How To Get More Views On Soundcloud For Free
How To Get More Plays on SoundCloud: 5 Legit Strategies …
As an artist, you are responsible for promoting your own music. So how do you promote yourself to get more plays on SoundCloud?
Here are 5 rock-solid SoundCloud promotion strategies that are relevant for the music industry in 2021. Here’s a snapshot of what you’ll learn:
The truth about SoundCloud and promotionOne thing you need to get right before you start promoting yourselfHow to leverage existing audiences to maximize your plays
By following these strategies, you can increase the number of plays you’ll get on SoundCloud, as well as followers and likes. Let’s go!
Check out our FREE eBook – 10 Tips For Promoting Your Music on a Budget. Nail your social media strategy Give your music the best chance of success Find your ideal audience online
A Brief Note
SoundCloud has made changes within the last few years where the home page is no longer your stream. This means that people who follow you aren’t always going to be finding your music when it comes out.
Spotify is a much more popular option these days for listening to music, and it allows you to reach a wider audience.
Including key services like Spotify and Apple Music in 2021 is crucial in unlocking the full power of promotion and marketing.
Apart from that, here are 5 strategies that will get you more plays on Soundcloud:
Make great music firstLeverage existing audiences on the platformUse email for networking and promotionGet into repost chainsMake your music discoverable
Strategy 1: Make (Actually) Great Music
While it is possible to promote crap music, it never survives the ultimate test: the opinion of the audience.
No matter how much PR or marketing you give a track, if it’s really average, then nobody wants to listen, and you won’t get plays.
Never forget this golden rule of music promotion – your music is the marketing. You don’t just market music, it’s inherently linked to the promotion process.
One of my earlier tracks, ‘Carpark Anxiety’, has only gotten 900 plays in 3 years, even though I sent it to a lot of people. Why? Nobody wanted to share it, because it’s very average.
People don’t buy a vacuum cleaner if they don’t want one, so people won’t listen to music if they don’t like it. This is especially true on Soundcloud, where the barrier of entry is so low that a lot of horrible music gets uploaded, meaning listeners have more to sift through.
I’ve found over time that artists and producers (especially those who want a career) tend to overestimate the quality of their music. I did in the early days, and you can go and listen to my really old music and hear the improvement over time.
One of my newer drum & bass tracks, a bootleg of Porter Robinson’s Get Your Wish, got a lot of plays and was shared a lot more, because this track is much higher quality than my old stuff.
But this begs the question – should I upload my music if it’s not 100% there yet? This is arguable, but on a platform like SoundCloud, the stakes are much lower, with removing tracks being just a click away.
Plus, you’re likely to get valuable feedback from the public if you ask for it, allowing you to gauge what will and won’t work.
So while promoting music online is important, getting feedback and taking that into the studio will prove to be a much more valuable use of time.
So how do I make my music ‘better’? That’s another topic entirely, and that’s also why we have courses like EDM Foundations and Songwriting for Producers.
But a few pointers:
Make sure your core musical ideas are solid – production, mixing and mastering won’t matter otherwiseGet feedback from listeners, tastemakers and other artistsBe patient and keep making a large volume of music
Strategy 2: Leverage Existing Audiences
This might be confusing to say, but it’s true.
There are people who are always going to be better at marketing music than you. So don’t reinvent the wheel, use these people to your advantage.
People dedicate their lives to finding and sharing music to audiences that love it, so you.
Find channels on Soundcloud that can share your music to larger numbers of people than you ever could. This could come in the form of
Repost channelsOther artists with bigger followingsPromotional channelsLabels/collectivesPlaylisters
Don’t ignore offsite audiences as well. Just because they don’t have larger audiences on SoundCloud, doesn’t mean a blog or YouTube channel can’t send lots of plays your way.
Make sure to utilize:
BlogsHype MachineYouTube ChannelsSpotify PlaylistsInfluencers (e. g. vloggers, Instagram accounts)Radio stations (some play directly off SoundCloud! )
The key here is to find channels that are a good fit for your music. Don’t go messaging someone just because they have a lot of followers. They are already looking for very specific kinds of music for their tastes.
