Mazimizing benefits from large collaborations

Written by Kyle Kraft of Krafty Entertainment

Krafty Entertainment is a music business development coaching company dedicated to providing guidance to musicians (and their teams) on how best to nurture supporters and profit from doing so. Krafty Entertainment’s founder Kyle Kraft has over 20 years experience in assisting both developing and established artists in substantially growing their net income from their music. Interested in working with us? Let’s talk!

When done correctly releasing a collaboration with an established artist can be a great means of increasing awareness of an artist’s music. Many artists are willing to take a payment (usually upfront, sometimes a percentage of income from the track, and sometimes a combination of both) in exchange for a collaboration, with the amount often being dependent on how large of an audience they have, how interested they are in making the collaboration happen, and so on. While investing in a collaboration can be beneficial if executed properly, the artist whose music it is needs to ensure they are taking proper steps to actually benefit from the collaboration as much as is possible. Whether you already have an unreleased collaboration with an established artist or you are considering trying to secure one, hopefully the following suggestions help you maximize the benefit that you can get out it.

UNDERSTAND THE REALITIES OF GUEST APPEARANCES

The public is aware of the fact that many artists are willing to collaborate with less established artists in exchange for payment, so in most circumstances a collaboration is not going to be viewed as much of a co-sign or be otherwise beneficial simply because the song is made available for streaming. Many developing artists release singles with more established guest features don’t make enough effort to promote the collaboration or otherwise benefit from it, only to end up disappointed with the fact that streams of the song weren’t substantially higher. 

ENSURE THE POTENTIAL COLLABORATION IS A GOOD FIT 

You only have so much time and money, so would be wise to ensure you are maximizing the effectiveness of the use of each by focusing on things that are likely to be as beneficial as is possible for you. As far as collaborations are concerned, that means working with people that are the most likely to help you make as many new fans of your music as is possible which usually means something that is stylistically complementary. If the potential collaborator’s audience isn’t likely to connect with the type of music you make, you might be better off investing your time and money elsewhere.

Also be sure that the artist you’re considering collaborating with has good engagement on the platforms you’re looking to grow your own engagement on. If your goal is to increase your Spotify streams by collaborating with an artist, ensure they actually have legitimate streams on Spotify this year and under the same name. A collaboration with a solo artist who was part of a big group years ago but doesn’t have a lot of streams now as a solo artist isn’t likely to help you get a lot more streams, so be sure to take the time to review their current engagement.

REQUEST THE COLLABORATION AND PROMOTIONAL SUPPORT FOR IT AT THE SAME TIME

If you don’t already have a good relationship with the guest artist, you are almost certainly going to have to offer some money upfront to get them to be willing to consider doing the feature. Be sure to recognize that you are also going to need spend some money to promote the song to reach the guest artist's fan base in order for the collaboration to be as beneficial as possible, so when you are determining your budget for this collaboration be sure to keep promotion in mind as well.

With any collaborations you're considering paying for do what you can to get permission to list them as a primary artist on the track (along with you) as opposed to just as a feature, as getting to list artists with strong followings as a primary artist will result in a lot more streams and listeners (than only listing them as a feature) due to getting access to their Release Radar listeners on Spotify (which is big for artists with a substantial following), having the song appear as their latest release on their artist profiles on streaming platforms, and so on. Having the established collaborator be a primary artist is definitely more beneficial to you, so should be a key request when you are negotiating terms for the collaboration.

Consider requesting that the guest artist potentially promote the song (via their email mailing list, their social media and YouTube channel, any playlists they may control, and perhaps even having them appear in and helping create awareness for a music video to use to connect with their audience), any supporting video content, and/or any giveaways or contests you may also set up to support the single to their fan base as part of your offer to compensate them for the collaboration. Be conscious of the fact that in some cases the more that you ask for, the more some artists may want to be paid. While having the guest artist's promotional support isn't necessary to making a collaboration make sense, it would definitely help it make more sense so at the very least be sure to address the topic with them.

Be sure to create a simple contract outlining the terms of the agreement you make, and do not make a payment until they’ve sent you back the signed contract. Your distributor may require you to show them this contract (and in the case of Distrokid may also require the collaborator’s Twitter account to send Distrokid a DM confirming they’re okay with the release, or else provide a photo of their driver’s license or passport) in order to proceed with sending the song to streaming platforms, so don’t skip this step. 

