my last death pop, doom country and symphonic blues were rejected)
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Have you tried trip jazz?
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No,but iām working on gothic lounge now.
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My new satanic motivational is in the queue right nowā¦
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Seriously, no one bothers you to experiment. first of all do what you do best. And after that do something popular on aj.and than do something what you never did. and repeat.
Nice thread @whalesongProduction Iām new to AJ too, first upload here was just a month ago with quite dark synthetic halfstep track and surprisingly it was accepted.
But I do understand that itās a marketplace and this unique/fresh ideas in the (underground) tracks wonāt sell that good. Somebody might be lucky enough to be noticed by people who search for specific items and to sell items with an extended licence. I personally have no sales yet at all and now Iām trying myself on different genres. Next in the queue is an oldskool big beat track (hope it will be accepted) and then a corporate one too (ooops)ā¦ 
Good luck and have a good weekend everybody!
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I think if you look at the top composers for extended periods, those who are the most original with quality music have been there consistently for a long time. Thereās no mystery as to why that would be the case. Some in the monthly and weekly reports are only there because they are the flavor of the month on āThat Motivational Songā and get a ton of licenses for whatās probably a relatively short period only on that song and everything else has a handful of licenses here and there. When you listen to their other work, itās just so-so and inconsistent. Artists such as Tim McMorris, Pinkzebra, and Soundroll have not fallen off the charts for what seems to be a very long time without relying on making a copy of āThat Motivational Songā and thatās because they are original compared to most of whatās on AJ and do what they do well. I doubt theyāre concerned about what other people are doing and they arenāt trying to be copycats. Thatās the road I plan to take here.
Iāll never write āthat songā or copy anything here. In fact, Iāve been listening to see whatās missing or weak and where I can carve a niche. I donāt plan to worry too much about the search engine and use other ways to promote the music here. If AJ only has buyers that want one thing for cheap, then this isnāt the place where I should be marketing my music.
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I do have several āunique tracksā some sells well some arenāt, but in the end someone like it and decide to purchase it. The key point is how to flavor a generic track that can be stand out as a unique composition ,maybe you can add some world instruments with standard chord progression and decide corporate category as a genre, but donāt over doing things, buyer likes something new while still retain some element that familiar to their ears. Play the buildup and feel carefully. The main goal is how it can be sells if you chase freedom of expression you can do that outside AJ , CMIW
My āexperimentsā were to make some āhappy motivationalā songs with unusual instruments. everyone has a ukulele. but who has a balalaika, a mandolin, a chinese lute, a charango?
I had fun using these instruments in my tracks, even if they did not became top sellers!
other experiments were to compose a track using only a baglama saz, another one using only acoustic percussions, another one using an accordionā¦
almost all of these tracks had a sale, even if they were somewhat āexperimentalā.
for me music is still having funā¦ iām certainly not becoming rich here! 
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A few months ago, they sent out a questionnaire to authors where they asked very specific questions about your position on PRO. They are figuring this out. You canāt simply say yes or no.
In full agreement, though there are some holes in your argument. Firstly, artists such as TimMcMorris, pinkzebra and soundroll have all been authors here for at least 4 years. AudioJungle was very different back then - the standard of quality around the marketplace in general has drastically improved, there were physically less files available back then and the search engine operated in a way different to the way it does now. Donāt get me wrong, those authors are still selling brilliantly today, but they had established themselves as authors years ago in the community, with buyers and with VideoHive authors, and have cemented themselves a good place in the top 3 authors; so it goes without saying that theyād be the ones who enjoy more regular sales. Their music stands out as some of the best around, however itās a different kettle of fish nowadays.
Unfortunately with the new search engine updates, many authors (including myself have resorted to using generic titles (Inspiration, Motivation, Epic etc), as itās become the best way to get exposure on a new track. Look at the popular files list. TimMcMorris, Soundroll and Pinkzebra all used to have several files there every week. Most are gone now to new tracks with generic titles (far more SEO friendly at the moment). As I said in a past post guarantee you TimMcMorris would not have had the success he had today if he had used the titles he did. No way Give Our Dreams Their Wings To Fly wouldāve become a hit.
