Music licensing can be a confusing world. As a content creator, you may be wondering how you can license music correctly without it costing an arm and a leg. Enter… Micro Licensing!
Micro Licensing provides licenses for smaller projects such as YouTube videos, vlogs, social media content, social ads, explainer videos and so much more. Keep reading to hear all about how micro licensing works, how it was introduced and how you can get started!
What Is Micro Licensing?
Micro licensing is a music industry term that refers to the size of a license. These types of licenses are for smaller, mostly web based projects with low budgets. This is different to licenses for big companies and projects like Film/TV/Ads/Games. Micro licenses are intended to be low cost and are perfect for indie films, personal projects, YouTube channels and small companies.
The differences between micro licensing and traditional music licensing are:
- Cost – Somebody creating a home movie or YouTube video can’t be expected to pay the same as a company using music for their TV Commercial
- Use – Micro licenses are used for smaller projects and not large commercial projects
- Process – For large licenses, there are teams of people involved (lawyers, labels, the client, publishers etc), extensive negotiations and long timelines
How Did Micro Licensing Come About?
Audiosocket was founded in 2009, and at this time, personal licenses and micro licensing was almost non-existent.
In 2009, music created by actual bands and touring musicians was expensive and hard to license. This was because there was no streamlined process. Audiosocket set out to address this niche and began signing bands and artists to our roster and pre-clearing our music to make licensing simple. We launched MaaS (Music as a Service), an e-commerce platform that made finding and licensing music from indie talent easy. Audiosocket was the first site to offer Personal Licenses online, which today is known as micro-licensing.
This changed the game, and eradicated the need for attorneys or for video creators to have large budgets. Audiosocket paved the way for small businesses, content creators, YouTubers, vloggers etc to be able to license music quickly and easily. Within Audiosocket’s catalog of over 80,000 tracks, creators can license tracks for use in:
- Home videos
- Vlogs
- YouTube or Vimeo videos
- Indie films
- Podcasts
- Wedding videography
… and many more!
How Much Do Micro Licenses Cost?
One size doesn’t fit all, and we get that! Even among smaller projects, budgets can vary. Audiosocket strives to offer pricing to meet the budgets of the creator. We price our licenses based on how the music is being used. For the Artist, this model is great because they receive compensation for the use of their work, regardless of how small. Plus, it preserves the value for them when used in larger projects. The artist is also compensated in a fair way that enables them to develop a sustainable career.
You can access Audiosocket’s music catalog for just $15 a month as a Personal creator. Not only that, but this allows you to license an unlimited number of tracks at no additional cost. Talk about win-win!
Final Thoughts
If you are looking for authentic, top-quality music for your project, why not check out Audiosocket? Your content deserves the best, so sign up today and access over 80,000 songs to bring your vision to life!
