From Random Promotion to a Professional Music Marketing Strategy

Random promotion is whatever you happen to think of that month: a playlist package for one release, a week of posting for the next, and nothing for the one after. A professional music marketing strategy is one written plan you run for every release, a record of what each release did, and one deliberate change each time. You can tell which one you're running by looking back at your last three releases. Here are the five signs, and the fix for each.

Sign 1: every release gets a different plan

Write down what you did for each of your last three releases. If the three lists look nothing alike, you've been improvising, and improvised releases can't be compared with each other.

The fix is one page, written once:

• Which tracks get promoted, and the checks they have to pass.
• What you do six, four, two, and one week before release.
• What you do in release week and the three weeks after.
• What you write down six weeks after release.
• What you can spend in a year, divided by the releases you'll actually make.

For a ready-made version, start from our repeatable release checklist or the six week release schedule. Copy one, adjust it to fit your life, and keep it.

Sign 2: every track you finish gets promoted

Random promotion spends on whatever is newest. A plan puts every finished track through the same three checks before any money moves:

• It holds up next to a released track by an artist one step ahead of you in the same genre, played at the same volume.
• You can name its genre in three words.
• The first few seconds give a listener a reason to stay.

A track that fails a check still comes out on its release date, and your followers still get it in Release Radar. You just spend nothing promoting it, and the money waits for a track that passes all three. There's more on how to decide which tracks are worth promoting in its own guide.

Sign 3: the promotion starts on release day

Start on release day and some of the most useful steps have already closed. The clearest one is Spotify's own pitch tool. Pitch an unreleased track in Spotify for Artists at least seven days before release and Spotify adds it to your followers' Release Radar, according to Spotify's guide to getting music on Release Radar. Pitch later and that step is gone for this release.

So the plan works backward from the release date. Six weeks out, you decide whether the track gets promoted. Four weeks out, the master, the artwork, and a few short video clips are done. Two weeks out, the Spotify pitch goes in, with plenty of room on the seven days. Release week is for starting your campaign, messaging your fans, and posting, and nothing in it is a surprise.

The same guide says only one of your tracks can sit in Release Radar at a time, which is worth knowing before you plan two singles in the same month.

Sign 4: nobody wrote down what the last release did

Without a record, a good campaign and a lucky one look the same, and you end up buying the same thing again because it felt busy. Keep one row per release, with the same columns every time:

• What you spent, and on what.
• Playlist placements, and which playlists.
• Saves four weeks after release.
• Followers gained.
• Cost per save.
• The one thing you changed, and whether you'd keep it.

Streams, saves, and the playlists your track is on are all in Spotify for Artists.

Cost per save is the column that tells you the most. Say your first release cost $200 and got 160 saves in four weeks: that's $1.25 per save. The next one cost $120 and got 240 saves, which is 50 cents per save. The second release did more with less money, and because you changed one thing, the row tells you which change to keep. How to measure Spotify playlist promotion results goes through each column in more detail.

That's also why you change one thing per release: the genres in your campaign, the minimum follower count you ask for, or the clips you post. Change three at once and the row can't tell you which one worked.

Sign 5: the money goes to whatever is advertised that week

Random promotion buys whatever turns up in your feed around release. A lot of what's sold to artists is pitching: you pay per curator for your track to be sent out, and whether anyone listens or replies is up to them. Plenty of artists spend a few hundred dollars that way and get back generic declines. Charging artists just to have a track considered also breaks Spotify's rules, and it's the artist who carries the risk.

A plan decides the paid step before release, and picks one where you know what you get for the money. On Soundmango you start a campaign for your track: you choose the genres and the minimum follower count you want, pick a duration, and see the price before you pay. Curators who run vetted playlists in your corner of the genre listen first and choose whether to take on your campaign, and when one passes, it goes to the next. Approved tracks have an estimated 99% chance of landing on at least one playlist. If no curator takes it on, you get every cent back.

What changes after four releases

After four releases on the same plan, your record starts answering questions you used to guess at:

• The three words that describe your genre, taken from the playlists that actually added you.
• The playlist sizes that realistically take your music.
• Whether your cost per save is going down.

At one release every six to eight weeks, four releases take about half a year. The first one sets your baseline, and every release after it is a comparison.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need a big budget for a music marketing strategy?

No. Most of the plan costs time: the checks, the schedule, and the record. The paid part is one line on the page, and you size it to what you can actually spend across the year.

What if I only release once or twice a year?

The plan still works, but your record fills up slowly, because each row takes months to arrive. Smaller singles between the big releases give you more rows to learn from and give your followers something new in Release Radar more often.

How do I stop changing everything each time?

Treat the page as fixed and allow yourself one experiment per release. Write the experiment into the row before release day, so a second one can't sneak in halfway through.

Is this worth it if music is a hobby?

Yes, the record part at least. It's worth it for anyone who spends money on promotion, because it shows you whether the money did anything. The rest scales down to the time you have.

A paid step you can count on every release

Your plan needs one paid step that works the same way every time. On Soundmango you pay one price, your track only reaches curators who run real playlists in your genre, and approved tracks have an estimated 99% chance of landing on at least one.

Promote your next release on Soundmango.