Pitch directly to Spotify via Spotify for Artists.
If you haven't already, go sign up and link your Spotify artist profile to Spotify for Artists right now!
Just head to the Music tab of your Spotify for Artists dashboard and choose 'Upcoming'. From here you can select the release you'd like to submit for playlisting.
Pitch music to independent curators.
When it comes to pitching your music to independently curated playlists (that’s any playlist on Spotify that isn’t built by Spotify themselves) you’ll need to start hunting down curators.
There are thousands of popular independent Spotify playlists out there created by all sorts of curators - from blogs, media outlets and industry folk to just your average Spotify users.
Spend a few hours searching through Spotify to find playlists that would suit your sound, make a note of who owns the playlist and head to Google.
A bit of Google searching can throw up the contact details you need to start submitting to the playlists you’ve chosen as targets. It’ll usually be an email address or maybe a submission form on their website.
You could keep things organized by making a spreadsheet of all your potential playlist contacts.
Once you’ve found the right contacts, it’s time to reach out.
Make sure to keep your email short, polite and informative with prominent links to your music on Spotify. Make it as easy as possible for them to quickly find out who you are and listen to your music.
Get on Discover Weekly & Release Radar.
Spotify’s Discover Weekly & Release Radar playlists are unique to every user on the platform. Rather than being curated by Spotify’s staff, they’re created by the platform’s algorithms.
Getting onto a listener’s Release Radar playlist is simple. Just get them to follow you on Spotify.
Whenever you release new music, it’ll appear on the Release Radar playlist of everyone who follows you.
Spotify UK’s director of artists and management has previously stated that Release Radar alone generates more streams than any of Spotify’s self-curated playlists. So it’s kind of a big deal.
Getting Onto Spotify’s Discover Weekly
Another Spotify exec explained:
"We look at what you've been listening to. And what are the songs playing around these songs that you've been jamming on, but that we know you haven’t heard yet on Spotify."
"Let's say you've been playing a song by The Killers and a song by Bruce Springsteen a lot. Algorithms look for how those songs are played and ordered in other Spotify users' playlists. If it turns out that, when people play those songs together in their playlists, there’s another song sandwiched between them that someone has never heard before, that song will show up in your Discover Weekly."
"Let's say you've been playing a song by The Killers and a song by Bruce Springsteen a lot. Algorithms look for how those songs are played and ordered in other Spotify users' playlists. If it turns out that, when people play those songs together in their playlists, there’s another song sandwiched between them that someone has never heard before, that song will show up in your Discover Weekly."
Drive traffic to Spotify from other Platforms
Ultimately, the most important thing from Spotify's point-of-view is getting more people to listen to music on their platform.
They love it when artists bring listeners to Spotify from “off platform”, so share your Spotify links everywhere! Post them across your socials, your website and any other channels.
This will work in your favour as Spotify’s algorithms will recognize that you’re bringing in listeners from across the web and driving users to the platform.
Grow your following on Spotify.
The more followers you have, then more likely it is that Spotify will notice you. Think about it. Everybody wants to be on the winning team. People want to listen to what other people are listening to and people want to follow who others are following. Its a popularity game, so make sure all of your friends, family and fans are following you on Spotify, share your tracks across Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, Triller, etc., and promote your Spotify account wherever and whenever possible to build up your followers.
And remember, any new music you release will go directly to your followers via their Release Radar playlist.
Share any playlists you're featured on.
If your music ends up being included on any Spotify playlist, no matter how small, share it as much as possible to start racking up more and more streams.
It’s always a good idea to tag the playlist curator in your posts too, to show them you’re invested in their playlist and build your relationship with them.
Complete your Spotify profile.
A complete and detailed Spotify profile gives you a more legitimate face on the platform and in turn makes it more likely for playlist curators to take you seriously and consider you for features.
You can complete your profile info in Spotify for Artists. Add a bio, social media links, upcoming tour dates and more.
Build your own playlists.
This is an easy way to give your music a boost on Spotify. Start creating your own public playlists, filled with great music and include your own tracks too.
With a bit (ok, a lot) of work, you could build your playlist to have thousands or even millions of followers over time.
But even if your playlist only has a few followers, it’ll still help your chance of landing on other, bigger playlists.
Remember, the Discover Weekly algorithm takes EVERY playlist placement into account, no matter how small. So you have nothing to lose in creating a playlist featuring your own music.
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