How Artists Can Make Money On Soundcloud

So you’ve reached the point where you have been going crazy uploading your singles, mixtapes and albums to Soundcloud and finally want to get compensated for it.

Well we are here to help give you information on how to monetize the music you place on Soundcloud.

In this article we give a break down on how artists make money on Soundcloud. As an indie artist you may not like the results of what you see but it’s up to you to decide if you want to take this route or not.

Also keep in mind Soundcloud just started this type of platform about a year and some change ago. they may come up with even better way in the near future.

On Soundcloud Partner Program

Soundcloud back in 2014 launched a program called On Soundcloud. How is works the service will allow artists to monetize the content they upload to SoundCloud through paid advertisements.

The paid ads will appear on either the Soundcloud player or within a streaming audio file. This may annoy your fans before they listen to you music, but this is what Soundcloud has come up with so far.

Also Read: 5 Ways To Get More Soundcloud Plays

Soundcloud Tiered Structure

Soundcloud has a tiered structure for their members. As an artist you can take care of three types of memberships.

Partner – This is the free tier. It allows you to upload 3 hours of content. It also comes with online support and basic reporting and statistics (play counts, likes, comments and downloads). Knowing if three hours of content is good for you are not depends on what you want to accomplish as an artist on Soundcloud.

Pro – This tier is a paying one. It will cost you $6 per month (or $55 annually) and you’re upload limit will be changed to 6 hours of content.

The Pro tier comes with a feature Quiet Mode, once enabled it will allow you to manage comments and stats for your tracks. This tier also lets artists “Spotlight” their best work, by pinning your top track(s) and playlist(s) to the top of your profile.

Pro Unlimited – This tier gives artists unlimited uploads – and it costs $15 per month (or $135 annually). In addition to all of the aforementioned features, you also get some advanced analytics perks.

With Pro Unlimited, you can see who’s playing/downloading your tracks, which countries/states/cities you’re most popular in, and which social networks are providing the most traffic or engagement.

What you should be aware of as an artists is that if you use a Partner, Pro or Pro Unlimited account, no audio ads will be placed on your tracks, and you are not eligible for revenue sharing.) So that means only Premier account users are eligible for income from audio ads.

Premier – The final tiered option is the Premier account. The Premier level is available by invite only and this is the tier where artists can start making money from the tracks they upload.

What SoundCloud has done is hand-selected a small group of artists or “creators” to participate in the initial rollout. What we want to see id the full rollout of the new ad format this platform has, so that it can be available to all artists, and even all users!

How Much Money Can Artists Make On Soundcloud

This has to be discussed with you and soundcloud. Once they accept you applications everything will be outlined to you and your management team. or you and your record label.

From our expereince users with little to no fans, vies, plays, and comments will not be selected to be apart of Soundclouds shared revenue program. The reason for this is because they want companies to be able to advertise on pages with audio files that reach a wide audience.

This is so they can get more of a bang for their buck. it’s just business. As an artist you can complain to them or find another platform to make money.

That’s how it is for now and I hope things change because Soundcloud is a great platform for music lovers. Your other Option is to Build Your Own Music Website and host all your music there to sell.

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