So play a few of their previous uploads/shares and make a decision. Don’t be too scared if your music isn’t exactly the same as what’s already there, but if it’s too different, it’ll likely get a pass.
Once you know who to send music to, then you need to figure out how.
Strategy 3: Email is still King
How do you send a message:
that you know the recipient will getthat goes to a place they check very oftenthat is simple and clearusing something everyone hasthat doesn’t rely on a platform that could be gone soon
The answer? Email. It’s old, but it’s still the best. How does this relate back to SoundCloud you might ask?
Email for Networking
Everyone has an email. Artists. Labels. Promo channels. Repost channels. Avid music fans. And you can communicate with them through this channel, no matter if they have Facebook, Instagram, Twitter or not.
I got my biggest play numbers out of email networking, including a top placement on one of Majestic Casual’s weekly playlists on Soundcloud. In this case, it was a form that sends them an email, but the point still stands.
Here’s an example of me emailing my track to someone for a YouTube upload, and look at the difference in response time.
The first email I sent.
The response time.
I got a response in less than 24 hours!
Granted, this won’t usually be the case for huge names in the industry, but email networking works.
Not to say that you can’t use avenues like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Those channels are great but always try email first. And use the Hubspot extension to track email opens, you’ll thank me later.
To make this easier, you’ll want to be making a list of emails of relevant people you can send your music to. Just use Google Sheets or Excel.
I personally use a software called Notion (has database functionality) to track YouTube channels, Soundcloud pages, labels and more. I’ve blanked out the emails for privacy.
A few tips & tricks about sending emails:
Be concise – the recipient is likely already time-poor, so get to the them a SoundCloud link – it’s the easiest to listen to, and you can make it conversational – don’t just send a link, actually treat the person on the other end like a human, and you’ll get treated like one rsonalise messages – CC’ing a large list never works, and it often annoys people, especially if people ‘Reply All’. Send one message at a time and once again, treat them like a up – not everybody is in a position to do something the first time around. Follow up in a week or two (depending on the person) if they haven’t replied.
If you want more promo email etiquette tips, check out this list from an industry professional.
Building a List
With the decline of plays on SoundCloud (due to the lower visibility of the ‘Stream’), it’s important your core audience still gets to hear your music when it’s released, and what better way to this than email marketing?
ToneDen offers free download gates that you can use to gather emails.
If you’re familiar with download gates like ToneDen and The Artist Union, perhaps start using them to gather people’s email addresses. If you’re a Bandcamp user, you can grab email addresses on checkout too. That way, you can build a list to send your music to next time you have something to release!
Once you’ve got a list, you need to find a email marketing service. Symphonic Distribution compiled a list of the best email marketing platforms for musicians, so make sure to give that a read.
Strategy 4: Repost Chains
This is one of the most useful tools on SoundCloud and is an effective way to garner the force of multiple accounts in a simple, automated way.
You can tell when the repost chain kicked in on my latest track.
In essence, a repost chain is simply a group of people who automatically repost a track, each at a timed interval, to maximise exposure. A service like SCPlanner allows you to do this effortlessly.
Just get a few music buddies in a chain and one person submits new tracks to the chain. As each of you gains followers, you multiply the reach each time.
There are a few ways you can join or create a repost chain:
Producer friends – get your inner circle together and signup to a repost chain. That way you get a guaranteed baseline of exposure every time you upload a chains – a lot of people on Facebook groups etc. are looking for accounts to join repost chains, because the bigger it gets, the more valuable. The only caveat is usually you need at least a certain number of followers to join these (e. 5000+ followers only)Random chains – if you just need exposure, try Googling ‘repost chain’ and you’ll see a bunch of results for submissions to certain chains. Some of these require payment, be wary. Also, these aren’t necessarily an effective way to gain promotion, as you could get a lot of plays that don’t mean much. So be selective.
Sounds good, right? Hold up, there are a few things to consider before joining a chain.
Firstly, make sure you’re okay with reposting the music in that chain. Does it fit with your brand, or will it annoy your followers? Even though the numbers can be appealing, hold off if you think it’ll damage your brand.
