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And I quote : " Any label that cannot produce $300.00 in GROSS sales each quarter will be put on a probationary status. If the label is unable to hit the $600.00 mark by the second quarter then that label will be cut from the Beatport system [...] "

I'm guessing that it is 300 USD ?

I want to have your thoughts on this.

How do you think this will affect the dubstep labels currently on beatport ?

Wow, that's kinda sad sounds like there might be some really good labels booted from the system, on the other hand maybe it will be good to filter some of the junk.

But in all honesty that means at 1.99 per track the label only really needs to sell 37 per month.


Hopefully the labels will put out more, high quality tracks per month to meet the quota.

their policies are really reasonable, if a label can't meet their minimums it probably isn't doing it's share on the marketing front.
Beatport has multiple 'tiers' of labels the top ones sell over 500 downloads of a new release in the first week it's released.
You'll probably notice though that the overall Top 100 is often mostly House, Electro-House, Techno, Trance and then maybe two or three 'Breaks' or Electronica tracks, the tracks that are in the top 50 or so of each genre generally tend to be moving decent numbers.
They also recommend coming on only once you have a 15 title catalog, which helps maintain sales if you go through a slow release phase.
I think it's great that labels can be more involved in their own sales management and work in marketing directly to their sales sources, but that's not just regarding Beatport and more a general statement about the whole digital industry.

BTW I've bought some of the Intoccabile tunes they're dope

there will be/are other places to sell music online. good perhaps to take some of the attention away from beatport who right now sets the agenda for all electronic music online

There should be the same quality control standards for digital releases as vinyl so I think it's a good thing and shows beatport in quite a positive light in my opinion as it looks like they care about the quality of the content

beatport should base these minimum quarterly quotas on the number of sales per each genre of electronic music. Due to the fact that each style has different popularity. don't cut a whole genre of music, but, do cut out the slacker labels who aren't giving it there all!"

Make a minumum number of sales for each genre of electronic music, thats the only way I see this making sense.

This isn't new...All labels on Beatport have been abiding by this for a year now...

They don't like to waste bandwidth. I don't blame them!


They have a much more involved label sign up process than any other site, as well. Paper contracts, tax forms, etc. Its not worth their time to process the info for a bunch of labels that just aren't going to make enough money to justify them spending their man hours processing everything. The have probably cut their operating costs by 1/2 by just weeding out the smaller labels.

Fi-FuLL wrote:beatport should base these minimum quarterly quotas on the number of sales per each genre of electronic music. Due to the fact that each style has different popularity. don't cut a whole genre of music, but, do cut out the slacker labels who aren't giving it there all!"

Make a minumum number of sales for each genre of electronic music, thats the only way I see this making sense.

Didn't think of that, judging it on ratios of sales of a genre is a much better idea

nedklic wrote:

Fi-FuLL wrote:beatport should base these minimum quarterly quotas on the number of sales per each genre of electronic music. Due to the fact that each style has different popularity. don't cut a whole genre of music, but, do cut out the slacker labels who aren't giving it there all!"

Make a minumum number of sales for each genre of electronic music, thats the only way I see this making sense.

Didn't think of that, judging it on ratios of sales of a genre is a much better idea

As a fan of music, and knowing about the general relative popularity of different styles, I can understand where you're coming from. But from a business perspective I don't think they have any motivation to set their rules that way.

Genres are somewhat subjective anyway.
What about "dubstep" that mostly sounds like techno? Or the huge
amount of tunes that don't fit into any specific genre? In some cases it would just end up with labels lobbying to be included into more lax genres, which would be a mess.

nedklic wrote:There should be the same quality control standards for digital releases as vinyl so I think it's a good thing

Completely unrelated to the Beatport discussion, I absolutely agree with this.

You need a reputation for quality more than you need releases, regardless of the format.

stupid double post. duh me.

nedklic wrote:There should be the same quality control standards for digital releases as vinyl so I think it's a good thing and shows beatport in quite a positive light in my opinion as it looks like they care about the quality of the content

i have to add that sales are not necessarily an indicator of quality.

in fact, in the music world that equation is usually fairly backwards. that's not to say that quality stuff doesn't sell, but usually the more risky and more adventurous/interesting the music, the less chance of massive sales.

Right... so labels just starting out would be cut immediately, even if you have quality music. Or more like "unless you pay a huge advance for a shit tune by a known quantity"

so much for taking risks. welcome to your pre-chewed and tasteless future.

Personally, I don't buy much from beatport, so it really doesn't matter to me.

I track down stuff that's good, regardless of where it is. I think people
who are open to more niche/less popular music will do the same.

wrecked wrote:Personally, I don't buy much from beatport, so it really doesn't matter to me.

I track down stuff that's good, regardless of where it is. I think people
who are open to more niche/less popular music will do the same.

niche/less popular doesn't automatically make something good...

freqone wrote:

wrecked wrote:Personally, I don't buy much from beatport, so it really doesn't matter to me.

I track down stuff that's good, regardless of where it is. I think people
who are open to more niche/less popular music will do the same.

niche/less popular doesn't automatically make something good...

That's true, but what implication are you pointing out?

I just mean I'll look elsewhere for stuff that doesn't make the cut on Beatport, and I don't think them having a policy like that is really all that bad. People who are into niche styles already know Beatport doesn't go very deep.

- cutups

Surface_Tension wrote:Right... so labels just starting out would be cut immediately, even if you have quality music. Or more like "unless you pay a huge advance for a shit tune by a known quantity"

They don't want new labels. Most of them don't end up making the grade.


Its a private company, and there are hundreds of other sites to buy/sell your music on. I dont see how any label could complain, if they want to be on the highest grossing electronic sales site, they should be a high-grossing label, bottom line.

I don't think putting out releases with 10 tracks on them by 10 different artists is a really good model for building up the artists, so much as the label. I'd rather have 5 good releases by 5 good artists, than 1 good release by 5 good artists. Call me crazy, but as long as I've been buying music that has been the model.

Your mileage obviously will vary.

I do find it odd that any time I mention private enterprise, profit, markets, or even the fact that money is made or lost in this business, I get reemed to no end, but it's apparently fair game here.

Profitable does not a good album make. All kinds of good stuff doesn't sell well. Labels that press up vinyl will go to that extra expense in the hopes that their digital sales may help cover the financial losses, and take away a large chunk of those digital sales from a site that gets the traffic from other genres(which are future fans unless you put out non-accessible, non-genre bending shit that no techno, dnb or house fan would like).

You are right, they are a private site, I am a consumer. Consider this my free market response then. Fuck that. No doubt, Shift probably does ok, you do what works for you and I wouldn't ever hate on that or talk shit on your model. It is obviously what they are looking for. We don't have 15 released tunes... It will take us probably 5 vinyl releases to get to that point, and if we weren't planning some 2x12's or something, it would be even longer... so no digital support for vinyl producing labels for 15 released tunes...

I have a hard time buying into the idea that we should have to release a shitload of various artist compilations just to make ends meet. I don't hear 10 good tunes in a month span usually. How in the hell would I then hear 10 good release quality tunes in a quarter? How would I be doing anything for the quality of digital, if the required model is form over function?

lukki wrote:Its a private company, and there are hundreds of other sites to buy/sell your music on. I dont see how any label could complain, if they want to be on the highest grossing electronic sales site, they should be a high-grossing label, bottom line.

Well said. Would this mean producers/labels are encouraged to shorten the time between finishing a tune and releasing it? (irrespective of whether its a good thing or not)