10 Approved Ways to Promote Music on Spotify
Want to get more streams, grow your fanbase and promote music on Spotify? These helpful promotion tips will help you optimize your profile, land on playlists, and turn listeners into loyal fans.
10 Approved Ways to Promote Music on Spotify
by Chris Huff via Disc Makers Blog
1. Optimize your Spotify artist profile for fan engagement
The first step in promoting music on Spotify is to make sure that the information in your Spotify for Artists profile is current and that the visual images are eye-catching and presentable. Write an engaging, concise bio avoiding hyperbole (i.e. “the best singer ever”). Focus on actual achievements, highlights of your own journey, and comparisons to other artists to give people a place to put you in their minds. Make sure all your links are updated to make it easy for your listeners to find your merch, recordings, and social media. Fill out every aspect of the artist profile, including photos and “Artist Pick,” which can be used to highlight your latest release.
2. Use high-quality visuals to enhance your brand
A picture is worth 1000 words, so the clichéd saying goes! Spend time carefully taking and selecting your cover images and promo pics. Make sure they are high resolution so they won’t appear pixelated. Coordinate the colors of your visuals to give the appearance of a unified look. This may feel artificial at first, but it actually makes people remember you more. Think of it less as being “slick” or “commercial” and more as appealing to people’s brain chemistry in the best possible way.
3. Submit your music to Spotify’s editorial playlists
How do you get on a Spotify playlist? You can pitch your songs to Spotify’s editorial playlists directly from your Spotify For Artists page. The more info you provide, the better chance the song has of being placed. You’ll need to deliver the track to the editors at least seven days before its release date to be considered. Knowing how to get your music on Spotify to prepare for a playlist submission requires the correct metadata to ensure your music is accessible.
The good news is they will also put your submitted track on your followers’ Release Radar playlist automatically; if you don’t submit a track, they will choose one from your release randomly. Having your songs on editorial playlists is a great thing, as these playlists have a large reach and can lead to more people hearing your new music.
4. Collaborate with curators on independent playlists
When promoting music on Spotify, a good strategy to spread your music farther and wider is to collaborate with the curators of non-Spotify affiliated playlists. It can be tricky to track the Spotify playlist curators down, as Spotify doesn’t have a direct way to contact users. If you find a popular playlist with a lot of saves and followers, you can often track the username if it’s used on other forms of social media. It might be a good idea to check your own social channels to see if anyone you know curates independent playlists regularly; they can be good collaborators for setting up playlists that include your music.
5. Create your own playlists to promote your music
There is also no law against creating your own playlists! In fact, it can be a great way to show people how you fit in with other artists within your genre. While it will take some time getting your playlists out there and building up your followers, the control you have over the framing of your own music means you won’t end up being labeled the next Ed Sheeran by accident (unless that’s what you’re looking for). Some people use just one playlist that they update weekly around a theme (such as “20 cool tracks for the week”) and others might make multiple playlists. If you go with the single playlist, don’t forget to update it at least once a week.
6. Utilize Spotify’s Merchbar to sell your products
This is probably the most-important step if you are hoping to promote your music on Spotify with an eye to increasing your revenue. Streaming royalties are quite low as we all know, so your best-case scenario will be to get listeners into your sales funnel through your links. Spotify has made this much easier, as now fans can buy merch directly from your profile. Link to your website, Merchbar, Shopify, or wherever you’d like your listeners to purchase merch.
7. Promote physical albums and limited-edition items
So now that you know how to sell on Spotify, the question is: What to sell? Promoting your physical products is a great idea on a number of levels, mainly because the profit margin on each unit sold is high. On a $25 vinyl record, you’ll generally clear half of that in profit, depending on how much you’ve spent making the record. Limited-edition releases can stimulate demand and lead to more sales; “act now while supplies last” is an old and generally successful sales strategy. Your most-ardent followers are likely to snap up limited releases quickly and will appreciate products targeted at them.
8. Use the ‘Artist Pick’ feature to highlight key releases
The ‘Artist Pick’ feature is remarkably versatile. You can feature a song, album, video, or playlist on it; you can also feature merch items, a concert, and even a podcast show or individual episode. It’s possible to rotate what’s displayed as often as you like, or the Artist Pick will automatically disappear after 180 days. The ability to highlight precisely what you’d like your listeners to see is extremely helpful.
9. Share Spotify links across your social media
Promoting music on Spotify requires telling people about it! Who knew? Trumpet your links, playlists, and releases across your socials with humor, grace, and a healthy dose of self-deprecation. Make sure to tell people about your music drops in advance so they can pre-save them; pre-saving boosts initial stream numbers and engages the algorithm on your behalf.
Judging by the social media backlash to Spotify Wrapped this year, you may encounter some hostility towards shared Spotify links. You can politely explain to them the necessary evil of Spotify for promotion, or … you don’t have to! You don’t owe anyone your time on social media. It’s good to keep a generally positive disposition to attract followers, but that doesn’t mean you owe every troll your time and attention. It’s ok to have legitimate grievances with Spotify and still use it to promote your music.
10. Track your performance on Spotify for Artists
Thanks to Spotify for Artists, you have a plethora of analytics available to you to find out how many streams you’re receiving, general listener demographics, and the listeners’ geographic locations. Understanding your data will help you improve your strategies for promoting music on Spotify and see how people are responding to your music and your promotional strategies. You can’t track everything and you don’t have specific information about each listener, but what you can track will give you some feedback as to how what you’re doing is going over.
Start implementing these tips today!
For those in the early stages of a music career, it may seem like all you need to do is post your music on Spotify and let the stream numbers accumulate. Unless you already have a vibrant worldwide fanbase or a song in the newest Marvel movie, this couldn’t be further from the truth! Using the tips above will help you work this admittedly flawed platform to your advantage. Increasing awareness of your music on Spotify will lead to increased streams, and some of these listeners will follow your links into your sales funnel, which will lead to increased revenue. It’s not just wishful thinking, though. Like the old adage says, “Pray to catch the bus, and then run like hell!” Keep releasing music regularly, keep your profile and links updated, monitor your analytical data, and your consistent efforts will bear fruit.
Chris Huff has been a professional singer, multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, and producer for over 25 years. He has worked as a sideman with Peter Yarrow (Peter, Paul, and Mary), Echo and the Bunnymen, Chuck Hammer (David Bowie, Lou Reed), and Tom Kitt (Broadway composer of Next To Normal). Chris also wrote liner notes for David Bowie’s Live And WellCD.
