Business plan
My business plan will revolve around having a website where artists can buy or lease instrumentals from any genre made by a tailored choice of musicians. This business plan would be similar to an already existing business revolved around the selling of beats mainly in the rap industry. BeatStars’s estimated annual revenue is currently $15M per year. This shows how much opportunity there is in a business like this as artists are always looking for high quality music at a cheap price without having to learn the complicated ways of producing. The way this business would stand apart from competitors such as “beat stars” is firstly the wide range of genres with specialists in each category, an extra payment that allows the company to take control of the artists promotion, releases, legal endeavours, and social media. Not only will this business offer to do all the work of such listed hardships a modern-day musician must face in order to make it in the industry, but it will also offer classes on how to build these skills so in the future you won’t need these services anymore, making people more proficient in the industry, pushing innovation and making more independent musicians.
The idea is to be able to contract highly talented musicians and teachers to be able to give an authentic learning experience to the customers whilst also using a similar business plan as Beatstars’ which I will talk about later in this business plan.
Products –
Licenses
WAV leases – $50
- This has a limit on sales or streams a song can make, if such numbers are exceeded, a further purchase must be made.
WAV stems – $100
- This has a higher number of possible streams than the latter. Individual stems of purchased track will also be available for artists to manipulate the song exactly how they want it.
Unlimited streaming lease – $200
- This version has unlimited streaming values and comes with the stems of purchased track. This is for artists who are serious about making big numbers commercially and not having to worry about upgrading their licenses.
Tailored instrumental to your choice – $500
- This is a much more classified option for artists who are looking for a track inspired by their visions but unable to put it out into music. Comes with all prior benefits.
*All these licenses are up to discussion with artist and producer in terms of the capital earned by a track.
Negotiation for exclusive rights of a track – $—
- This could be for a tailored track or a market track however, all rights of the instrumental go to the buyer, with none of the profits going to the producer and such track being unavailable for purchase for other customers. On average, you would be looking at around a sale of $5000.
Lessons
Industry Lessons – $30/month : 6 lessons monthly
- This would be a side of the business for musicians looking to build valuable skills in the industry so that they can further progress in their career.
Production Lessons – $30/month : 6 lessons monthly
- For new producers or artists looking to make a start on producing and becoming more independent.
Advanced Production Lessons – $60/month : 6 lessons monthly
- For producers looking to take that step into a new league of production and find their style.
Music Theory Lessons – $30/month : 6 lessons monthly
- For beginner musicians who want to learn the basics of music theory.
Advanced Music Theory Lessons – $60/month : 6 lessons monthly
- For musicians looking to understand the full scale of music theory.
Instrument Lessons – $50/month : 4 lessons monthly
- Instrument lessons of customers choice by a tutor of their choice.
This business is suited for all levels of musicians as there is a way for them all to generate income and provide a service. The higher levels of musicians will be able to give classes or undertake the advanced classes, and the more beginner musicians will have all the lessons to choose from to begin and advance their musical journey.
The lease side of the business is great as anyone can purchase the tracks leaving a great business opportunity as there will always be a demand for more music.
Competitor Analysis
BeatStars is a prominent online music licensing platform that allows producers to sell and lease beats to artists globally on the web. Established in 2008 by Abe Batshon, it has had an important role in democratizing music production and distribution, particularly within the hip-hop and R&B genres.
Beatstars provides a service for producers to offer both non-exclusive and exclusive licenses, allowing for multiple revenue streams from a single beat. This is very appealing to a producer as they only need to pay a maximum of $180 a year for unlimited uploads with 100% royalty rights.
This is a great business plan from beatstars as they are not relying on the income from the music. In theory, the music sold on beatstars could make $0.00 yet beatstars would still make the money from the subscriptions from the sellers. This is an interesting primary source of income as its not the actual customer paying beatstars, it’s the people providing the product paying for a platform where they can easily be found and accessible to customers.
BeatStars offers several subscription plans tailored to music producers, each with distinct features and pricing.
Starter Plan:
The starter plan is $19.99 per year and provides unlimited track uploads, access to basic analytics, ability to sell beats, sound kits, and services. However, this comes with the setbacks of being limited to 4 active license types (e.g., Basic, Premium, Unlimited, Exclusive) and having limited messaging capabilities. You cannot upload stems, are restricted to one embeddable player, have no access to Pro Page or advanced marketing tools and are subject to a 12% service fee on marketplace sales.
Growth Plan:
The growth plan is $79.99 per year and provides all Starter Plan features, ability to upload stems, more embeddable players for external websites, enhanced analytics and marketing tools. However, you have no access to Pro Page which allows you to set up your own website easily, being able to customize and changes features suiting your vibe. You are also still subject to the 12% service fee on marketplace sales.
