Bandcamp is now limiting the number of free downloads available:
Starting today, new accounts come with 200 free downloads, and all existing accounts are granted 500. (You can of course still stream and sell an unlimited amount of music using Bandcamp.) Each time a fan downloads a track or album for free, it counts as 1 against your balance (an album, regardless of how many tracks it contains, still only counts as 1 download). You can buy more downloads for a small fee from your Tools page. The pricing is the same as for download codes:
Log in free album. All-time best selling free album. Poke EP (Free Download) by Simon Mills. Buy now you own this wishlist in wishlist.
300 downloads for $9 USD (3¢ each)
1000 downloads for $20 USD (2¢ each)
5000 downloads for $75 USD (1.5¢ each)
Requiring Code To Download Free Album Bandcamp Free
200 free downloads is probably plenty for most very small bands. But it can run out quickly.
I think this is a service worth paying for. Bandcamp requires visitors to enter an email address in order to receive a download link. This is very useful for building up a large email list which can in turn be used to promote other releases in the future. Free music acts as promotion to gain more fans, and having email addresses is the retention of those fans.
That being said, I don't get why they went with a prepaid credit system. It seems like it'd make more sense to hook up a Bandcamp account to a credit card, and then just charge per download and bill monthly. You could set daily and monthly spending limits. And then you could provide all sorts of great charts and statistics to show usage and cost over time and how it correlates to buzz and sales and all that. I am pretty sure people would err on setting their limits too high at first. Buying a prepaid bundle of credits seems clunky in this day and age.
Streaming is still free.
Best Free Bandcamp Albums
If this development bothers you, you can use bandcamp to stream, use archive.org for downloads, and paypal to sell merch. The crucial missing link is of course, grabbing those email addresses on every free download.
Reward your Fans - with Digital Download Codes!
Building up your fan base plays a huge role in a musicians marketing strategy. Your fans are the ones that are there for you at your shows, following you online, and digging your music. So why not give them a little something back? Download codes is a great feature available on the Pro plan that allows you to do just that! It is set up so that you can give a fan a unique download code for a free album or track.
Watch this video tutorial to see how easy it is to generate download codes for your music:
If you print the promo codes onto cards or stickers, you can sell those or give them out at your show. If you are selling t-shirts, why not add a free digital download as an added bonus? When your fan goes to your download url (http://yourwebsite.com/dl), they will enter the code and receive their music. The code will remain active for 48 hours after the first time it is entered.
You can track how many of your codes have been redeemed by clicking on any Album feature, then choosing the Transaction History tab.
Another way to use these codes: you can also send out tracks to your mailing list using this feature! Just click on the Mailing list tab, compose your message, and choose the track you would like to attach.
Download From Bandcamp
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