Also consider your argument about the come-and-go hits. On AudioJungle there are several (currently visible) cases where this is not the case. Look at PR_MusicProductionsā Inspiring, SilverTigerStudiosā Motivate, Amaksiās Inspiration, AudioPizzaās Upbeat (also Epic) etc. These are massive hits that have been charting for months on end, making the authors multiple thousands (some cases 10s of thousands) in earnings. This is very much the way AudioJungle operates nowadays - a track can either become a massive hit, or is forgotten after a few weeks. So what Iām saying is that yes, it takes well-produced music with a high commercial value, though working within the boundaries of convention and genre is the key to success here. This doesnāt mean you have to mimic other files here (Iāve definitely tried this a few times, as have many other authors - with mixed results) youāve just got to work with the genre and come up with something that is both unique and within the boundaries of the genre youāre working in.
Yes the business model is different on AJ (same to some extent with other microstock sites), maybe less lucrative and sustainable in many ways than some other libraries, but itās a model that works for some. Itās very possible to make a decent income here if the work is put in. Itās not a sprint, but a marathon.
Anyway, I agree with your argument; just that AudioJungle is a bit different to your average stock site. You might find it suits you. You might find it doesnāt.
Apologies for any mistakes - wrote this on my phone 
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While not number ones, both Tim and Pinkzebra each have two songs in the weekly chart and have a long history of such standing. Many of their songs are selling very well even though those songs have been in the catalog for a while. Thatās likely to be due to the fact that they arenāt āone hit wonderā songs that were based on something trendy for the time. While being here for years has helped the three I mentioned, Iām pretty sure many others who started at the same time are buried somewhere under the pile. Time did not help them at all. So, I wouldnāt say time is all it takes. Itās probably a combination of quality and originality, possibly coupled with external marketing, that might be responsible for their longevity. I just know that being a copy-cat wonāt get you there for sure.
Perhaps the current number one is going to last for eternity and everyone else who seems to be writing that same song is just copying it. I donāt know who wrote āThe AJ Songā first, I just know a ton of people think they need to copy it. And thatās what weāre talking about hereā¦ a lack of originality. The belief that you must follow the lead on that song is what could end up damaging AJās popularity if it is allowed to continue. Eventually, people could realize there isnāt enough creativity here and start going elsewhere.
Very true. Consistent quality, originality and a diverse portfolio is what will get you success here. I was just making a point about how making generic tracks is one avenue to potential success, however long that may last. However I agree with you that this stigma of generic tracks with generic titles will damage AudioJungleās image. Another problem is that many authors are working within the boundaries of what is already on AudioJungle - this kind of notion will have us running in circles. Stepping outside of AudioJungle and looking at what is popular (for example, in advertisements, etc) is always good for inspiration (forgive the pun).
Ultimately though, AudioJungle is still a marketplace with (as Iām sure you can see) a clientbase generally geared towards certain genres (corporate/motivational, cinematic, pop, indie rock, folk etc). Every marketplace has its pros and cons, so itās up to the author to decide which suits them best. Make the most of what you can do here, or pursue another more boutique marketplace.
This is not to say you canāt innovate and set new trends here (hence the topic in discussion), but if youāre expecting to make a living solely from āabstract experimental dubstepā or ādeath metalā for example, then you might want to look elsewhere
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i personally think thereās a bit space for originality all the same but that a lot of guys do actually show creativity and originality this far ā¦
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all u said makes perfect sense , thumbs up
u are right and thatās true for all marketplaces , those who had the good idea to join as soon as the beginning, are in almost all case much better off than all the others ā¦
They are called ādinosaur itemsā. When the number of items on the marketplace reach a point where it would be impractical to evaluate them all, buyers start to sort by sales to save time, or worse, browse through top-selling authorsā portfolios. Eternal snowball effect to follow. Iāve been on the fences since my humble beginnings here to level the marketplace and make it more fair to newcomers, and IMO much have changed for the better. For example the āTop New Filesā page was a game changer when it came to highlighting successful tracks recently uploaded. This, I believe, is the main reason why the Popular Files page now sports a more diversified lot than earlier, when essentially the same 10 tracks topped month after month.
Now that an avenue to recognition truly exists, we seriously need to address AJās currently biggest issue - The Flood. Being unique or working harder on tracks than the competition is still not a viable option. Itās still all about getting on top of The Flood. Buyers clearly rather get a mediocre track on search page 1 than listen through 100s of optionsā¦ 1000sā¦ 10,000sā¦ 
I think Envato is very aware of the situation and since not a lot is being done in the āraising the barā area, my guess is that they have their reasons. It could be things likeā¦ every new author brings a few new buyers to the site, links to Envato from other channels, and so on. This āinflux of marketingā could very well be so effective for overall sales that it outweighs any negative aspects of having 200,000 tracks on board. Just my guesswork here. It could also be for grander reasons, like keeping the markets āinclusiveā, standing up for the ālittle guyā and so on. Without any information itās hard to say.