Also, some people have a problem with repost chains because it ‘abuses the repost feature’, so have a think if this works for you or not. Personally, I think it’s fine as long as you repost music you like.
Strategy 5: Make Your Music Discoverable
Now that the ‘Discover’ tab exists on Soundcloud, the aim is to get your music featured on this new avenue of discovery.
The best way to do that is metadata. Tell Soundcloud what your music is, and give it the best chance on the platform.
There are a few key ways to do this:
Correct Genre tagsRelevant track tagsName your track appropriatelyUtilize the descriptionGet other engagement (likes, comments etc. )
You might be wondering why I’ve bolded ‘Correct Genre tags’, and that’s because it’s probably one of the most important factors in SoundCloud deciding where your music will be placed.
You can see one of San Holo’s latest tracks is tagged as ‘Electronic’, which is one of the default options when creating your track. Soundcloud likes this because it knows who to show the track to.
Beyond that, the more metadata SoundCloud has, the more opportunities it can give that track on the platform, not only with ‘Discover’ but also with the ‘Charts’ feature, especially when it gets more plays.
Relevant metadata goes beyond the platform into other services like Google, meaning your music will come up in search results too.
Why?
Because Google reads text, not your mind, and if it can see who you are and what your music’s called, it’ll help your chances of showing up. Pretty neat.
Bonus Tip: Don’t Buy Plays
Everyone wants to take the easy road, right? But oftentimes it’s simply not worth it.
For a few thousand extra plays in the short term, you can damage your career, risk your account getting shut down, or simply lose the trust of your true fans. Plus, it’s against SoundCloud’s Terms of Use.
I had to mention this here because it’s often something people consider when they’re looking to up their Soundcloud game. The same can be said for likes and followers, and other platforms too. These stats are fake and don’t provide organic growth.
The Bigger Picture
Like I already said, marketing and promoting your music should go beyond SoundCloud.
Plays aren’t the only thing to consider either.
Yet it’s hard to promote your music well without a lot of money.
That’s why we made our guide about promoting your music on a budget. You can grab it free below:
If you have questions about marketing and promoting your music, let me know at [email protected] – I’d be happy to answer.
Want more promotion and marketing tips? Check out 15 more here.
How to Make Money from Your Music on SoundCloud – Open Mic UK
Posted on 19/06/2020
Following the launch of the new-and-improved SoundCloud Premier in 2018, SoundCloud is now better than ever. Singers and musicians from all walks of life can join their monetisation programme and make money on Soundcloud with original tracks.
SoundCloud is notoriously popular among independent artists. The platform helps indie artists upload, stream, and make money on their original music. Savvy users can even connect distributors and online stores to their SoundCloud to make more money.
Every musician’s dream is to make money from their craft, and SoundCloud helps independent artists on their way to do just that. This article gives a full breakdown of the best ways to optimise your earning potential on SoundCloud.
Can you make money on SoundCloud?
Independent artists across the board have been able to make money on SoundCloud since 2018; when SoundCloud Premier was re-launched with a revised set of rules.
The monetisation programme existed before 2018 but was an invite-only beta until the programme was changed a couple of years ago.
The new, revamped SoundCloud Premier has become much more inclusive and allows any indie artists who self-upload tracks to make money on SoundCloud.
How do you qualify for monetisation on SoundCloud?
You’ll have to tick a few boxes to qualify for monetisation on SoundCloud. To start with, you need to be signed up to SoundCloud Premier to start making money from your music.
To be eligible for SoundCloud Premier, you need to be:
18 years old or above
An independent, original creator
A Pro or Pro Account SoundCloud member
An artist who has at least 5, 000 plays in the past month from SoundCloud monetised countries
An account holder with no copyright strikes
How to monetise a track on SoundCloud
Once you’ve signed a SoundCloud Premier agreement, you can submit a request to monetise your tracks on the platform. If you’re approved, a blue icon will appear beside your content.
When you’ve got your account approved, you can monetise multiple tracks on your SoundCloud account at once by following these steps:
Step 1
Go to your tracks page and select all the tracks you want to monetise.