Professional Plan:
The Professional Plan is $179.88 a year. This plan allows the user to use all Growth Plan features, unlock the customizable Pro Page (personalized storefront) have advanced marketing integrations, access to BeatStars Publishing and Creator Rights Agency, free premium sound kits, option to offer exclusive memberships to customers and have 100% of all sales made on their pro page.
This is where my business plan takes a lot of inspiration from in terms of having the actual customer to business be the producers and musicians selling their music to their customers. However, the difference about my business plan is that it will be using professional which will be under a contract to the company earning a yearly salary for their classes and their exclusive music which will be hand picked and tailored by our workers.
Costs
I used my time in the seminars to collaborate and talk to peers about how this business would work and the pricings of it and some of the discussions and some of my own thoughts led to this.
The
To figure out the costs of starting up the business and keeping it sustainable, I will start out by figuring out a hypothetical situation where I have 10 teachers doing 6 lessons monthly each to 50 students in each class.
This would equate to: the average price of the lessons per month ($40) x the amount of customers (300) = $12,000 x 12 = $144,000 a year
This would equate to each teacher earning 28,800 a year. However, as this would not be a full time position, the amount of money that went to a teacher would go to 20,000 a year (1700 a month) which is quite reasonable for the amount of time they are needed for.
This would leave us with the amount of money needed to go to pay the 5 teachers ($100,000 a year)
This website would be able to be run by one person and legally maintained by one lawyer too.
This would average to around $12,000 a year for the lawyer and a yearly salary for the website designer / maintainer of $30,000 a year.
Adding up to $42,000 a year
Cloud Hosting and storage would equate to around $3000 a year, along with marketing and promotion being around $40,000 a year, that would be most of the ongoing costs for the business.
Adding up to $43,000 a year
Totalling to around $185,000 a year
The business setup would have to include things such as:
A business entity where I would have to register as an LLC, Corporation, or a Sole Proprietorship.
Trademarks to protect the brand name and logo
A payment method so that customers are able to send the money through easily under companies such as Paypal, Stripe, etc.
This would include business personal such as a business lawyer and an accountant.
The Technology infrastructure would include:
User Management: Accounts for producers and buyers and teachers
Audio Upload/Preview System: Support MP3, WAV, stems
Licensing Engine: Automate delivery of licensing contracts and files
E-Commerce Engine: Secure checkout, split payments
Cloud Hosting: AWS, Google Cloud, or DigitalOcean for scaling
Database: User, track, and transaction data (PostgreSQL, MongoDB)
The Security & Compliance would include:
SSL/TLS Encryption for all data
DDoS Protection (Cloudflare, AWS Shield)
User Data Privacy (password hashing, encrypted storage)
License & Sales Auditing to prevent fraud
Dispute Resolution System for IP issues or chargebacks
All together, the costs yearly would average around $200,000, that’s taking into account any problems that may come ahead. However, this price will increase as more teachers and workers are hired as the business would continue to grow and expand.
This business could expand into a social media for musicians where they can go and talk about music in terms of improving, learning or anything at all related to music. This business could grow to facilitate a place where all genres of music are sold and taught making better musicians and artists around the world. It could also include a feature where events are set up so that aspiring musicians and artists are able to meet like-minded and potentially helpful people for their career.
In conclusion, this business is here to help people express their creativity, learn to create music and improve on their skills.
Bibliography
anotherxlife (2024) BeatStars pricing: How much does the BeatStars Pro plan cost and is it worth it?, anotherxlife. Available at: https://anotherxlife.com/beatstars-pricing.com (Accessed: 10 May 2025).
Staff, B. (2022) Offer Exclusive Memberships to Your Customers with the Pro Page, Beatstars.com. Available at: https://blog.beatstars.com/posts/new-feature-memberships-pro-page-2?utm_source= (Accessed: 22 May 2025).
OctavOnTheTrack (2024) How to Sell Beats on BeatStars: The Ultimate Guide 2025, Producerfury. Available at: https://producerfury.com/resources/how-to-sell-beats-on-beatstars?utm_source= (Accessed: 22 May 2025).
Loop Fans (2025) Loop.fans. Available at: https://music.loop.fans/learn/how-to-market-and-sell-your-beats-online?utm_source= (Accessed: 22 May 2025).
Paterson, A. (2018) How to sell your beats online | Native Instruments Blog, Native Instruments Blog. Available at: https://blog.native-instruments.com/how-to-sell-your-beats-online/?utm_source= (Accessed: 22 May 2025).
How to Sell Beats Online: Fast and Simple – BEATSFROMYOURBEDROOM (2024) BEATSFROMYOURBEDROOM. Available at: https://beatsfromyourbedroom.com/how-to-sell-beats-online-fast-and-simple/?utm_source= (Accessed: 22 May 2025).
