Behringer publicly shares its marketing policies and may offer “free” gear to individuals as compensation for their time.
In the last few days, there has been a lot of discussion about the Behringer Loopop topic. It’s about that Behringer has publicly accused Loopop of not doing reviews of their products because they don’t send him free gear. Loopop then issued a statement that these statements were a lie. But this was blocked on FB by Behringer’s social media team.
Many Synth YouTubers then backed Loopop’s statement. Today, the topic, or as some say the “drama” continues with a Behringer post where they shared their marketing guidelines/policies with their community on Facebook, including how they manage free gear.
Behringer Free Gear
In this post, Behringer says:
Why we don’t “pay to play”
We understand that our social media administrators may not always get it right, as they may not be aware of the complete history or the changing nature of people and situations. However, we have implemented clear marketing policies to avoid any conflicts of interest:
- We do not pay for reviews from media or influencers. If they choose not to support us for any reason, we are perfectly fine with it.
- We do not engage in paid advertisements.
- We have stopped providing free gear to influencers.
- We may offer “free” equipment to individuals who actively contribute to the design, testing, or create performances and tutorials as compensation for their time.
We firmly believe that our customers are fully capable of evaluating the equipment themselves and making informed decisions. Our primary goal is to pass on the savings directly to them.
If this means we lose sales because the media and influencers don’t support us, we don’t care. Our only concern is ensuring the integrity and authenticity of our products and maintaining transparency with our customers.
We understand that not everyone likes us because we are disrupting the market, but nothing will stop us from delivering utmost value to our customers. That’s what we stand for, and this will never change.
Free Gear To Influencers VS Free For Individuals
Points 3 and 4 are interesting. Here Behringer says that they don’t send free gear to “influencers”. However, they may offer “free” equipment to individuals who actively contribute to the design, testing, or create performances and tutorials as compensation for their time.
Okay design and beta testing I can understand that you need free gear for that. But what is the difference between an influencer and an individual who does tutorials or performances?
Both are individuals, and both are human beings, making video content that consists of tutorials and performances. Both want clicks on their videos and need clicks. Otherwise, why send out free gear to a tuber when no one is looking at the content? You have to keep in mind that content on a “non-influencer” 1k+ sub-channel also earns money with it and can influence you to buy the stuff.
The definition says: “a person with the ability to influence potential buyers of a product or service by promoting or recommending the items on social media”. Yes, even a tiny channel can do that. I can understand if it’s published internally on the B channel but if it’s external, it’s a different thing.
Behringer VS Competition
Since the Swing release, we know that Behringer has very own principles of competition. In a new comment, the topic opens up again here. A user named Jake says: “I do also wonder how many are paid by your competition to publicly hate you”. The social media team did not leave this uncommented and writes: “you draw your own conclusion”.
Is Behringer spreading the conspiracy here that other companies are paying people so influencers, media… to talk bad about them?
it’s just click bait folks nothing to see here.
it’s just a troll folks nothing to read here 😉
of course I’m trolling. these types of ‘whiney personal problems taken public’ postings demand trolling. it’s a public service. however, that doesn’t mean I’m wrong. besides, how many of your other product posts get this much attention? none. zip, zero; you’re milking this. and it shows poorly on your site you didn’t post the 100’s of behringer positive posts from the forum your cribbing for clicks as well. seems like you’ve picked a side brother.
They are well clicked but people don’t comment on it. You could start by commenting on them. And this is also news as it sparks discussion in the synth community. If you don’t take up such topics, then you’ve either missed the train or you can’t because you are not allow to write. MusicTech, MusicRadar… also wrote already stories about it.
you know, i do make a effort to post bad or good – i do both! – on your site.
however, I think at some point the animosity this type of content stirs up between readers. further, the divisive slant ‘you guys in the media’ do a larger damage to the community than the feelings of one youtube guy and his fans. it’s bad enough as it is without all the pot stirring.
i submit to you that *not* promoting things like this does a larger good to the community by showing a net more positive reporting on Products, Performance, and Production. i love performance pieces, do more of that instead; I’ll boost the fuck out of your site.
I’m looking for positive engagement across the board. when I encounter negativity, I react in kind.