Step 2
Press the “Edit tracks” button and click “Monetisation. ”
Step 3
Double-check your metadata is correct and then press the “Enable Monetisation” button.
Step 4
Press “Save, ” and you’ll be notified in 24 hours whether your monetisation request has been approved.
How many plays do you need on SoundCloud to get paid?
You’ll need to be signed up to SoundCloud Premier to get paid on SoundCloud. To go Premier, you need 5000 plays in the SoundCloud approved countries listed below.
SoundCloud monetisation countries
To sign up for SoundCloud Premier, your tracks need to be streamed in SoundCloud’s recognised monetised countries. These are currently the UK, Ireland, US, Canada, France, Germany, Australia, New Zealand, and the Netherlands.
Where SoundCloud monetised tracks are available to stream
Once you monetise your track on SoundCloud, your song will be made available to stream in all countries. Just double-check your SoundCloud track settings and ensure you haven’t enabled geo-blocking if you want your tracks to be streamed everywhere.
SoundCloud monetisation free
If you want to make money on SoundCloud, you’ll have to part with some of your own money first. Sadly, there’s no way to access their monetisation for free – subscribing to a Pro account alone comes with a monthly charge.
Like with a lot of audio streaming platforms, selling your music on SoundCloud has a catch: the platform will keep a share of the revenues from your sales. Singers and musicians who monetise with SoundCloud Premier receive a 55% net revenue. This means that for every song you upload or own the rights to, you will earn a 55% share of the profit, while SoundCloud will keep a 45% cut.
Your income on SoundCloud is also affected by the platform’s revenue. How much you get paid will depend on how much SoundCloud makes from advertising and subscriptions, as it’s these schemes that fund the SoundCloud Premier programme. If SoundCloud doesn’t perform well and their income dips, so will yours.
How does Soundcloud make money?
As SoundCloud’s performance and revenue will directly affect your income, it’s worth knowing how the platform makes its money. SoundCloud operates a freemium basis, meaning its core streaming is available free of charge to its users.
If people can listen to your music for free, you might wonder how you can make any money on your tracks. The SoundCloud Premier programme is funded largely by premium features and advertising, meaning that – although fans can access your music for free – the platform can still make a profit and pay you revenue on your songs.
Premium features like SoundCloud Go and SoundCloud Pro Unlimited require a subscription fee. The income from this, and from collaborations with big companies and brands to run ad campaigns, turn over a profit for SoundCloud and allow them to pay artists who upload tracks to the site.
How much money do you make on SoundCloud per play?
The revenue you make on SoundCloud depends on more than just your plays, so it’s hard to determine how much money you’ll make based on streams alone.
Your income will actually depend on SoundCloud’s performance each month in terms of advertising and membership subscription, rather than how many times your track is played. Whether people engage with the ads on SoundCloud (which they won’t if they have an ad blocker on) will affect how much you earn, and this means your revenue can fluctuate.
A rough ball-park figure for how much existing artists have been paid per play on SoundCloud is in the region of $2. 50 – $4. 00 for every 1000 streams.
How can you sell your music on SoundCloud?
Joining SoundCloud Premier and monetising your tracks is the typical route for selling your music on SoundCloud, but it’s not the only way.
If you want to sell your music on SoundCloud and cut out the middleman (and the extra revenue charges) you can connect your online store to your SoundCloud. Directing your fans to an external site to buy your tracks means you can keep 100% of your revenue.
Make money on SoundCloud with Sellfy
If you don’t have an existing online store, a great e-commerce platform you can use to set one up is Sellfy. Lots of artists use this site to connect their online store up to their SoundCloud profile and make more profit on their music.
Follow these steps to create a Sellfy online store that’s SoundCloud-friendly:
Head to and create your online store. All you need is an email and password, and you’ll be set up in a few minutes.
Add some products to sell on your Sellfy store. You can do this by pressing “Add New” on the dashboard and selecting the “Digital Product” option.
You’ll then be given the option to add your music, a description, an image, and a price. Click the “Publish” button when you’re done.
Before you complete your Sellfy online store, make sure your store can accept card payments. To set up PayPal payments, select “Payment Options” on the dashboard and enter the email address you use on your existing PayPal account.
