Hey, welcome to the 21st century! 

You can have your seat. 

As you already know, there is a new world order in the music industry. You can do almost anything a big record label or music agency would offer you by yourself. Below are tips on how you can monetize your music in this new age. 

1. Fight For 100% Rights To Monetize Your Music 

Heard of the word splits?

 Here is how you could shortchange yourself if care is not taken. Let’s assume you’re a music content creator coming from the medieval age and you probably haven’t dealt with splits. The term “splits” refers to the percentage of the writer’s share and publisher’s share each writer has on a song. The sooner you start to address this, the better you position yourself in the industry to make money. 

For example, if you wrote a song by yourself, you have 100% of both the writer’s share and the publisher’s share. However, if you co-wrote it, you could do 50/50. Count how many stories we have heard of writers, producers, and bandmates fighting over misunderstandings on splits ( Plantashun Boiz ). Conflicts like this could have severe consequences on revenues earned from your music and you may end up not collecting any money. 

So How can I prevent this? Good question. 

Sign a collaboration agreement today. Your name, Their name, Addresses, Date, Working title of song/composition, ISRC if you have one, Agreed-to splits. Just Do it! 

Start here

2. pLaYlIsTInG iS a BiG dEaL!!

Is it that important?

If there is one thing you need to be good at, it is to get your songs into as many playlists as possible. 

Why? Why not!!

Playlisting on streaming platforms is the new radio. In fact, the №1 music discovery tool in the world, even on Mars is playlisting, not gigs and events, not radio play, not TV, not singing by the roadside. It is Playlisting!! 

With over 200 million listeners, your job as a musician is to get in as many playlists globally. China, India, Brazil, Africa, lol. What you want to do is to get into a killer playlist that gets shared by the people and your fans on social media. 

Start here

3. Your Metadata Is Everything! 

What is metadata? 

Basically, this is like a digital fingerprint of your song. The data collected is unique to your song/recording. You must have seen that page on your TuneAfrique dashboard where you’re supposed to list the song name, writers, publishing information, length of the song, and more, that information right there is your metadata. 

To show you how much of a big deal this is, you can’t distribute your song on any major platform without properly inputting your metadata. However, from my experience within the industry, I see artist skip these sections or put inaccurate information about their song. 

Any logical explanations? 

Its one of the two. Either you are just plain lazy, or two, you are just plain ignorant. However, you might be costing yourself a lot of money. Still disagree? Your metadata information does a lot. It helps your music marketability, ensures you song enters the right playlists, gets discovered by more fan, gets listened to by the right audience (You don’t want your Hip-hop song being pushed as an RnB), gets more listens and plays and ultimately helps your direct licensees and aggregator pay you. 

Summarily, its expedient that the information you provide is correct and completely checked before you submit. 

Start here

4. Hello Artist, You Are A Social Magnet 

Music is social and so you are. 

We talk (and argue!) about it; we watch concerts together; go clubbing together; experience it as a communal soundtrack for parties and religious worship and much, much more…I get really sad when I see artists do everything except connecting with their fans. 

Ask yourself how many books and articles you have read on how to use social media as a tool for making money from your music. Well here is all you need to know. 1. You are a social magnet 2. Before sharing anything having to do with YOU or YOUR music, ask yourself why? what values am I providing my fans? If you can make your postings relevant and create a context around the post that has your people “like,” engage, and ultimately convert (into fans who are willing to obtain what you’re offering) — you’re good. Social media is a social tool. It is about conversations, interactions with your fans. 

Start here

5. Update your profiles on Spotify, Deezer, Soundcloud, TuneAfrique et.c 

Just putting your songs on these 4 platforms alone means your song is accessible to more than 100 million users, the rest is up to you, is it?

Your goal is to ensure your profile is up to date and verified. Ensure your fans can easily find you. Once your profile is approved, your artist page will be marked with the coveted blue check(in some cases), giving your profile a professional, credible, and authentic look. 

Becoming a verified artist will also help improve your profile’s discoverability on general searches while boosting your position to potentially have your content picked up by playlist curators. 

That said, why in the world wouldn’t you get that done? Do it Now. It’s free! 

Like what you just read? Start monetizing your music! 

Start here