GET YOUR RECORD OUT- How to get Your Music Online
You’ve finally produced an awesome track, it’s mixed, mastered and ready to upload. You know it will go gangbusters!
You upload your banger onto Soundcloud, check the plays, but no matter how long you wait, the track doesn’t get many plays. Why?
You’re not distributing your music across different streaming platforms using digital music companies.
Consider this: Having your music uploaded to multiple platforms like Google Play, Apple Music and Spotify is going to get your music to as many listeners as possible. Putting your song on one streaming service is limiting your plays because Soundcloud users might not be using Spotify. Many users are committing to a single streaming service. The people using these streaming platforms are often looking to discover new music, which means you could be missing out on thousands of new fans if you limit which platforms you release on. By uploading your music to many platform, your outreach will improve dramatically.
So, how do you sell your music on Spotify, iTunes and other streaming platforms?
At first glance, uploading music to Spotify as an independent artist can seem impossible. Spotify has no “upload” option available to unsigned artists.
To get your music on Spotify, you have use a digital distribution music service.
Digital music distribution services, also called aggregators, upload your music to various streaming platforms such as Apple Music, Spotify, and Pandora.
These companies are great but they all charge a fee. The good news is musicians also receive royalties from every song played on any streaming platform. Royalties are the money you’ll receive based on the amount of streams (plays) and downloads your song gets and where it’s played.
Some digital music distributors are curated and only accept certain types of music, while others require you to fill out an application that will then either be accepted or denied.
There are also a few that will accept all kinds of music! You’ll get approved if t your work is of good quality or if there’s an audience for it.
This may all sound a bit confusing, so to help you find the right aggregator, we’ve put together a list with some of our favourites.
These websites will get your track uploaded to Spotify and several other platforms as well.
Tunecore — one of the original services. Require annual fees.
Awal stands for “Artists Without A Label”. You have to apply to be accepted in order to use the service
Believe similar to AWAL -you have to apply and be accepted in order to use the service.