Your online store is now ready to go, and you can connect it up to your SoundCloud account to make even more money on your music.
How to make money on SoundCloud
Connecting your online store to SoundCloud will create more earning potential on your tracks. There are 3 ways you can connect your store to your SoundCloud profile:
Add a link to your online store in your track description
When you upload a new track to SoundCloud, paste a link to the product on your online store in the “Description” box that comes up.
Paste a link in your bio
Your bio is another great place to provide a direct link to your online store. To add a link to your bio, go to your SoundCloud “Profile Settings” and press “Edit. ” Paste the link to your online store in the bio box and make sure you press “Save Changes” afterward.
Create a buy link on your tracks
The buy-link is a button that appears underneath your songs on SoundCloud. To get one, select the “Metadata” heading that comes up when you upload a track to SoundCloud. You’ll then be given the option to add a buy-link to your tracks and choose the text that appears on the buy button.
You’ll need to make sure you have a SoundCloud Pro or Pro Unlimited profile before you can add buy links to your songs.
Tunecore SoundCloud monetisation
You’ve monetised your SoundCloud tracks, you’ve connected your SoundCloud profile to your online store. Now the only thing that’s left to do is to connect TuneCore to your SoundCloud.
TuneCore is a digital music distribution and publishing service and has had a partnership with SoundCloud for over ten years. Working with distributors is invaluable for indie artists, as the service can get your music out onto all the biggest streaming platforms.
Connecting a distributor like TuneCore to your SoundCloud will boost your monetisation not only on SoundCloud but on other streaming platforms too. TuneCore can take the music you’ve uploaded to SoundCloud and distribute it to other commercial services like iTunes and Spotify. You maintain all your rights and 100% of the royalties on your tracks, making TuneCore a priceless tool in the monetisation of your music.
How to connect TuneCore to your SoundCloud
Connecting TuneCore to your SoundCloud account is super easy and really worthwhile. Here’s how to do it:
First, you’ll have to enable the import feature on your SoundCloud account. You can do this by signing up on the TuneCore landing page.
Once you’ve signed up to TuneCore and logged in, click on the “Distribution” menu button and create a new single or album using the form that comes up.
Next, a button saying “Connect with SoundCloud” should appear on the song adding page on TuneCore. Press this button to connect your SoundCloud account to TuneCore.
Now that your accounts are connected, a “Get Song From SoundCloud” button will appear on your TuneCore song adding page. You can use this button to import each track from your SoundCloud account over to TuneCore.
The rest is then down to TuneCore. The distribution service will do all the legwork to get your music from SoundCloud onto all the important streaming platforms. Hopefully turning over a bigger revenue for you in the process.
How to discover music on SoundCloud
SoundCloud has a huge user-base and a huge catalogue of artists waiting to be discovered. You can find music on the platform using the universal search bar, the charts feature, or the site’s recommended song suggestions.
As an indie artist looking to be discovered, SoundCloud is an invaluable resource. The platform will not only help you be discovered by new fans but if you monetise your SoundCloud tracks and connect your account to your online store, you’ll be earning revenue while you do so.
If you’re hoping to get discovered as well as make money on your music, SoundCloud is the place you need to be.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do SoundCloud’s royalties compare to Spotify?
According to figures from 2016, SoundCloud typically paid 0. 001305585 per stream in royalties, whereas Spotify paid 0. 003589881. This means to make $1 on SoundCloud, you needed a total of 766 streams. To earn $1 on Spotify, you needed 279 streams. A full comparison of the royalties paid across streaming platforms can be found here.
What is the difference between plays and monetised streams?
You might notice a discrepancy between the number of plays your track has on SoundCloud, and how many monetised streams you’ve been paid for. This is because you only earn money from streams containing an ad on SoundCloud.
Some users have adblockers on while they play your song, so it won’t count as a monetised stream. This can result in your number of monetised streams being lower than your total plays.
Do you have you music on Soundcloud? Leave a link in the comments and we’ll check it out.