If you’re paying a substantial amount of money for the collaboration you would be wise to request that payment be made partially upon receipt of the signed contract, and partially upon delivery of their commitments (ie sending you the stems of their recording, their DM’ing Distrokid if you’re using them for distribution, their appearing in a promotional video, etc). Keeping someone you don’t already have a strong relationship with financially incentivized to deliver what they’re committing to is a good business practice, and a wise way to protect yourself in this often shady industry.

ARRANGE YOUR SONG SO YOUR PERFORMANCE IS BEFORE YOUR COLLABORATOR’S 

In order to maximize the number of your collaborator’s fans that listen to your part of the song, you would be wise to have your collaborator’s part be as late in the song as makes sense. If you put them earlier, some of their fans may be inclined to stop listening after they hear your collaborator’s contribution that got them to listen to the song. Regardless, your performance on the song needs to be as good or better than your collaborator in order to win over the people who are listening to the song because of their involvement.

SHOOT A MUSIC VIDEO FOR THE SONG

If you can get your collaborator to appear in a music video to promote the song (which could be worth some extra compensation) it would make sense to invest in creating a quality music video. This video can not only be used on your own platforms, but also on the collaborator’s platforms if they’re willing, as well as in video ads you create. If you aren’t able to get your collaborator to appear in the video it could still make sense to shoot a video for the song, and find a creative way to still showcase your collaborator’s part of the song in the video even though they’re not in the video.

If you are able to get your established collaborator to appear in a music video, you would be wise to also invest in having an additional camera person or two dedicated to taking behind the scenes video and photos with you and them in them, interviewing them, and so on. A music video shoot where you are both together for hours is a great opportunity to get a bunch of supplementary video content that can be used to further promote the song online.

If shooting a quality music video for the song isn’t possible, at the very least make a lyric video to use to promote to both of your audiences. Lyric videos are generally not as effective at engaging cold audiences as music videos, but having video content of some kind to support the online promotion of a song is critical.

In any case be sure to have both of your names on screen prominently at the start of any video content you create in support of the song so that the name recognition of your collaborator will result in more people watching the video than otherwise might.

ENSURE YOU HAVE A STRONG WEB PRESENCE AND MAILING LIST SET UP

Make sure the bio on your Spotify artist profile is up to date, that there are quality photos on there, and that links to your strongest social media platforms are also listed on the “About” page of your Spotify artist profile so that anyone who discovers you as a result of the track can easily become more engaged with you as an artist. Having the bio, photos, and links up to date on your artist profile is also important to maximizing the likelihood that Spotify’s editors will consider adding the track to one of their curated playlists when you submit it via the “Upcoming” music section of Spotify for Artists.

While having a good social media presence is important (especially on at least some of the platforms your collaborator has a large presence on) its also important to ensure that you are as set up as possible to maximize the long term benefit you can get from a collaboration that will expose your music to new people. Having at least a simple website set up (which you can do yourself fairly quickly with no web design experience and minimal expense using one of the many DIY website services like Squarespace) with a focus on building your email mailing list (I recommend using an email mailing list platform like Drip) and/or SMS texting list (note that SMS lists tend to have a much higher rate of unsubscribes, so start with email) is critical. Mailing lists can be cornerstone sources of income for artists who are effectively capitalizing on all potential income streams, and when nurtured properly over time can account for the majority of many developing artists’ music-related income. 

Setting up a contest or giveaway to incentivize more of the people who are discovering you as a result of the collaboration to join your mailing list is a wise idea, but be careful to make the prize(s) something that people who are actually interested in your music would want (ie merch, exclusive access, etc) as opposed to something pretty much anyone would want (ie an Amazon gift card). Quality of leads is more important that quantity!

ENSURE YOU ARE SET UP TO MAXIMIZE YOUR SHORT-TERM INCOME VIA ONLINE SALES

While most people who weren’t already supporters of your music won’t be ready to give you their hard-earned cash yet just because you released a song with an artist that they are interested in, some people may be ready to do more than just listen to more of your music or sign up for your mailing list. Having an online store set up to sell physical products like shirts, sweatshirts, and even physical albums (especially autographed and personalized copies) is critical to your income. The sale of a single shirt can generate you as much income as much as 10,000 streams, so this is an important revenue stream to ensure you are capitalizing on. As your engage listeners via social media and your mailing list some of them will be more inclined to support you further with purchases of physical products.

