This guide has been written for an indie songwriter who has not enough financial and technical capability to start a music publishing company of his/her own.

I know, there are million of songwriters in the whole world waiting for their music to be “published”. The only way to do this is to start your own music publishing company. No matter how small, it is your own publishing and that is something you can be proud of. And if you kept writing through years, your catalog will grow so as your audience. And of course, good news will happen to things that are done as truthfully as seriously as possible.

Starting a business is an entrepreneurial activity; it means that failure and trouble is part of the process. You will need a strong heart, commitment, knowledge and passion to keep your business going. If you do not have, I recommend not to have your own publishing and have yourself employed either to other music publishing companies, I know there are tons out there.

OK let’s start with the flow. For details, I recommend you will start searching Google for detailed answers. Of course, this post cannot cover everything but at least I give you the process which is very important.

This process assumes you will be marketing your songs in the internet because it is way lot cheaper than doing the traditional way and it gives a better exposure of your catalog.

Step1. The first thing in your plan should be examining if your catalog is worth starting a business. If you have just 5 songs, of course it is not. And if you are starting a website out of it as well as start copyrighting songs, it is more expensive to do that. I recommend you have least 20 songs to start a music publishing company. So that your potential clients can choose a lot of songs, as well as the cost of copyright is low (you can copyright the entire 20 songs as one application).

Step2. Your master recordings should have ISRC and registered to Nielsen BDS. This is for royalty tracking purposes.

Step3. Copyright your 1st set of catalog to US copyright, file Form PA and SR, if you also own the sound recording copyright.

Start4. Start registering your business. Think of a business name. I use my own name in my music publishing business. But you can use another name example “XYZABC Music”

You should register your business with your government agencies. You can either start sole proprietorship since you most likely do not have partners or incorporators at this stage.

Step5. Start a bank account using your business name.

Step6. Register your songs to performing right societies like ASCAP, BMI or any societies which your country has. Register yourself as both publisher and a writer. Remember to use your music publishing business name (the one you’re registered with your government) as the publisher name in the performing right societies you are affiliated with.

You can however use your original name as the writer name.

Step7. Start a website and register a domain name that matches your business name. For example www.xyzabcmusic.com