What I do know is that very few of the ālittle guysā make it past 100 sales. Half of the 10,000+ authors have made less than 15 sales since they enlisted, according to the Top Authors page. Either way you see it, that has got to count as a mutual business failure. The idea was great, but the numbers prove it wrong. Trying to cater micro-licensing to all of the worldās wannabe musicians is bound to create discrepancies in perceived value over the spectrum.
I think itās about time we figure out a way to filter The Flood. Itās just detrimental to let it go on. 80% of tracks coming in are essentially the same. Collectively all these new items make exposure super hard, for everyone. You canāt just expect āthe invisible handā of the market to sort things out. These are items mostly coming from new authors just āgiving it a goā, ātrying AJ outā etc. When they learn of the hardships in here, most will leave without notice. But their items will remain. And new authors will follow, every year a new crop of DAW jockeys. āThe invisible handā only works in retrospect, one author at a time. By the time someone throws in the towel, too many new players have entered the game.
Hereās an idea, among others. Validate authors first, then their items. Some other libraries work like this, maybe for good reasons. Something like, potential authors submit a range of tracks for consideration, say 10 tracks to make it real. Itās like ānormal approvalā, but now reviewers get a chance to spot copycats early on. If the 10 track portfolio is considered too monotonous, or lacking depth, sorry, try again. Thatās a threshold that would keep many luck-seekers rather sinking their flood content into competing sites, effectively diluting other markets while serving to raise AJ to a higher standard.
I can understand that simply āraising the barā is easier said than done. Especially here, where there are so many different buyer groups, that may have differing preferences and value music from their specific perspectives. Some (many) buyers may not even care if āthe mix is offā or āthereās no progressionā. They just buy whatās in front of them. But for the same reasons, they would also buy a āwell made, originalā track - IF it is in front of them. So turning down the influx a tad wouldnāt hurt overall sales, as I see it. What DOES hurt overall sales is buyers going to other sites because āeverything on AJ sounds the sameā. Thatās where we need to start. Basically, we donāt need every author to have 10 āInspirationsā each in their portfolio. One is more than enough!
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Agreed! What Iād like to see changed firstly though is the dreadful generic-title debacle
I wish for a system with ranked tags (order tags from most relevant to least relevant), where the top ranked-tag would be equivalent to calling the track that title. Then, the title can be completely disregarded from the results (from a normal search - there can be an advanced search option to search by title).
This would be far, far better as it would give authors a change to name their tracks unique and meaningful titles (that buyers will remember!), tidy up the search results with a page full of interesting titles (more interesting than a line of āCorporateā, āCorporationā, āCorporative (is that even a word!?)ā etc), and finally, give each track a special quality that simply cannot be achieved with āCorporateā and the like.
As it is, music can take a number of different qualities that many times cannot simply be expressed with a one-word title. I feel that other than the title of the track, there is no other unique way to search for my track - it seems the tags are useless at the moment, but they have the potential to be very useful with the ranked tag system! The buyer enters a few keywords, and voila, the search engine displays a list of tracks from top to bottom in order of relevance to the entered search terms. At the moment, the best way to get found is to name your track the exact same title as what you want the buyer to search for - this is not ideal!
If anything, this is hurting the reputation of AJ - imagine what buyers think about all the tracks being named the same names - it must be very confusing for the user experience. On top of that, how easy do you think it will be for a buyer to come back and search for a track they liked a while ago, only to find itās been swamped by a load of new same-titled tracks. With unique titles, buyers will more likely remember the name of the track, AND it would make searching for them a dream if an āadvanced searchā option would be implemented.
So please, staff (@ADG3studios, @scottwills, anyone?) - are there any plans for changes like this in the future?
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There is no point to make something original for AudioJungle. I saw the guy here with 2 tracks with +500 sales. Hes corporate tracks is 99% same as other tracks of top sellers, but some lucky star decided to bring him thousands of $.