You can set up a simple online store yourself with minimal expense using a platform like Shopify. You can start with print-on-demand merchandise which is a good way to test out demand before committing to ordering the dozens of pieces of merch (that are necessary to make a full run of merch make financial sense), but margins tend to not be very good with print on demand options. If you want to test out a piece of merch you can always do a pre-sale for it to gauge demand, letting your supporters know that it will be weeks before you will actually be printing them and that you will be refunding them if you don’t get a minimum amount of orders needed to have the order make sense. In any case, be cautious about ordering large quantities of merch unless you’ve already had good success in selling merch and don’t complicate things (and tie up cashflow) with a bunch of different designs and color options until you know the demand is there. Polling your supporters via social media or better yet your mailing list are a good way to determine interest in designs and colors, but doing pre-orders is even better.

SETTING UP A SINGLE RELEASE WITH YOUR COLLABORATOR AS A PRIMARY ARTIST

When you’re uploading the track for distribution be sure you list your collaborator as a primary artist and not as a feature if you’ve been given permission to do so. Any tracks that you're listing a collaborator as a primary artist will have to come out as a single prior to the an album or EP release (in order to be able to list them as a primary artist, which you can't do if the track is only released as part of a larger project), so you should plan to release those tracks leading up to the release of a full project.

In order to have both your distributor and streaming platforms allow you to have your collaborator be a main artist, its essential that the track artwork also look reflect that. The artwork can’t say “ft” or “featuring” before their name, otherwise the distributor or streaming services may not allow the single to be uploaded or may change it to your collaborator being a feature instead of a primary artist (in some cases without even informing you of the change). Ensure your collaborator’s name gets the same treatment as yours on the artwork to ensure that doesn’t happen.

Also, be aware that Spotify will usually only allow a maximum of 3 primary artists on a track for singles distributed via DIY distributors (ie Distrokid, Tunecore, CD Baby, etc), so be sure to not upload a single with more than 3. Otherwise you may find that NONE of the artists you had intended to be primary artists end up that way, as sometimes Spotify will make the primary artist of tracks with a large number of artists be “Various Artists”. Prioritize making yourself and your established collaborator as primary artists; if there is more than one other artist on the track you can always list them as a featured artist instead. 

ALLOW FOR A MONTH BETWEEN DISTRIBUTION AND RELEASE

Building in some extra time between when you distribute a song with an established collaborator and when you want it to be released is a wise idea. There can be distribution delays as your distributor may want confirmation that your collaborator is okay with the release (whether they are listed as a primary artist or just as a feature), since in the past people have released songs with vocals from artists that didn’t actually give their permission for their vocals to be used. Some distributors may require you to send them your signed contract with your collaborator AND request that they DM them or provide a photo of their driver’s license or passport to confirm they are okay with them being included on the single, and their review of whatever you send them can take some time.

While Spotify currently says you should pitch a song for playlists no later than 7 full days in advance of the intended release, they used to request 3 weeks for that so that may be a better window to aim for to maximize the likelihood of getting curated playlist support. With that and the several days it normally takes between the time a song is distributed and when it shows up in Spotify’s database, you’re probably best to aim to distribute a single a full month before your intended release date.

PITCH THE SONG TO SPOTIFY PLAYLISTS VIA SPOTIFY FOR ARTISTS

Not only does pitching your song via the “Upcoming” music section of your Spotify for Artists dashboard at least 7 full days in advance get your music considered for the Release Radar algorithmic playlist, but it is also the best means of pitching music for Spotify’s staff curated playlists as well. Highlighting your collaborator’s involvement in the song in your pitch may increase the likelihood of your getting on a Spotify curated playlist or playlists that you previously haven’t.

PITCHING THE SONG TO APPROPRIATE YOUTUBE CHANNELS

Depending on your genre of music there may be YouTube music channels with substantial followings that might be interested in premiering your song (especially if they’ve featured your collaborator’s music in the past) on their channel. Its important to reach out to them weeks in advance of your release in order to allow them sufficient time to consider whether they want to feature the track on their channel. These channels are typically not interested in featuring music that has already been released. 