If something doesn’t suit you, why don’t you keep scrolling like you used to? All this costs you a lot of time in which you can do other things that you probably like more.
I don’t know what it brings you or others, maybe it just keep you busy in your daily life or it makes you happy. Don’t know. I wouldn’t go to other media and express myself like that. I keep scrolling. Media is not an à la carte business. It has the keep it or leave it nature.
The articles don’t have to please everyone. It’s an open buffet and pick what interests you. When I write about plugins or iOS, they scream “Oh no those apps that are about to die”. Then about new hardware from small manufacturers: “Behringer does a better job for 1/4 of the price”…
I do what I enjoy and am interested in. Even if it goes deep and tears open wounds. But no matter what I do, there are always people who know it better. I always recommend to open your own news media that interests you and make your own experience from a publisher side. It’s not easy to please everyone.
And that you can talk so openly and get personal answers is more extraordinary. Neither MusicRadar nor SOS have the ability to comment. They publish articles and its done. If the comment drama gets too much for me, I’ll close its forever. I’m just a one-man operation with limited ressources.
I will never do: a 7d/24h praise of how brilliant all products are. “Everything is awesome” is not the case in the industry. You won’t win a flower pot (German saying) with banal reposts or copy/paste press releases.
Can you please go back to the other site you trolling and stay there?
you, sir or madam, take things far too seriously.
No, that would be you.
“We have stopped providing free gear to influencers.
We may offer “free” equipment to individuals who actively contribute to the design, testing, or create performances and tutorials as compensation for their time.”
Say what? You “stopped providing free gear” … but you may offer “free” equipment 🤣🤣
Who the hell is writing these statements? Their interns?
let the hate flow through you Synthanatomy.
this website is becoming more of an opinionated blog than a neutral news source for people interested in Synths and such, and I don’t think these editors get it. instead they split hairs on what makes someone an influencer, blah blah..
to be fair, Behringer seriously needs to get their public image in shape. maybe a change of staff is necessary.
secretly these outlets and commenters look forward eagerly to Behringer product news Lmaoo
peace
P.S. No hate, I appreciate you Synthanatomy, you’ve sold me on some gear in the past and I’m not going anywhere
thanks, well I could make it simple and just copy paste the thing and go further to the next topic. So it just moving content from one platform to another. It’s how many other synth website work.
Questioning the things that are published is the most exciting thing about it. If you just copy and paste news, you have to look for another website, that’s true. Presenting news like this leaves you exposed to a mop of positive and negative comments. That’s normal. Cheers
Tom,
you wouldn’t be Tom if you would not have an opinion on all the things you post. So I appreciate and read your comments, and pray you continue being yourself. I then make my own opinion based on what I read from the various sources. That’s is how it is and should be.
Thing is that some companies tend to polarize and others thend to harmonize. In the synth world most companies are on the second site. Behringer obviously is not, and we synth lovers aren’t accustomed to such behaviour. So we talk more in love and hate terms when it comes to them, than to any other company, regardless of the many mistakes many of them make.
This polarization is not something created by Tom or LoopOp or any other influencer, or something that we participants to social media trigger, not even the trollers. It’s the company itself that chooses to do so. So us, mere mortals, should refrain from blaming each other for what someone else is provoking, be it intentionally or not. But we should point out when some one is slinging phrases at us that seem to suggest a certain truth, without any evidence. Hey, before you know, some one will tell us that planet Earth is flat, you know, and that we are stupid to believe otherwise!
Do I like this type of polemic? No. Should we disregard it alltogether? Probably not. Should we then insult those that disagree, whatever the side is we choose? Not needed, I can make up my own mind. I’d rather focus my attention on the nice things we can do with music and with synths, and give more weight to facts than to assumptions.
But companies that polarize will always get more attention than those that don’t. Just like bad news sells better than good news. It’s human nature.
Even if you don’t like and don’t buy Behringer products they still are having a huge influence on the industry. The cosey club of old manufacturers must be feeling very pained to see how expensive their own gear looks, and how easily customers move to the other side.
I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the recent changes at Moog happened because of pressure from Behringer sales eating into their market.
So it’s no stretch to imagine “sponsored” anti-Behringer campaigns designed to smear the brand.
