Spotify Release Checklist
These are strategies Waterflame and I have refined over the years for releasing to Spotify (preferably via Distrokid).
- Pre-generating the ISRC. Upload the track privately on Soundcloud first, then edit and check the "Create ISRC' under metadata to have an instant pre-generated ISRC to use on your releases (so you don't need to wait for the first release to finish processing to get the ISRC, in case you need to reupload or have multiple releases or whatever).
- Release Radar. Release on Fridays with global release at 0:00 New York time to ensure it gets on release radar (only updates once a week on Friday, so if you miss it by even a second, you're out of luck). The fastest distributor is Distrokid, but even they require usually 2 days so you want to have the track uploaded by Wednesday at the latest.
- Release Frequency. Your latest release will generally take the release radar away from the previous, so ideally release once every 2 weeks for important tracks. The track will tend to stay on release radar as long as 4 weeks, but the ending weeks tend to not matter as much and are small compared to the start.
- Albums vs Singles. Spotify will generally only push one track from your release, so it's better to release each track as a single. You can then group up the tracks in an album later as a compilation release with every track having already gotten its full exposure/push. The stats will be consistent between single & album releases as long as you use the same ISRC.
- YouTube Music. If you have a YouTube/content id partner (see bottom), leave YouTube Music unchecked, so they can upload the YouTube Music side and keep the content id database 1:1 with the YT Music (necessary to maximize revenue).
- Leave One Store Unchecked. Leave Flo or some other obscure store unchecked, so you have the option to reupload and replace seamlessly without takedown (a trick only possible with Distrokid, more below).
- Staging for Seamless Reupload. Again only possible with Distrokid, more detail here. Use Flo or whatever obscure store you unchecked to upload the new track first with same ISRC, release date, etc - essentially "staging" the upload. Wait for that to be processed and sent to stores. Then "Add to more stores" to Spotify, so that there is no downtime from waiting for the track to be processed by Distrokid or other distributor. The "Add to store" function is near instantaneous once the track has already been approved, so most of the delay comes from the distributor approving it and not the actual sending to the store. If you don't use a YouTube Partner for YouTube Music releases, you'll want to exclude YouTube Music from this process if that video has a lot of traction because it'll result in a reupload on YouTube Music (and resetting any organic traction); however a YouTube Partner would be able to seamlessly replace the audio without the video being a new upload, so you would do this separately from the Spotify reupload.
- No Takedowns Before Release Day. Do not takedown the main release and reupload before release day if it's already been sent to stores. This will make it ineligible for pitch, release radar, etc because Spotify thinks it's an already-released track. Instead, you can use the staging trick to upload a second release to Flo (the obscure stores), so it's ready to "add Spotify" on release day only after it's already on Release Radar (and takedown the old release simultaneously so it's a seamless replacement).
- Non-English Language. For Distrokid, do not change the language from English if you can avoid it because there is a bug that won't let you edit the track later (it'll keep telling you not to have English characters in the title/credits even though it allows this on initial upload).
- Collaborations using primary artists, not featured artists. No more than 3 primary artists at the album level. Otherwise it becomes "various artists." But this doesn't apply for individual tracks in a larger album, so if you have more than 3 artists, try to have at least 2 tracks to get the option to add everyone else as "additional primary artists" at the track level. If you can't add an extra track, release the track multiple times with different combination of primary artists (with the rest as featured artists), and the stats will combine as long as the ISRC, title, and song length is the same. This is why we pre-generated the ISRC, so we don't need to wait for one release to happen before having an ISRC to do the other. Do not leave someone as featured artist if you can avoid it because featured artists don't get to share the listeners/streams stats, and the track also don't show up on the notifications/release radar for featured artists.
- Old Album/Track Links. Old Spotify links to tracks/albums will retain old metadata if the track is replaced, such as artists etc. Audio will update fine though. Share playlist links instead when there's a chance you'll change the metadata later.
