| CD Baby DIY Musician Podcast |
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| Sonic bids in hot water, be wary of them |
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Be wary about using sonicbids right now !
There is an ongoing investigation, to be taken to the FTC, regarding one of their "drop-box" scams. (One among many scams and major complaints that members have been blogging about and reporting to the BBB, FTC, and so forth).
They have dozens of "dead" drop boxes, so that customers submit to promoters who have pulled their opportunity down from the website, YET sonicbids leaves these attractive offers open and available for c.c. payments.
Sonicbids and CEO Panos Panay continue this scam unabated, as well as allowing many unproven "promoters" to operate scams DIRECTLY on their website. Sonicbids only requirement for a promoter to operate on their site regardless of their credentials, is $$$$.
Even their ballyhooed NACA deal is very risky - one needs to put up close to $1,000 dollars in total fees just to have a chance at one of those gigs. And worse, there recent NXNE promotion bilked artists who unwittingly submitted to this event well beyond its closing date - without being notified as such, and since then dozens of artists have filed for refunds so far not forthcoming.
Sonicbids is so ashamed and afraid of all these potentially very damaging complaints getting out of the bag they no longer allow the pubic to view their forums, and also now have swept these posts that have "outed" them (as well as any and all critical posts from customers dealing with numerous un-responsive "promoters") well beneath a newly minted "Lounge" that only allows “raw-raw” blogging.
Their are countless posts on this now hidden forum of members submitting money to fake "promoters".
Their support staff has made minimal effort to even attempt to refund customers who have been cheated.
Its unfathomable that they have gotten away with it.
Sonicbids will be lawyer-ing up soon, wait for it.
If you use sonicbids, you are wasting your money, as there are plenty of free EPK sites now, and their drop box "opportunities" are an absolute lottery and shark fest of scrupulous scammers on the take. CAVEAT EMPTOR !
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i agree with this warning about sonicbids. i've always thought they were a little scammy. for example, i could announce that i was going to throw a festival and was accepting submissions from bands. each band has to pay 5.00 or 20.00 for a CHANCE to be considered - not actually play in the festival. so, let's say 100 bands send in 20.00 each. i pick 3 bands, throw a party in a vacant lot, play to nobody or whatever, and then i keep the rest of the money.
if i had a thousand bands who each submitted 20.00 - you see my point? and all you need to do is submit your idea to sonicbids and pay some cash.
it's pretty much the lowest of the low who feed off of other people's dreams.
be warned.....
www.cdbaby.com/billwest
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Yeah i ran into some problems..and they refunded my money ...just make some noise...JM
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You guys have to do your own research on submissions. I know for a fact that SB DOES look at stuff before they put it up on the website and take money for submissions, but they can't be held responsible for an event which doesn't happen.
Who is doing this investigation? An attorney? A police department? Some guy who feels he was screwed? Post more details.
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We submitted 4 entries, through Sonicbids) to the American Songwriter Lyric Contest to qualify for the free subscription (great offer by the way!)
BUT
We did not initially qualify as American Songwriter said they had not had the entries but when they checked with Sonicbids they then started our new subscription. That part was great but again
I was left feeling that our lyrics had not been judged - and we have been on the winners page in the past
Ah well - sad about Sonicbids but history repeats itself with sharks in the music biz.
Thanks everyone for the warning and comments
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whatever...I signed up a while back, man did it feel like an
exploitfest.
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Hey, anyone know of the best way to check to see if your music was submited by CD baby to Itunes?
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Hey all,
I'm the Artist Relations Manager over at Sonicbids and wanted to
chime in here real quick with a few clarifications.
To start with, there is no FTC investigation into Sonicbids.