SoundCloud – How To Get Your Music Noticed | Bandvista.com
In the 1990s I worked as a talent scout and band manager. I loved scouting for labels. I was lucky enough to work with a number of small independents and a major label. I would spend my nights visiting rehearsal studios and live music venues.
During the day I would work for the bands I managed. I would spend hours phoning labels and making new contacts. I would spend a small fortune duplicating demos, stuffing them into mailers and taking them to my local post office.
Now the game has changed. In one way it is a lot easier to get your music seen by the right people. In another way, it is a lot harder for artists to get noticed.
With thousands of hours, of new music, added daily, SoundCloud is an ocean of new music. It is also one of the number one tools used by talent scouts, though artists continue to make the same mistakes when using this service.
Here are some things to consider if you want to get noticed on SoundCloud.
Only The Best
Many artists use SoundCloud as a showcase for their music catalog, by uploading everything from demos to live performances. This is a mistake if you want to get signed.
Your Soundcloud page should be for the best, the very best. You should treat your SoundCloud page as a showcase. When I was stuffing cassette tapes into an envelope in the early 90s, I would only have three tracks on a tape. The very best three tracks. Artists are much more fortunate now. They can showcase entire albums, but they should be selective.
If the music on your page sounds old and not up to your current standards, remove it. If songs are badly mixed and edited, remove them. If badly mixed tracks from live performances are there, remove them.
Get Plays
Getting plays on SoundCloud is fairly easy with little effort. SoundCloud is a community that rewards interaction, so the best way to get thousands of plays and look popular is to find other SoundCloud users with similar music and tastes to your own.
Interact with them, like their music. If you like their music, they will come looking for your music. Keep interacting, make new friends. This is a music platform, and we all love talking about music.
Get friends and family to play and like your music and get them to comment. I would set up a SoundCloud account for my granny if got me a few plays and a nice comment. They all count.
The final thing you can do is spend $5 and buy 1000 plays of a specialist company. A quick Google search will throw up lots of companies who provide this service. I know some people frown on this. Personally, I don’t.
If a SoundCloud page has nothing but paid for plays, it is easy to spot. As the play count will be high and there will be no comments or interactions. If a page has lots of interactions and a block of paid plays somewhere in the middle, nobody will ever know. Music scouts look for talent and popularity above all other things. Play the game a little. Major record labels buy plays all the time (cough, allegedly). So why can’t you? Just do it in a smart way, just like they do.
If you use SoundCloud in a clever way, you can have thousands of plays and followers in a very short period of time.
Create Your Image
You want your page to look popular and professional. It is not hard to create a good image for yourself and look professional. Design a logo. You can do this yourself with free software or a pencil and paper. There are a million and one ways to create a good logo.
If you can’t do it yourself, grab a graphic designer of a website like Fiverr for $5, and they will make it for you. It is so easy to look good, and it does not have to cost the earth.
Write an interesting biography, don’t be boring, Be creative. Give your listeners something to read while they listen to your music. If they are engaged and interested in your page, they will stay there for a longer time.
You can then use your logo and bio across the rest of your social media. This will create a unified image and make you look professional and like you mean business. Use the same logo on everything. Youtube, Twitter, Facebook and Band Camp.
Music fans love this; talent scouts also love it. You will love it as you will feel professional. If you use SoundCloud effectively, you will gain followers who genuinely like your music. You will also have a brand and a page that looks attractive to talent scouts.
Frequently Asked Questions about how to get more views on soundcloud for free
How do you get free SoundCloud views?
If you want to make money on SoundCloud, you’ll have to part with some of your own money first. Sadly, there’s no way to access their monetisation for free – subscribing to a Pro account alone comes with a monthly charge. … Singers and musicians who monetise with SoundCloud Premier receive a 55% net revenue.Jun 19, 2020
Can you make money on SoundCloud free?
SoundCloud is a community that rewards interaction, so the best way to get thousands of plays and look popular is to find other SoundCloud users with similar music and tastes to your own. Interact with them, like their music. If you like their music, they will come looking for your music.
Is SoundCloud a good way to get noticed?
An expected payout can range from $0.0025 to $0.004 per stream. So for every 1000 plays, you’d receive between $2.50–$4.00.Apr 2, 2020