Be sure that you release the single on audio streaming platforms like Spotify at the same time as its released on any YouTube channels; the initial engagement of the song on those platforms is critical to determining how much algorithmic support the song will get, so be sure to give it the best chance possible to reach as many listeners as is possible by directing people to the song on those platforms.

CHECK TO ENSURE YOUR COLLABORATOR IS LINKED TO THE CORRECT ARTIST PROFILE

Its possible that even if you do everything right when you are distributing the single that your collaborator might not be linked to their correct artist profile for the track on Spotify. You should check to ensure that they are linked to the correct artist profile the night the song is released, and if it isn’t contact Spotify right away via the following form to request that they fix it:

https://artists.spotify.com/contact

PITCHING THE SONG TO APPROPRIATE SPOTIFY USER-GENERATED PLAYLISTS

Aside from ensuring the track is included in any appropriate playlists you or your collaborator may control, its worthwhile for you to research (search user names on social media platforms) curators who control playlists with lots of followers who either feature your collaborator’s music or may be inclined to do so, and then reach out to them asking them to consider featuring your song with them.

There is an entire cottage industry of playlisters who charge for placement on their playlists, and that isn’t likely worth paying for as it usually won’t generate even the same amount of money that it costs you let alone making you a profit - even indirectly. Its also not worthwhile to pay for a playlist promotion service; there’s a high likelihood that using a Spotify “promo” service will result in you getting a bunch of fake bot-operated “plays” which could potentially result in your music getting removed from Spotify completely, and the best case scenario is that it won’t make you back as much money as those services charge.

In general its worthwhile for you to do the research and pitch the few appropriate playlists yourself in case they’re willing to add your song without charging you, but its not wise to pay to have your music featured on playlists.

ADVERTISING THE SONG

The most effective advertising you can do to work towards turning a cold audience into fans and customers is video ads on Facebook and Instagram, in which your goal is to build a custom audience of people (for retargeting purposes) who watch most of your video in order to determine who are interested in your music. You should be aiming to use a video of the full song (either the music video or a lyric video) on Facebook, and the first 2 minutes of the video on Instagram (since that’s the maximum length of a video ad on IG). YouTube doesn’t allow the same kind retargeting that FB& IG does, so is not as effective an option to building a truly monetizable audience beyond just getting paid for YouTube streams.

While its possible to send people to Spotify and other streaming platforms with your FB & IG ads, doing so will usually not make financial sense as the cost of the ads will not likely be covered (even indirectly) by the streaming income generated. Instead, you’re better off continuing to warm the custom audience up with content to the point that they are ready to sign up for your mailing list, and then make them sales offers for physical products. For a lot more direction on running effective FB & IG ads check out:

https://indepreneur.io/lp/fan-finder-method-p87V27/?ref=14 

These ads are most likely to be the best spend of your promotional dollars, helping you generate a retargetable audience of listeners who you can continue to engage with to move them along in the journey from mildly interested in your music to mailing list subscriber, then customer, then repeat customer and advocate of your music. While you may be inclined to spend money on PR, playlist promotion, etc you are almost certainly going to get better results from dedicating more money to your advertising budget than pursuing those kinds of initiatives.

BE READY TO MAINTAIN MOMENTUM

Its important to keep attention when you get it. You should be ready to release another song (ideally something similar to what got your new listeners interested in you in the first place) shortly after your release this collaboration, and also to stay in new listeners’ minds with regular social media posts and emails to your mailing list. Having a plan in place for those follow ups and perhaps even having the next song finished, social media posts and emails to your mailing list written and scheduled will take the pressure off and allow you to retain as much of your new audience as is possible.  

This information was compiled by Kyle Kraft of Krafty Entertainment. Whether you are an artist who is in the early stages of building your career and have next to no money to invest into it looking for the best paths to generating income, are an artist that has established a following and are interested in getting assistance with securing tens of thousands of dollars in funding to further your career, or are an artist or collective with an extensive fan base that would like assistance with increasing the efficiency of your business development, we can help you.

Want to read more articles written by Kyle? You can do so here.