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i think u are right but this is all the same a bit too firm to affirm that all buyers do this ā¦ when they are proving daily that they are not all doing something like this, and thatsā fortunate that they do not all do indeed, newer guys would have no sale at all no matter how good their products would be ā¦ . However, u are a bit right as some feel maybe a bit reluctant to search for long for the item that suits them best , which takes time when u have a big flow of items.
i personlly have to say also that i do not like all sorts of features here , they are most of the highliting the same guys or the same style and some categories are completely or almost completely forgotten and for me this brings something unfair to the table on the long run ā¦ especially as we have no idea of what is the criteria that are being used to determine why an item is the set and why. Besides, something disturbing also here is that most of the featured things are being featured because they have huge sales ā¦ when a good item is not necessarily one of these which make the most sales indeed. By extension, u see some pretty flat things here that make big sales here when u are still wandering how the item could make it through the quality control ā¦
i think that thereās nothing really unfair for newcomers, itās the same for all people ā¦ . If u do fail to advertise your things, then u need to pay your dues and make yourself known and thus , most if the time that implies that either u are super talented or that u work really hard ā¦ . I think that the only unfair thing that used to be part of this marketplace was the attitude of top level or highly ranked authors with the newcomers. they received no comment or whatever, until some guys try to change things , just like i did, now, i think that is fairer for newcomers as it used to be in the past this side ā¦ and it also helps new guysin town to gain some exposure too
u are right when u say that the position in search engine is important and thatās also also any authorās role to try to find a way not be so very far from the beginning of the results ā¦ especially in AJ, i might add as this is impossible to preview items whiteout having them running ā¦
for me u are exactly right, i think that if they are nĀ°1, this is the main issue, they accept all and all guys advertise their items as much as they can and they generate both traffic and a base of buyers which laos make envato go up in the search engines too ā¦ this is somehow some way building their popularity and increase their visibility according to me
however, i disagree with you about somethign ā¦ thereās no need to raise any standard anymore ā¦ the fact of the matter is that the result of raising the standards on several occasions already is just to have more a rather good and potentially good enough items not to make it , when the too flat and rather poor that they used to accept are still unbelievably making it , which tends to prove that there maybe some other issues sometimes than pure quality ā¦ plus inconsistencies are human , for sure, having a system 100% perfect is impossible but working on embettering whatās not really perfect would be a necessity too ā¦ I also would like to remind u off something, indeed, thatās a fact that there are always more and more guys in town and items and all this is also implying that there also continuously better designers, artists or whatever who join the adventure and this is not making the quality go down in all cases to say the least ā¦ this may be amounting to saying that the situation is tougher in any case as with more talents, the level is raising on its own or more items make it, this is math ā¦
u also have to think about something ā¦ what is a pain for some authors (the huge number of people and items) as this is difficult for all to make a decent share , in any car, this is profitable for envato because they are in all transactions, and basically if they have 2 guys who make 500 sales or 500 guys who make 500 sales thatās not any different for them, except that the more guys in town they have and the more they are likely to offer something potentially original and also enjoy a good advertising and flow of people on the site
for discrepancies, i do not completely agree with u, thatās right part of what u said is true, however, there are also tons of guys who do not know how to handle the marketplace , who do not dedicate enough time to it or who completely fail to advertise in an appropriate way until they are not being successful at all, which does,'t mean that they do not have any talent for your what they produce
this is exact, the flow makes items difficult to find, but i think thereās no real solution, because the policy is not going in the right way , with always continuous new additions and so on , u can hardly expect more exposure as the number of item is growing proportionally to the number of authors and the more u have on sale,the more u have trouble to find new items ā¦ and we cannot consider that we come to an extent in which u raise the bar so very much until, thereās almost nothing accepted . Besides, if so, buyers would consider the site as getting stale ā¦ this is constant flow that buyers are also interested in. Letās face it , we are in a system of volume now,if u indulge into not posting anything for a while, your sales drop drastically, thatās a fact ā¦
this is exact but whoās NĀ°1 in the end? envato so whoās right? whoās wrong? the problem about the flow is just for authors who can expect limited sales with any individual item , thatās all
i canāt agree with you , about the āin AJ all looks the sameā, i am sorry but in any marketplace u have some people complaining about this ā¦ . Once we had a guy coming in GRās forums in the old version and he explained as a buyer that he felt all flyers were the same. And what did the guy do? he just promoted having guys doing look alike personalized items but pls tell me how can guys do something like this, this is a marketplace? plus these guys who complain are doing none other that what the guy was doing, that is to say buying from top or high paw guys ā¦ so basically he was very likely to buy the same things as other buyers did ā¦ for me that just makes no sense at all. besides, u can go anywhere else and let me tell you what uāl find , very often the same guys as these u can find here , with the same items too, so how can it be any different?
u are also wrong, if guys could not have several items in the same sub-vategory, then most of guys would simply have no more than 10 items per portfolio, which is ridiculously low and which would not enable guys to make any money , either