Hey, I haven't done anything like this, joint venture with other bands and artist on this level. I am willing to gave it a go and learn from the experience at hand. I believe this particular joint venture helps bands and artist to play gigs and shows they would never have the opportunity and maybe asked back. Keep me posted with this awesome idea.

So the idea is to have two musicians or bands, that each understand internet marketing and have a mailing list and an affiliate program setup to promote their products. Then they mail each others list and earn income by selling the other band's music? Is that how it works? Ideally this would coincide with an actual show or even a tour together.

The other idea I had regarding affiliate software is to make the band members affiliates with a high commission rate (like 75%) to reward the band member that does the most marketing and conversions on behalf of the band. It could be short term, like just for the launch of a new album or something like that, what do you guys think?

What affiliate programs are people using? I know John mentioned One Shopping Cart, and Ejunkie seems pretty newbie-friendly (at least in terms of start-up cost - what else is are you guys using/considering?

I think the other advantage of clickbank or ejunky is that there is a level of credibility that makes potential affiliates comfortable.  There was a product that I was researching recently and I found an affiliate vendor but when I went to their affiliate program the interface was really shoddy and was behaving strangely.  So of course I bailed.  Clickbank is Clickbank.  Everybody has heard of it and it works well.

Here's a music related affiliate idea I've had kicking around.  The obvious is to hook up with other bands and cross promote CD's etc to their lists.  A variation that I think could really work well - especially across genres - is for the two musicians/bands who working together to record a cover of one of each other's songs.  Then they can go to their list and say "check out our cover of a cool song by <band name>.  They are great, you should check out their CD <preview page w/affiliate link>"  or  "Our friends <band name> covered our song <song name> and they did a great job! They have a new CD and you should check it out. <preview page w/affiliate link>"  

In addition to adding value to the partnership, it seems like it would really lend itself to youtube, and other sharing services where people would naturally click through to find out what the other band was all about.

The reason I think this could work across genres is because a) most people like a variety of musical styles and b) a lot of people dig things like country versions of punk songs, or lounge versions of metal songs etc.  I've even got a CD by Luther Right and the Wrongs called "Rebuilding The Wall" that is a bluegrass version of Pink Floyd's The Wall.

Of course the key to making that work would be finding partnerships where the parties really dig each other's music, and so it's fun.  If it works it could lead to other collaborations and kind of mutually snowball.  

Just thinking outloud, there are a lot of directions something like this could go with the right partners.

Daniel

Pretty interesting idea Daniel! There is a band in my area that did a cover of one of my songs a while back, and it went over very well. My version had a male voice for the lead vocal, they had a female, I used a synthesized pan flute for the hook, they used a cello. My main instrumentation was mainly acoustic guitar and bass, they used acoustic guitar, accordian,  violin and cello. It was really cool do hear the same song done with such opposites. They only did it live and never recorded it (that I know of!!) The only strange thing was when their guitar player tried to tell me how to play the guitar part..... I just looked at him, smiled and said "yeah, I know....."

Your idea of musicians recording and cross promoting each others stuff has some real possibilities. Anybody else find this intersting?

Yeah, I'm thinking live recordings are in reach for most people. On the other hand many of us have some form of makeshift recording ability with GarageBand or Audacity, and I'm sure more than a few of us have some sort of home studio set up. One could get pretty creative without shelling out money for studio time. I think the more oddball it is the better.

Hi John,

I've seen digital access pass before... to me it looks like an interesting alternative to wish list. What's the difference and why would I need both?

Are you saying that in JV partnerships where you're offering a cut of sales, the JV partner becomes an affiliate? Does the software create a back office for them to track their unique link's sales? I feel like we skipped a few steps.

Many thanks!!

Julianna