With new promoters, our Business Development team reviews
event and licensing contracts between the promoters and the
festivals and companies they represent before they're allowed to
open a drop box. It is the standard operating procedure for our
Promoter Relations team to close drop boxes when promoters
are finished taking submissions. We will also shut down drop
boxes if a promoter stops reviewing submissions and we are not
able to reach them about it. In short, if a promoter is not doing
their job we will proactively shut down their listing. If an artist
encounters any difficulty with a promoter, we work closely with
the artist to resolve the situation. If you have a dropbox URL
where it appears something other than this is happening, please
share it with us. Or if you’d like greater detail on our promoter
policies, check out the “Submission Questions” section of our
support center. (A link to the support center and contact info
follows at the end.)
The majority of NACA members are colleges looking to book
entertainment or booking agents looking for gigs for their
artists. Sonicbids' partnership with NACA provides NACA
members with Sonicbids accounts and some special tools
designed to facilitate NACA's unique block booking process.
Colleges looking for music can set up drop boxes which NACA
members can submit to for free and non-NACA members can
submit to for a small fee (around $5)—and that’s the extent of
fees for submission. The $1,000 referred to in the blog post is
the high end of NACA membership fees, which vary greatly and
actually start at around $340. Again, this is not a fee for being
considered, it’s a fee for joining NACA. Sonicbids does not set
that fee, and we get no portion of it. As a NACA member, you
get access to the NACA network of college bookers and you get
a trade booth at the conference, where bookers can come find
you to book you. What we think makes the NACA deal so
potentially great for artists is that while the initial outlay of cash
might be higher than in some other situations, it’s not unusual
for artists at the conference to walk away with as much as
$100,000 in cumulative offers. As with every other gig listing on
Sonicbids, it’s up to every artist to decide whether the NACA
deal makes financial and professional sense for them.
Submission deadlines are always set by the promoter of the gig,
and will only be extended at the promoter's request. With NXNE,
the promoter had asked us to extend their submission deadline
on NXNE’s gig listing page on Sonicbids. The promoter did not
post the extended deadline on NXNE’s main website, which may
have caused the confusion.
Lastly, while I think "caveat emptor" is a bit strong, we always
tell artists to pay attention to what they are submitting to. If an
artist submits to random opportunities, they won’t be using
Sonicbids the way it’s intended. Artists who strategically target
their submissions and maintain a well-tailored EPK are making
good use of the service.
In a lottery, winners happen randomly. There is nothing random
about having fitting music, presenting it effectively to the right
opportunity and being selected to perform.
If anyone has questions about Sonicbids, here is the link to our
FAQs and the contact info for our support team:
http://www.sonicbids.com/support . Please reach out and let us
know how we can help.
Rock on,
Lou
=====
Artist Relations Manager
Sonicbids.com
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Sorry, while adding our new spam filter (you'll see below, where you have to
type in the words to verify you're a person and not a "bot"), Lou's post was
deleted.
I've re-added it and deleted and re-added my post so it will show up below
Lou's, as it was intended to and originally did.
Rad, feel free to re-post yours if you feel the need, my apologies that it was
deleted --- I didn't see that if I erased my original post yours would be
deleted too.
___________________________________________
What Lou has said is spot on.
Sonicbids is one of CD Baby's most trusted partners, and we certainly do
our research before making a deal because we want only the best for the
200,000 + artists we work with.
We know that Sonicbids does everything that they can for artists too,
creating a great service for independent musicians.
I'll be the first to tell you to do your research before joining ANY company,
so please always do that and take care of your career as an indie musician,
finding companies that are a *great* fit for how *you* work.
You have to look for the best gig for you on Sonicbids, and as Lou said, if
you ever realize a problem, just let their service team know and they'll
certainly be right on it.
Feel free to e-mail me as well if you have anything you want to discuss
about CD Baby's relationship with Sonicbids: lindsey [at] cdbaby [dot] com.
- Lindsey
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SONICBIDS is the biggest SCAM in the world. I tried it, wasted
allot of money and quit. I felt I got scammed. Now I wont pay to
enter anything and I wont Pay to Play, I wont sell tickets, but Ill
keep writing my songs and playing out. If ARTIST keep paying to
enter festivals/gigs than ART will be worth nothing, its bad
enough I give my music away for FREE. I have allot of fans that
have taken a liking to my music in the FREE WORLD such as
MYSPACE and FACEBOOK. I hope SONICBIDS burns in hell. Thank
god for companies like CD Baby.