- Pitch Your Release. This is under Spotify for Artists > Music Upcoming. Supposedly it gives you a chance to land editorial playlists, but that's never happened for us even on our best tracks. Doesn't hurt to keep trying, but just don't expect anything out of it.
- Discovery Mode. This boosts autoplay circulation and effectively doubled Waterflame's monthy listeners over the course of a year. It's a multiplier, so it works best on already popular tracks. Turn this on under Spotify for Artists > Campaigns > Discovery Mode for your track after about a month past release date. If you don't have a campaigns tab, add a US credit card and billing address to your account and wait a few days. You also need to distribute the track via Distrokid (and recently Soundrop seems to work too), otherwise this is a feature the distributor usually holds the keys to (Tunecore, etc).
- Marketing. Release Radar usually dwarfs anything you can buy in advertising, but if you need the extra push, use Spotify Ads Center to target your own fanbase instead of Marquee/Showcase. You can get about 10 listeners/dollar instead of the much more expensive <1 listener/dollar rate of Marquee/Showcase. See Spotify Marquee vs Ads. They're both essentially a paywall to notify your own followers. Use Marquee/Showcase only when nothing else is working for you and you have no choice. Lastly, at least in our case, it's been nearly impossible to get people to leave YouTube or some other platform for Spotify, so we generally only use Spotify to get Spotify listeners.
- Discover Weekly Playlist. Confusingly similar name but not the same as Discovery Mode. At least from our experience so far, it seems if you do well enough in the first weeks of release, the track can end up on Discover Weekly where it ends up "evergreen" and perpetually recommended by Spotify.
- Distributors. Our preference is Distrokid because it's fastest from being mostly automated and gives you most control over the process as long as you don't need support (but even then, just ask to contact support on the chatbox and you usually get a response in a few days). However, it charges per album-level artist. This is fine if we use "extra primary artist" on a multi-track release (we don't want to use featured artists as mentioned above), but if not, then the second choice is Soundrop. Soundrop is basically the slowest but free (it almost seems like they've moved on to other things and are just operating at bare minimal as a keepsake). A way to smooth out the pros/cons sometimes is to release the track twice, once on Distrokid using featured artists and once on Soundrop with everyone as primary - that way the track is sure to make it out on time and the worst case is some artists just don't have it on their discography for the first few days. It does not hurt to have the track released in multiple stores; Spotify will merge the stats as long as the ISRC, title, and duration are the same. Tunecore is expensive, slow, and has the worst customer service (expect weeks of support tickets to make changes or if anything goes wrong); they even accidentally removed half of Waterflame's discography at one point completely unprompted and for no reason. AWAL seems premium and has a nice interface, but it's extremely inflexible, slow, and has terrible customer support - content id is on automatically, edits take forever, reuploading or takedown requires support tickets which also go unanswered for weeks.
- Full Royalties Collection. The distributor only collects master royalties from Spotify. You want to make sure you register it on your PRO (composition royalties), TheMLC.com (mechanical royalties), and SoundExchange.com (neighboring rights royalties). Even if your music isn't used in a show or anything, every stream on Spotify is divided up into fractions of revenue that go to different places other than your distributor, so you need to register the track at these other places to get the full payout just from Spotify even. You can use a service like Songtrust or Tunecore Publishing Admin to do it for you automatically, but they have been extremely slow for us (a year later to register a track) and often make mistakes (wrong artists, wrong title, wrong IPI, etc). On top of that, they usually take 20% for essentially a one-time registration. Waterflame also gave a talk on this here, but some of the information (like using Tunecore publishing) is outdated.
- YouTube Partner. Having a YouTube partner on the channel will almost double the revenue per view on music video uploads because they unlock "premium revenue" to be collected. However, at least at this time, it seems that if you go this route, you cannot also have Memberships (fans that pay you monthly), so you need to decide what's more valuable in your case. The bigger benefit of this for us has been manual control over content id, as most distributors will not let you talk to someone to make sure you whitelist or disable it on certain videos/channels, etc.
