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Indie Artists, Labels and Managers

Learn and get tips that will help you navigate in the music industry. 

If you are an Indie artist or Producer find out how to make Soundcloud work for you.

#emusicentertainment #fortherecord #indieartist #indielabel #producers #soundcloud Apr 24, 2021

Soundcloud is now paying Artists directly

SoundCloud, has helped to kick-start the careers of many previously unknown artists. The open audio platform once started as a website for upcoming artists to upload their tracks but has evolved and now has 175 million registered users and continues to function as a track sharing platform for new artists and is now paying artists directly.

 Direct Monetization – giving artists the ability to make money off of the platform. The program, is called SoundCloud Premier.  In order to qualify for Premier, you must be an independent creator with a Pro or Pro Unlimited account and have at least 5,000 plays in the past month from SoundCloud-monetized countries (which, for now, is limited to the US, UK, Canada, Australia, France, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, and New Zealand). You cannot have any copyright strikes against your account and have to be at least 18 years of age. All content has to be original.  For more information visit:  https://help.soundcloud.com/hc/en-us/articles/360053309734-Premier-Eligibility-FAQs

How do you grow your following? 

Now in order to build your engagement here are some features you may want to take advantage of:

1. SoundCloud Tags Are Important - SoundCloud tags are essential for your song's success. Because SoundCloud uses an algorithm to recommend tracks to users, it's important to tag your songs with accurate genre and mood tags.

Click on the Metadata tab when uploading

Add a buy link - to buy on Beatport, or wherever you sell your merchandise on line

Pro account you can change the button text to anything including Spotify

2. Tell A Story With Your Waveform

SoundCloud allows fans to comment on your waveform.

Use the waveform comments to tell your fans and community about your process. Be transparent about how you made your track. Ask for feedback and mention specific sections.

For example: If you’re not sure about a section of your track, comment on the waveform where the part starts.

Something like: “Not sure about the high hats here.  Let me know what you think”  and listen to the comments from your community.

You don’t have to be completely done a track to publish it either. You can put out demo tracks, get feedback and then improve the music.

3. Get your album art right

Album art always matters and even more so on SoundCloud.

If your track gets embedded on a blog your artwork will be there. If you share your track to Facebook your album art goes there too.

Your album art or track artwork represents your music no matter where it goes. Remember its a representation of your Artistry and it is important.

Before anyone hits play the artwork should be attractive and draw in your fans!

Your album art and music is a representation of your business no matter where it is seen.

For best results always use a JPG or a PNG that’s at least 800 x 800 pixels.

Remember you can hire a photographer or graphic artist to help create the image you want and need. 

5. Share tracks privately before your release

SoundCloud lets you share private links to your tracks.

It’s great for sharing unfinished tracks with collaborators, sending demos to labels or blogs, or contacting other outlets like radio stations with exclusives.

Sharing a private link gives your music the personal touch and a sense of exclusivity that is great for reaching out to tastemakers.

Just upload a track and set it to private. Save it and go to your profile. Click the track you want to share privately and hit the ‘share’ button below the waveform.  This is the private URL that is directly linked to that specific track.  You can even make a whole playlist private if you wanna share your entire new album.

Plus, you can reset the the private link at any time to make your private links time sensitive.

6. Change the audio without losing Comments, likes and plays

A Pro subscription on SoundCloud, allows you can swap out the audio on any SoundCloud upload at any time and you don’t lose all those plays, likes and comments from your fans.

It’s perfect for sharing unfinished songs to get feedback. Tweak your track based on the critiques and re-upload any time.

7. Share with care

Soundcloud is about building a community.  This means it works best when you engage with people on the platform.  Don’t just post your own music. Re-post artists that you’re excited about or songs and mixes that you love.

Sharing other artists and helping your audience discover new music builds relationships.  If you share other artist’s music there’s a better chance they’ll share yours!

8. Link to your SoundCloud

Sharing your new tracks to your SoundCloud community is great. But why stop there? Put your tracks out into the world!

Share them to all your promotion platforms like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.  Once you upload a track share it to all your platforms under the ‘Share’ tab and this can also be shared on IG Stories.

You can also auto-post your tracks to all your social platforms automatically by linking your accounts. Just head over to your Account Settings to manage your Connections.

Tumblr, Twitter, Facebook and Google+ are all connectable for auto-posting. Connect your accounts and get your tracks into all those ears!

 

Conclusion:

The beauty of SoundCloud, is the community that allows for free sharing and expression.  That gives artists an opportunity for creative freedom with your music and allows for constructive criticism as you work through the process of making GREAT MUSIC. 

 

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