As for all the virtuous big-name synthfluencers, just revisit the recent “pay me” rant by Red Means Recording. He stated very clearly that he wasn’t doing anything without substantial payoff.
These guys are not the friends of industry disruptors or outliers. Some I regard as mere grifters and their truthfulness is very suspect.
Back when Arturia first launched their big synths like the Matrixbrute, I remember quite a few messages from people saying they were having terrible hardware issues. They’d had to send the synth off for repair. Or they’d returned it to the shop and bought a DSI synth instead.
Strange thing was, all this was before the Matrixbrute was actually available to buy…
Influencers and Reviewers are completely differnt People/Occupations.
For me it looks like a huge missunderstanding on both sides!
I do not understand the division of the community.
Come down from your high horses everybody!
How can you make a statement without making a statement….
No free gear or free gear, that’s the question?
Is this a MUGA Trick?
(Make Uli Great Again)
what is the difference between an influencer and an individual who does tutorials or performances? Loopop style is of a human manual (most review), a Pro/Con segment (influence) and a performance (usually end of video). This means some of these people can be 2 or more of the mentioned styles of youtubers. HIS VIDEOS HAVE THE WORD REVIEW.
—- An influencer —- is a person that is a character first defined by what they do (synths) and latter defined by a very very particular personality (Cuckoo, BoBeats, Ricky Tinez, Look Mom No COmputer, Starsky Carr, etc.). Note none of these deal with Behringer, do other synths which we know or not they got for free. For example, Ricky Tinez used to work for Novation and now works for Elektron, we know because he has said it himself multiple times. The others we dont know. Then come a special breed of influencer like Benn Jordan who goes face first towards into controversy name calling companies, challenging them and what not. The profile of influencers is by now very well defined as well as their function and goal. They create rapport by feeling familiar and other tactics so you develop trust and then ‘influence’ when buying a synth you can see they are using BUT its all a charade/hoax for you to think they bought it but they did not. It was a loan or gift to influence sales.
—- Tutorial —- people that do the manual contents on the synth explained. For me, the best tutorial person is XNB (who also do Behringer tutorials) (XNB also do some reviews). Loopop is sort of a tutorial but he more of a human manual. Also companies do their own tutorials with their in house employees/wannabe influencers (example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68CAeXEbDM8)
—- Performance —- people do just that and dont even talk. These videos usually have a (NO TALKING) right in the subject.
If anything, AUDIOPILZ with BAD GEAR is kind of an anti influencer by showing what NOT to buy lol
but in the end they influence us all, no matter if it’s a tutorial or a review. The effect is the same.
Thats like saying a salesman at a car dealership is basically the same as a racecar driver.
You are comparing two different things: a consumer product vs a sport competition. The car in the sport competition only transport the image of the company not says: buy the race car which is not available to the public. In your case, the comparison would be a car salesman vs a friend who drives the car. The friend is influencial because he shows you the car, say how amazing it is, “see how brilliant this and this”… it’s like a car tutorial but just in real and not on video.
You’ve always had a thing against Behringer and have alwaus kissed synth influencers ass.
You’ve always had a thing against Behringer and have always kissed synth influencers asses. Glad people see it and are calling you out on it.
I wish you a nice day.
Nooo. It’s more like you needing a Toyota but the salesman is secretly sponsored by BMW. You just need a car to get from point A to B but the salesman wont make any money off the Toyota and will sway you to BMW either you need it or not and probably it is outside your budget, particular need, etc.
No Way! It aint the same buying a synth because you heard a ‘NO TALKING!’ synth demo (car racer) and, at the other side of the spectrum, bought another thing because it was “reviewed” by BoBeats and you already know the guy, kinda trust his criteria, you have followed for quiet some time now, there is some demo at the end (going for a short ride with the salesman), BUT!, he was paid to review it and you do not know about it. Maybe there was some other synth it wouldve suit your needs better but you can be swayed and he can be payed.
So yes, he IS both a car racer and a car salesmans.
Tom,
The USENET taught me to not feed the trolls. 😉
Keep up the good work!