- Pre-generating the ISRC. Upload the track privately on Soundcloud first, then edit and check the "Create ISRC' under metadata to have an instant pre-generated ISRC to use on your releases (so you don't need to wait for the first release to finish processing to get the ISRC, in case you need to reupload or have multiple releases or whatever).
- Release Radar. Release on Fridays with global release at 0:00 New York time to ensure it gets on release radar (only updates once a week on Friday, so if you miss it by even a second, you're out of luck). The fastest distributor is Distrokid, but even they require usually 2 days so you want to have the track uploaded by Wednesday at the latest.
- Release Frequency. Your latest release will generally take the release radar away from the previous, so ideally release once every 2 weeks for important tracks. The track will tend to stay on release radar as long as 4 weeks, but the ending weeks tend to not matter as much and are small compared to the start.
- Albums vs Singles. Spotify will generally only push one track from your release, so it's better to release each track as a single. You can then group up the tracks in an album later as a compilation release with every track having already gotten its full exposure/push. The stats will be consistent between single & album releases as long as you use the same ISRC.
- YouTube Music. If you have a YouTube/content id partner (see bottom), leave YouTube Music unchecked, so they can upload the YouTube Music side and keep the content id database 1:1 with the YT Music (necessary to maximize revenue).
- Leave One Store Unchecked. Leave Flo or some other obscure store unchecked, so you have the option to reupload and replace seamlessly without takedown (a trick only possible with Distrokid, more below).
- Staging for Seamless Reupload. Again only possible with Distrokid, more detail here. Use Flo or whatever obscure store you unchecked to upload the new track first with same ISRC, release date, etc - essentially "staging" the upload. Wait for that to be processed and sent to stores. Then "Add to more stores" to Spotify, so that there is no downtime from waiting for the track to be processed by Distrokid or other distributor. The "Add to store" function is near instantaneous once the track has already been approved, so most of the delay comes from the distributor approving it and not the actual sending to the store. If you don't use a YouTube Partner for YouTube Music releases, you'll want to exclude YouTube Music from this process if that video has a lot of traction because it'll result in a reupload on YouTube Music (and resetting any organic traction); however a YouTube Partner would be able to seamlessly replace the audio without the video being a new upload, so you would do this separately from the Spotify reupload.
- No Takedowns Before Release Day. Do not takedown the main release and reupload before release day if it's already been sent to stores. This will make it ineligible for pitch, release radar, etc because Spotify thinks it's an already-released track. Instead, you can use the staging trick to upload a second release to Flo (the obscure stores), so it's ready to "add Spotify" on release day only after it's already on Release Radar (and takedown the old release simultaneously so it's a seamless replacement).
- Non-English Language. For Distrokid, do not change the language from English if you can avoid it because there is a bug that won't let you edit the track later (it'll keep telling you not to have English characters in the title/credits even though it allows this on initial upload).
- Collaborations using primary artists, not featured artists. No more than 3 primary artists at the album level. Otherwise it becomes "various artists." But this doesn't apply for individual tracks in a larger album, so if you have more than 3 artists, try to have at least 2 tracks to get the option to add everyone else as "additional primary artists" at the track level. If you can't add an extra track, release the track multiple times with different combination of primary artists (with the rest as featured artists), and the stats will combine as long as the ISRC, title, and song length is the same. This is why we pre-generated the ISRC, so we don't need to wait for one release to happen before having an ISRC to do the other. Do not leave someone as featured artist if you can avoid it because featured artists don't get to share the listeners/streams stats, and the track also don't show up on the notifications/release radar for featured artists.
- Old Album/Track Links. Old Spotify links to tracks/albums will retain old metadata if the track is replaced, such as artists etc. Audio will update fine though. Share playlist links instead when there's a chance you'll change the metadata later.
