Satisfaction Guarantee

As a service provider most of us face the need to give a satisfaction guarantee. Let’s dive in to see whether it is a good thing to have or should We ditch it. Fist everybody thinks of it like a must have client magnet badge that is critically important to have an overall goodlooking first impression of our business. In reality this business policy can do more harm than good as the devil is in the details.

Subjective Complaints

We work from what we get therefore cannot forsee if the provided material by the artist will be good enough to meet the clients expectations. On the other hand, We can’t expect the artist to be able to judge objectively how much the brought material can be improved. This results as two unknown variables in the equation. The situation is further complicated by the question of personal taste. So even if all the preparation and engineer work was flawless still the client would have an option to say the end result does not satisfies the expectations or there was something differently imagined in their heads. This happens quite often with young artists who generaly does not have that much of a routine in production work. Also they happen to be the price sensitive group of the scene.

The Solution: Revisions

The most effective solution to this situation is to give room for their ideas and give them space to think. If We provide only one mix or master than that’s it, you either like or you don’t, but if you have three to choose from than you start to think. My personal experience is that most of the times artists insists on their own perversity against the engineer’s suggestions at the beginning but then realizes that it is worth considering the engineers view point. This usually ends up by meeting halfway and both engineering and artistic choices being present in the final product. This ensures the appearance of the sound image and characteristic that the artist is known by but with some necessary restrictions in order to have the best translation factor when its played back on different systems.

Clever Swindlers

Sad fact that there are enourmus number of scammers in our beloved indusrty. We all know the dirty secrets of canceled paypal payments or empty promises with biglabel deals fame and gold Ferraris. In their eyes the satisfaction guarantee is just another hole in our armor. They will send in their cheaply recorded music in hopes to have it fully polished to perfection than leave a bad review and take the results for free. They even publish it and claims that the mastering is made by themselves. This behavior became so common that many studios,including us, were forced to introduce full payment in advance. Although this does not solve the problem of artists lying about the mastering credit but that We can live with it.

Get rid of amateurs?

This is a very divisive question. From a business side of view they bring many extra hours as they are always the ones that make a lot of mistakes and requires a lot of back and forth. Communication is harder as they may not know the technical terms. All in all they eat up much more time in the process than an engineer would allocate for a project. From a financial point of view, this phenomenon means that the hourly rate will be reduced. This is a strong commitment. Of course the result of persistent work can be an artist who sends better and better songs, whose satisfaction leads to even more customers. I always supported the beginners as I like to teach and witness the development of an artists as their world unfolds and shows new and exciting musical ideas. This fills me up too.
Although I must note that there are more and more young people who aim for quick and easy success and fame without any particular effort. They are the typcial ones that records their vocals with their mobile phones and steal beats from youtube. They are definetely the ones that should be greeted immediately with a warm farewell.

The right way of business

I believe that joint work requires mutual respect from both artists and engineers. Instead of loosing in business details such as hourly rates and contract parameters, it is much more worthwhile to focus on the human qualities as these will be the ones that really matter: Style, personality, how well you understand each other. It is not worth getting hung up on such insignificant financial parameters although everybody should get paid for their work. From artists point of view trying an engineer or studio is like trying out a new restaurant. If you don’t like it you don’t go there next time or may give a next try with a different meal. This is the same with music business. If mastering haven’t brought the expected improvement maybe you should try mixing and mastering. It could still turnout that it would be too much and stem mastering can be an optimal solution which is in between. As you start to work with somebody you will get to know each other. This is an inevitable risk from both sides like with any new relationship or workplace. This will make the whole thing exciting while you can learn a lot at the same time from each other.

This is how you gain experience. This is how you get knowledge. This is how the pros do it.