Why all this social media stuff. I don’t think that anyone has realized that there is no such thing as bad publicity. Does anyone have time to play and enjoy these instruments from whomever? Very few people are true influencers and those that are, are the easiest to influence. Just something to influence you to love music and synthe. Cheers
So I believe that this is about partnerships where the get an artist to do a tutorial or a performance with the gear where it is specifically with Behringer as the sender. This is very normal across the industry where some prefer gear they want/need or can sell afterwards and some prefer cash payout/day-rate. An influencer is, I think they mean, is where the sender is the influencer and typically it involves some kind of review. If you look at red means recording/Jeremy he has actually stated similar that he does do partnerships where it is not reviews.
Please answer you own question for us in an investigated follow up article. ” Is Behringer spreading the conspiracy here that other companies are paying people so influencers, media… to talk bad about them? ”
Good read!
Thats the thing. In these circles there is a mob mentality to hate on Behringer, love the OP1, think the Elektron sequencer is the best thing, think Moog filter is the best sounding, analog is better than digital, the best DAW is Ableton Live, the cool thing is to have these boutique hyper expensive eurorack modules instead of a mass manufactured synth… you get the idea.
The point is proven to oblivion when there is still people saying “Behringer manufacture their synths in chinese sweatshops”, well… where do you think 99% of consumer goods are made? Jupiter? Take your gear from Elektron, Novation, Korg, Tascam, Arturia, MOTU, Sony, Pioneer, MSI, Gigabyte, LG, Lasko, Apple, Samsung, Roomba, GE, Westinghouse… 99% of them are made in China but, to make it not sound that bad, “Designed in California” or someplace NOT China.
An interesting thing about China: They were until very recently poised to become the top economy in the world and you do not do that with sweatshops, you do that with skilled labor who know how to operate an automated manufacturing facility. Check the staggering upward trend on their STEM grads over 20 years. Check how the Chinese car industry will soon top Toyota, the current biggest, just due to electric vehicles and the list goes on. Will you find sweatshops in China? probably, however, they are rapidly moving towards a middle class and such sweatshops are moving to other poorer countries which are, interestingly enough, the same places where Apple and such manufacturers want to move to and they cant do it fast enough. It is not people anymore who make all this stuff, its automated processes, conveyors, robot arms, etc. what used to be 100 people now are like 10 machines with 2 automation engineers in house and like 5 working from home monitoring such machines.
I know because Im one of those WFH engineers making sure the machines operate within spec so quality keeps the same across unit production. Oh, and the thing about QA/QC, it is industry standard to out of 100 units, pick 5 or so and run them thru plenty tests to measure durability, functionality, electrical, etc. EVERYBODY do this because they have to comply to US/EU consumer protection laws. If say Behringer or Arturia get a product with a high failure rate, people comply to the correct agency within their country and of there are enough numbers an investigation is opened… and not even the consumer, the moment Amazon or Sweetwater start getting returns of a certain item, it gets canceled, money return to origin and defective units back to either a place in US/EU for refurbishing or China.
Another interesting but normal thing, Behringer offers up to 3 years warranty while Apple is 1 year. This is extremely costly to cover something for “so long” and usually companies do this when there is an image to build or repair (exactly). But, if Apple stuff is so well made, why they offer just one year? Because there are not million upon millions of Behringer products in the wild being carried everywhere and subjected to taking a dunk in the toilet/lake or sea, in other worlds SCALE in addition of the logistical and expensive nightmare of getting a product from a person back to the correct people to figure out whats wrong it it, repair and resell. Sometimes this aint even viable and the product gets destroyed since it is cheaper to just manufacture a brand new one. Also, once Behringer meet whatever criteria they have to keep this going (TAM?) they’ll be back to one year.
TLDR; there is a mob mentality everywhere about love or hate a certain brand and the synth world is the same as everything else. It doesnt matter, in the end everything is being made by the same machines located in China. There is nothing magical or special about a company in the business to sell stuff and make money. Disruption can happen with a new technology (ChatGPT) but also with more efficient manufacturing processes (Behringer vs. Moog) sometimes to the point of simply knocking the other company out of the race. No amount of buttery warm sounding ladder filter can pay rent, wages, components, for long, just until you can get a 95% same sound but 80% cheaper.