Spotify recently made a small investment in the aggregator DistroKid, solidifying a major partnership that could push their new independent upload feature to the front of the pack. What does this partnership mean for independent artists?: Your tracks can be uploaded to multiple platforms through Spotify’s upload service – all facilitated by DistroKid.
This doesn’t mean a complete merger between the two companies, however; DistroKid will remain independently operated outside of the Spotify for Artists feature. But the move does respond to the largest criticism Spotify’s new feature, which is currently in beta testing. Despite the promised 50% royalties on each stream, Spotify for Artists originally lagged behind smaller digital distribution due to their lack of reach. In other words, paying for and uploading to Spotify for Artists still wasn’t appealing enough in comparison to their direct competitors.
Of course, the pure saturation of Spotify may still deter independent artists from paying to upload to Spotify. Without heavy promotion, it could be difficult to see any substantial royalty payouts.
Either way, Spotify is continuing to make moves that might yet make their business model profitable. This could very well be the year the streaming service moves out of the red.
What independent artists would you hope to see move to Spotify? Let us know in the comments!
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