Peace,
http://www.brandonricemusic.com
http://www.myspace.com/ricemusic
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I've felt from the beginning... that Sonic Bids, though a great idea maybe for Panos to make some great money. IT was another bad link in a already weakened chain for us working musicians. Heck...we already have to pay for years of music lessons, raising gas prices, stage clothes, equipment and equipment upkeep. Car maintenance to get to the gigs, be treated like cattle everytime you fly to a gig. Stay in crummy motels when the gigs are low paying. Deal with corrupt record companies to try and get your royalties. How many rehearsal room hours has your band for? Sonic Bids was another Pay to Play idea that has the clothes of a now a maybe "Pay to maybe Not Play" if there is any funny biz going on with your package maybe not being submitted or if there is any funny stuff going on. Songwriters, bands and players are already taking it in the shorts with their incomes with the invention of Napster and that technology with free digital downloads on certain websites.. I've heard of a couple of instances with Sonic Bids where a fee was paid and the artist's submission was not used because there was a quota on how many the client would allow. Although Sonic Bids didnt' post this on their submission ad and the fee was not re-imbursed to the artist. Imagine how often that happens...times how many fees paid? I contacted a big local university in Los Angeles a while back about their season concerts program to submit my band's package. This was the first time I had run across Sonic Bids and the young lady explained to me who was running the school's booking department, she explained to me the deal w/ Sonic Bids for the first time. Sonic Bids has just made it harder for bands...they've driven up our operating costs before we even get any gigs... they've put themselves in the middle of our biz and have made it harder to make a living. I have not personally used them and for now I still refuse to bend to them. I dont' believe we should support them and I've talked to several festival bookers who agree out there. We all have to take a stand on them. That...along with the Mitt Romney Clear Channel buying up all the radio stations and controlling the airwaves... in order to make it safer for republican right wing brain washing information to be broadcasted out there. It's just getting harder out there.
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Airplay direct is the only company that is truly helping the indie artist with free digital press kits. Our band swears by them. Sonic bids has never gotten my money. Airplay is free dude!!
Kacy
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Hmm...all I can add here is my personal experience. Sonic Bids has really only worked for me in the case where I actually already have a standing relationship with a festival or gig opportunity that I'm submitting to..and they're using Sonic Bids to go through submissions...other than that it feels like some huge cattle call and am often very doubtful that my material is actually listened to - and that some promoters are using the submission fees as income...so I only use it now for submissions where I already have a connection..not for blind submissions - like the one armed gambling bandit.
Beyond this; I've been using Air Play Direct - they offer a Digital Press Kit Service that's geared towards radio but is useful for any digital press kit submission situation and it's free. I was recently picked up by a radio station that was using Sonic Bids but I wouldn't submit that way - I submitted with Air Play Direct.
Cheers,
Manda
www.mandamusic.net
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airplaydirect has a free sign up and you can send epks and broadcast quality tracks for free. Radio stations come to airplay direct looking for music.Its a good deal and very useful. Take a look at my site http://www.airplaydirect.com/RichyKicklighter
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Thanks for the suggestion on Airplay Direct. I hope that everyone
understands that Sonic Bids is just bad business and that if you
keep using them and supporting them then they will not go away.
Obviously if you read this far down the post then your probably
already pissed at Sonic Bids or you work for sonic bids and are
trying to do damage control. If you are the later, then you can go
suck a bag of dicks!
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Sorry, no letter from a supposed artist relations manager at Sonic
Bids changes the fact that they are a scam operation. It's Pay-to-
Play on a massive scale, and they should be ashamed of themselves
for taking advantage of indie artists. I adore CDBaby, and have
always wondered why they endorse these guys. The sooner SBids
go under, the better for all of us.
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