_Ver1
3. Choose the right file format for your samples
Offering a variety of file formats can help you make your sample packs accessible to a bigger audience, no matter the software they’re using.
Here’s a short list of the most common sample formats that are sold online:
- You can’t go wrong with WAV as it’s the most popular, lossless audio file format that works well with most music software.
- AIFF is another high-quality, lossless format that’s widely supported by music software.
- MP3 is rarely used for samples as it’s a more compressed format. Though some music producers still use it for sample packs that are meant to be downloaded and used quickly.
- REX2 is a file format specifically designed for loops and samples. Plus, it’s widely supported by music software.
4. Create the audio preview (demo track)
Audio previews are sometimes the only way for your audience to hear what your sample magic is all about. So once you’re done putting your pack together, it’s time to get out there and make some noise with an audio demo.
Here are a few helpful tips to get you going:
- Start by picking the best samples or presets from your pack.
- You can then easily arrange them in a short demo track using music software like FL Studio or Ableton Live. It’s important to note that the more time and effort you invest into mixing & mastering, the more polished result you’ll get in the end.
- Finally, upload the demo to your social media, and streaming platforms like SoundCloud or YouTube to draw more attention from potential customers.
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5. Create a cover image for your pack
Cover art for a sample pack is like a cherry on top of a cake.
While it’s important to have quality, high-resolution artwork for your sample pack, it’s not a difficult task to design your own image using the basics of software editors. The best program for it would be Adobe Photoshop, but you can also use free alternatives — for example, Canva.
You could also look for inspiration and high-resolution background images on royalty-free sites like Unsplash.
6. Write a EULA
What’s EULA and why do you need one?
EULA stands for an End-user license agreement. While its primary purpose is to grant users a license to use an application or software, it’s often used for digital products like sample packs too.
Simply speaking, EULA gives your customers the right (a license) to use your sound products, but not sell or transfer them to a third party.
Think of it like a rental. A tenant does not own the house, nor can they sell it to someone else. However, they have the right to live in it. Legal ownership remains with the landlord.
There are different ways to create an end-user license agreement:
- Using a generator like TermsFeed or Termly
- Using a downloadable template
- Writing your own or consulting a legal expert
What are the key features of successful sample packs?
There’s a reason why people say:
“Learn from the best.”
This led us to the idea that we can actually talk to a bunch of musicians and producers who are successfully selling their products on Sellfy and ask them to share some effective marketing tips.
Don’t have a client base yet? Try giving out freebies!
UK-based music producer Jack Crconin launched his career by starting a YouTube channel and selling his custom drum kits on Sellfy. Now he has over 61K subscribers on his channel and continues selling sound kits on his online store. He claims that has never actually had to pay for advertising thanks to posting positive reviews of his products and user-generated content.
When we asked him what advice he could give to other creators who are looking to build a similar business, here’s what he said:
“Don’t be scared to post stuff for free. That’s the easiest way to build up email lists. If you have an idea of what you want to do and you know where to send it, you’ll easily gather hundreds of emails. Personally, I’ve gained thousands of emails from just posting free stuff over the years.”
From there, you can start growing your business and offer products that customers happily pay money for and increase your revenue.
Don’t underestimate the power of the cover art for your sample packs
Jack also stresses the importance of having high-quality cover art for your digital products:
“Get some good cover art. If you’re not good at graphic design, you should find a designer because the first thing people will see is either a picture or a video. If it looks amateur, then you’re going to lose clients straight away. So, don’t skip out on the cover art of whatever it is you’re selling.“
Tease new products to your audience
Charlie Göcke is a talented music producer and sound pack designer from Germany. He is best known for creating drum kits, samples, one-shot kits, and other sounds for producers worldwide. He’s also successfully selling digital products on his Sellfy store to 9K+ followers on Instagram and 18.7K+ subscribers on YouTube.
Here’s what he said when we asked him about his social media marketing tactics:
“Whenever I launch something new, I promote it by posting a teaser trailer on Instagram. That’s how I keep things interesting. I always try to turn it into a whole new experience for people. For example, if I were to launch a sample library, I wouldn’t just tell everyone, “Okay, here are 10 new samples that you can use.” Instead, I would try to make it more interesting by creating an artistic trailer with an intro and outro, or some interludes.”
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Don’t overcomplicate things
Denis Berger (best known as PVLACE) got signed to 808 Mafia, one of the biggest Hip-Hop production groups in the USA. His credits include Wiz Khalifa, Ty Dolla $ign, Young Thug, and more.
Here’s what he has to say about promoting his products:
“I use two simple marketing strategies when I launch a new product: pre-ordering and email marketing. Pre-ordering helps prevent pirating because no one has the product before it’s released. In the first week, I get around 150 pre-orders. The other is email marketing which I do from my Sellfy store. Email marketing is amazing, everything is automated. I use it to promote every new product.”
FAQs: selling music samples
Can I sell samples online?
Absolutely! Selling sample packs online will always be a profitable business as it costs almost nothing to get started. All you need is an audience and an easy-to-use eCommerce store like Sellfy. The best part about having a Sellfy store is that it comes with built-in marketing tools to help you promote your sample packs.
What are the best platforms to sell sample packs?
You can upload your sample packs to marketplaces like AirBit, Splice, or Soundee. However, we recommend selling through your own website or an online platform like Sellfy so that you can have full control over your business (marketplaces tend to be oversaturated and very competitive). With Sellfy, you can even create a sample pack subscription service.
How much money can you make selling sample packs?
It depends on how you decide to sell your sample packs and presets. If you choose to upload it to a digital marketplace such as Splice Sounds, then you’ll only be paid a royalty for each sale. If you decide to sell your pack independently, you can name your price and keep 100% of the profit.
How do you market a sample pack?
The key to selling more sample packs is to bring more traffic to your sample store. To do that it’s important to be active on social media and streaming platforms. For example, you can Include direct Buy Now links on SoundCloud, share vocal audio previews of your sample on a social media platform like YouTube, and share freebies to generate social media leads and grow your audience.
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