I came across a  blog post  by music producer and recording artist Matti Charlton where he evaluated SubmitHub, PlaylistPush, and Musosoup. His review caught my attention because I am familiar with all of these services and wanted to compare his findings (as artist) to my findings (as curator / promotional channel). I must admit that we share some similar thoughts about these services! This post includes some practical tips to help you make the best use of the opportunities that you may come across. (tl,dr:) I.m.h.o. the only service really worth the money is SubmitHub, but finding the right tastemakers on SubmitHub will take time (and money). UPDATE - January 22, 2023: I have added and commented on a response from Musosoup at the end of this post. SubmitHub basics There are various types of channels on SubmitHub. In essence, the channels break down into the following categories: Radio/continuous streaming - play your music on e.g. (Internet) Radio stations, YouTube live stre...

Because Spotify is the world's largest streaming platform, it's no surprise that scammers have made a business out of taking advantage of unsuspecting musicians.  In this blog post, I'll break down the factors that influence playlist quality, additional factors that you may have access to (e.g. Spotify for Artists), and aggregated patterns/trends that are common among fake playlists. Vanity Indicators Followers, playlist descriptions, "Discovered On" presence, and so on are examples of forward-facing indicators. Because of the importance of these indicators, many people think they're a good measure of the quality of a playlist. The ratio of profile followers-to-playlist followers At least one profile follower for every 100 playlist followers is a healthy ratio. This growth is due to traffic over time or the popularity of the so-called 'follow-gate' services used by some playlist curators.  You should be extremely cautious of any curator that has a larg...

Maybe you've heard this before... "I tried using Facebook ads to expand my Spotify, but it wasn't working for me. How can I grow the right way?" I personally don't like Facebook ads because I believe that Facebook is more concerned with making money for itself than with helping you. But Facebook is still where most of the 'eyes' are (including the eyes of your target audience), so that is where you need to increase visibility. So let's try to maximize every dollar we spend.  Before I forget, don't 'boost' your posts on Facebook! 'Boosting' posts on Facebook is like flushing money down the toilet. Facebook just takes your money without any lasting results… Facebook has more than 10 campaign objectives that align with business goals, such as increasing sales, leads, brand awareness, and more. Boosted posts are only optimized for engagement which has no correlation to growing sales or brand awareness among other goals. They'll get ...

Why would you want your lyrics to appear on as many services as possible? If the lyrics to a song are easily accessible, 88% of listeners will view them (e.g. by pressing an icon on a webpage or in an app) The addition of lyrics improves the listening experience. Listeners will be curious about what the artist is saying during live performances where artists are speaking / calling out to the audience (and are less audible). Law requires websites and services to pay royalties each time lyrics are displayed (songwriter royalties). With 88% of listeners viewing song lyrics, having your lyrics displayed on streaming services is a simple way to generate additional royalties! The process that is used to collect these royalties, also ensures that you receive royalties when your song is covered by another artist, when lyrics are used in books, sheet music, etc..   The steps to get your song lyrics on Spotify, Apple Music, etc. is relatively easy... and we have tools and guides to help...

So you've written, produced, and mixed a masterpiece, and it's time to share it with the rest of the world. If you are an independent artist, the next step is to figure out how to distribute your music. This article provides a summary of the options we believe are the most popular for getting your music distributed to Spotify and other major streaming platforms. What Options Do You Have? There are plenty of music distributors who can help you get your music on Spotify and other streaming platforms. Some take a percentage of your royalties in exchange for allowing you to list your music for free, while others charge a fee upfront in exchange for allowing you to keep 100% of your royalties. Some distributors offer additional services such as mixing and mastering, as well as tracking and marketing tools for your music. It all depends on your needs as an artist and your budget. Every music distribution platform has its own advantages and disadvantages. The overviews will help you t...

Having fake followers on Spotify playlists reduces your chances of being placed on the algorithm-driven playlists, provides you with low royalties, and reduces your chances of receiving streams. In today's modern music industry, one of the indicators of success for an artist is how many streams they have. (This is also the primary reason why we ignore sales data when compiling our Top 100 charts.) You, as an artist, have better bargaining power and more monetary compensation the more streams and followers you have. You may gain more exposure through large Spotify playlists, but here's the catch... It is possible to find a lot of large independent playlists comprised entirely of fake accounts! Just the fact that they use fake accounts should be enough to steer clear of them. In making these playlists, curators exploit artists who seek exposure from Spotify playlists to leverage their popularity in the music industry. As a result of these exploits, not only are the artists' n...

Spotify's competitive edge is the amount of data it holds on listeners and the way it uses that data to increase engagement. ... Using the same underlying data and technology can provide unique insights to record labels and artists about who's listening to what and help them reach more listeners. The Spotify algorithm sets itself apart from other digital music streaming services. The algorithm is an AI system known as BaRT (an abbreviation of Ba ndits for R ecommendations as T reatments). Basically, BaRT’s job is to keep listeners listening. It does this by playing and suggesting songs it knows the user is familiar with, while dropping in some fresh tracks it thinks they might like, but most importantly, haven’t heard before. This makes sure the listener is engaged, but things never get boring. BaRT decides what to suggest to listeners by combining two concepts – Explore and Exploit. This combination is the key to the platform’s recommendation system. Exploit uses the listene...