As the DJ world gets to grips with and lurches towards streaming, it’s easy to forget that music pools are still a thing. And while outside of our strict technology focus, zipDJ has blipped on my radar for over a decade now, and the dogged tenacity of president Nick Fiorucci to get me to post about them has finally succeeded. They’re celebrating the aforementioned decade with a fresh launch — behold V3 of zipDJ.
There’s PR of course:
zipDJ Refines Music Promotion Celebrates Over a Decade of Delivering High-Quality Digital Music to DJs
Toronto, Ontario – An online digital music pool that helps break new music for the global music industry is celebrating over a dozen years of success with the launch of its brand new website. zipDJ is a platform that connects the public with music label’s latest tracks through professional DJs, and provides a host of benefits for DJs and it’s music label partners.
zipDJ provides a state-of-the art platform for DJs to obtain the latest music from multiple genres for play either in their clubs or on their radio mix shows. The increased exposure to the public encourages listeners and club patrons to use Shazam, Spotify and other streaming services to identify the tracks or look for the songs they hear.
zipDJ’s extensive catalog of genres includes Dance, House, Hip Hop, R&B, Latin, Reggae, Pop, Rock, Country, and more. The music featured on the site is available by subscription only to professional DJs around the world, all of whom are required to go through an vetting process first. Music labels can restrict distribution geographically by territory.
For DJs, the service is user-friendly. “DJs simply select and download tracks using the download manager. They can then access them in one convenient batch zip file. It just doesn’t get any easier than that!” explained Nick Fiorucci, President of zipDJ.
The music featured on zipDJ is available for professional DJs around the world to download in the most current format. In the new world of Digital delivery, physical ownership of music is fast becoming obsolete. Music labels now rely on streaming services for a vast portion of their income. The more people hear the music, the more the financial income from streams. And this is where zipDJ continues to play an important role.
Music labels benefit from zipDJ through their marketing and promotion initiatives by distributing their upfront promotional releases to professional DJs in the club and radio sectors of the industry. This makes them key players influencers.
ZipDJ provides:
- Access to more than 2000 major and independent music labels.
- Unlimited downloads with a large variety of exclusive mixes, remixes and special advanced music.
- Hundreds of new releases weekly.
- Option for member DJs to rate releases and provide labels with feedback and opinion, and influence how well a record performs.
- An intelligent search engine feature to find and download specific tracks or artists using keywords.
- A summary of key information about the release attached to each listing.
- Ability to preview every mix before downloading.
- Availability of upfront promotional releases
zipDJ has received rave reviews from industry professionals. Digital DJ Tips described zipDJ as having “one of the most comprehensive electronic music selections….with speedy search capabilities and lists/charts that make immediate sense.”
Labels that feature on zipDJ:
Stand a chance of having their track featured on the site’s ‘On Our Radar’ feature for even more exposure.
Remain in total control of who accesses their music since zipDJ operates a unique distribution system with dated delivery and custom distribution.
Can choose to target clubs, radio DJs, radio stations, certain geographical areas and more.
Can view the popularity of a track by way of a visual barometer on the site’s weekly zipDJ chart.
Can view and download statistics to indicate the success of their music according to geographical location and read feedback in emails from DJs.
Believe it or not
In all my time sitting in the editor’s chair, I’ve never needed to be a member of a music pool (although the magnificent Beat Junkies bestowed a membership upon my unworthy head). I don’t need the latest and hottest music to test DJ gear. If anything, a smaller selection makes testing and comparing so much easier. Thus my experience of pools is approximately zero, and will almost certainly remain at that level.
So I’m not going to spend time learning or writing at length about how great zipDJ is compared to others. It would be unfair to do so, especially as so many of you who routinely use pools would soon pick my words apart.
But looking at the zipDJ site, it’s a pool that underlines the relationship between DJs, artists, and labels. Like any good pool, it offers exclusive edits and mixes, as well as curating playlists, something that at a time when there is just too much music is incredibly helpful. Importantly zipDJ offers tools to promote and check how tracks are performing. This is vital for labels and artists, as they depend on such data to determine future directions.
WHY POOLS MATTER
While streaming is undeniably brilliant in so many ways, pools are still important, if not vital. I prefer the security of having actual files in my possession. It gives me the ability to play music anywhere at any time.
It also gives me the comfort knowing that a song in a setlist will still be there tomorrow. There have been instances where I’ve added tracks in Spotify only to see them greyed out after a period of time, sometimes temporarily but often permanently.
I doubt that music pools will be in trouble any time soon, but they do need to adapt and offer streaming models. But at the same time, they need to remember why they exist and the features they offer beyond being an all-you-can-stream endless music service.
ZIP DJ THE BOTTOM LINE
In the streaming economy of never-ending monthly payments, much of this comes down to price. zipDJ’s menu is more expensive than streaming models, but you get to keep the music and enjoy the other services that they deliver.
zipDJ starts at a Silver level $25 with a 50 track download limit per month all the way up to a Pro $420 per year unlimited account. For working DJs, that’s a no brainer. Full plan details are here.
So big up zipDJ. Well done for breaking down my defences for long enough to write about your adventures in music delivery for DJs. And long may you continue.