Splother is a one-stop sponsorship and licensing service for musicians and brand managers. The Nashville and Los Angeles-based company was founded in 2010.
SUB: What is Splother?
Collins: A service where music supervisors and brand managers can select the best independent music for sync licensing or sponsorship and obtain a one-stop license.
SUB: How does it work?
Collins: Splother will have the best artists readily available, for many different licensing needs. Have a deadline, looking for the right sound or look for your product, go to Splother, find what you need, and click to pay, contracts are created automatically and you have your agreement.
SUB: What is the vision behind Splother?
Collins: To simplify the music sync licensing business.
SUB: How did the idea come about?
Collins: Dave Durocher, a longtime music publishing executive, wanted to create a simple sync licensing model, as well as a home for all artists or labels that own their creative rights and want to make their music or image available.
SUB: Who do you consider to be your competition?
Collins: Currently, there is not a model like Splother, there are music libraries that have a phone book of music, that is too deep to search through and quality level is low.
SUB: How are you marketing the service?
Collins: Viral, and we had a successful launch event in Nashville on April 15th. We have an office in Nashville and Los Angeles that has relationships with music and brand supervisors for all major channels.
SUB: When was the company founded, and what were the first significant steps you took in establishing it?
Collins: The company was founded in 2010 and we incorporated in 2011 in Tennessee with plans to become a B-corp.
SUB: What have some of the challenges you’ve faced been to this point in building Splother?
Collins: Innovating software methods we can patent to set our model apart.
SUB: Have you raised outside funding to this point?
Collins: Splother is owner and founder funded.
SUB: Do you plan to raise more in the near future?
Collins: On an as-needed basis, we have large plans. By this summer we plan to launch our Latin site for Spanish speaking markets. Next is the EU, UK, Asia. Due to the diversity and quality of our artists we also seek to create a rotation of music available on Internet radio. These large endeavors will most likely require additional funding.
SUB: Where do you see Splother in a year or so from now?
Collins: The global Amazon of licensing, our goals are to have the best quality artists available with speed to market. We plan to have offices in all major markets globally, to allow market specific marketing promotions targeted toward specific markets. Due to the level of quality and diversity of our website, we plan to also pursue an Internet radio station, that has all Splother artists on rotation, accessible from any wireless connection.
SUB: Finally, a question I always ask—as an entrepreneur who has weathered the bad economy, what advice do you have for entrepreneurs just starting out now?
Collins: Evolution and creativity needs to be at its highest level during down economic conditions. Be sure you are bringing something fresh and new to the table and know your revenue generators and focus on them. Cut out all bad business, focus on new and nurture current profit centers. So many business owners become complacent, and never evolve their model. The competitive landscape is continually changing.
Splother – www.splother.com