- Pitch Your Release. This is under Spotify for Artists > Music Upcoming. Supposedly it gives you a chance to land editorial playlists, but that's never happened for us even on our best tracks. Doesn't hurt to keep trying, but just don't expect anything out of it.
- Discovery Mode. This boosts autoplay circulation and effectively doubled Waterflame's monthy listeners over the course of a year. It's a multiplier, so it works best on already popular tracks. Turn this on under Spotify for Artists > Campaigns > Discovery Mode for your track after about a month past release date. If you don't have a campaigns tab, add a US credit card and billing address to your account and wait a few days. You also need to distribute the track via Distrokid (and recently Soundrop seems to work too), otherwise this is a feature the distributor usually holds the keys to (Tunecore, etc).
- Marketing. Release Radar usually dwarfs anything you can buy in advertising, but if you need the extra push, use Spotify Ads Center to target your own fanbase instead of Marquee/Showcase. You can get about 10 listeners/dollar instead of the much more expensive <1 listener/dollar rate of Marquee/Showcase. See Spotify Marquee vs Ads. They're both essentially a paywall to notify your own followers. Use Marquee/Showcase only when nothing else is working for you and you have no choice. Lastly, at least in our case, it's been nearly impossible to get people to leave YouTube or some other platform for Spotify, so we generally only use Spotify to get Spotify listeners.
- Discover Weekly Playlist. Confusingly similar name but not the same as Discovery Mode. At least from our experience so far, it seems if you do well enough in the first weeks of release, the track can end up on Discover Weekly where it ends up "evergreen" and perpetually recommended by Spotify.
- Distributors. Our preference is Distrokid because it's fastest from being mostly automated and gives you most control over the process as long as you don't need support (but even then, just ask to contact support on the chatbox and you usually get a response in a few days). However, it charges per album-level artist. This is fine if we use "extra primary artist" on a multi-track release (we don't want to use featured artists as mentioned above), but if not, then the second choice is Soundrop. Soundrop is basically the slowest but free (it almost seems like they've moved on to other things and are just operating at bare minimal as a keepsake). A way to smooth out the pros/cons sometimes is to release the track twice, once on Distrokid using featured artists and once on Soundrop with everyone as primary - that way the track is sure to make it out on time and the worst case is some artists just don't have it on their discography for the first few days. It does not hurt to have the track released in multiple stores; Spotify will merge the stats as long as the ISRC, title, and duration are the same. Tunecore is expensive, slow, and has the worst customer service (expect weeks of support tickets to make changes or if anything goes wrong); they even accidentally removed half of Waterflame's discography at one point completely unprompted and for no reason. AWAL seems premium and has a nice interface, but it's extremely inflexible, slow, and has terrible customer support - content id is on automatically, edits take forever, reuploading or takedown requires support tickets which also go unanswered for weeks.
- Full Royalties Collection. The distributor only collects master royalties from Spotify. You want to make sure you register it on your PRO (composition royalties), TheMLC.com (mechanical royalties), and SoundExchange.com (neighboring rights royalties). Even if your music isn't used in a show or anything, every stream on Spotify is divided up into fractions of revenue that go to different places other than your distributor, so you need to register the track at these other places to get the full payout just from Spotify even. You can use a service like Songtrust or Tunecore Publishing Admin to do it for you automatically, but they have been extremely slow for us (a year later to register a track) and often make mistakes (wrong artists, wrong title, wrong IPI, etc). On top of that, they usually take 20% for essentially a one-time registration. Waterflame also gave a talk on this here, but some of the information (like using Tunecore publishing) is outdated.
- YouTube Partner. Having a YouTube partner on the channel will almost double the revenue per view on music video uploads because they unlock "premium revenue" to be collected. However, at least at this time, it seems that if you go this route, you cannot also have Memberships (fans that pay you monthly), so you need to decide what's more valuable in your case. The bigger benefit of this for us has been manual control over content id, as most distributors will not let you talk to someone to make sure you whitelist or disable it on certain videos/channels, etc.
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