My neice has written a country song. what do we need to do next?

The best thing you can do is get the song copy righted, this does cost a little but it will be save and no one will be able to copy it for any reason you can then sell it or produce it yourself which also has a cost but to sell the song you can find many places that buy songs

There is no requirement to pay money to "officially" copyright an original work. Your daughter should place the comment "Copyright 2008 by Her Name. All rights reserved." on any copy of the song she provides to anyone. That constitutes legal copyright without having to pay the copyright fees and submit the work to the U.S. Copyright office.

The next thing your daughter should do is to mail a copy of the song (with the copyright comment on it) to herself in an envolope that is sealed very well with tape. When she receives the mailing, she should NOT open the envelope, but store it unopened in a safe place.

Most copyright disputes hinge on who can prove they had the work first, and a USPS postmark is evidence that can be presented in court to establish a date. The envelope should remain unopened unless required in court.

As long as your daughter places the "copyright" statement on every copy of her work, it is unlikely that someone who might plagiarize or steal the work would be able to prove they didn't know it was copyrighted.

Yeah, i agree with Idsch, mail it to yourself. but also do look into copy writting it.

Then after that, either find someone to sing it, or she can start preforming it.

Have your niece prepare several copies of the material , send it in a self addressed envelope through the mail . When it is returned to her DO NOT OPEN . The post office date will appear making these items . Proof that she holds the copywright to the enclosed material. Make sure to use correct postage .