# Success in submitting music to licensing companies



## sIR dORT (Oct 27, 2019)

I know this is a broad and highly variant question, but I'm going to ask it anyway: if I submit music to 9-10 licensing companies, and it's of good quality objectively speaking, how many should I expect to be accepted? Submitting my music to blogs right now and getting basically universally rejected so far is making me question how I'll fare in the licensing game. I know that submitting to blogs/playlists/etc is super subjective, which is why I ask about licensing.


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## muk (Oct 27, 2019)

What kind of music libraries are we talking about? Royalty free? Top tier exclusive libraries? Something in between?


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## sIR dORT (Oct 27, 2019)

Mostly not Royalty-free, and most are non-exclusive as I'm just starting with this. But the ones that I went with I made sure that they looked to be of at least decent quality.


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## muk (Oct 27, 2019)

That's a good choice. If the quality of the music is good, it should be accepted by some, if not most, of them. If it isn't, you are targeting the wrong libraries (still assuming the quality of the music is good).

The most important thing is to not be discouraged. There are plenty of reasons why music gets rejected. Many of them have little to do with the quality of the music, and certainly nothing with you as a composer. Try to see it as part of the game and don't let it discourage you. It takes some time. If a library hasn't listened to your music after two weeks or so, send a polite follow-up. You will start to see results after a while.


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## sIR dORT (Oct 27, 2019)

muk said:


> That's a good choice. If the quality of the music is good, it should be accepted by some, if not most, of them. If it isn't, you are targeting the wrong libraries (still assuming the quality of the music is good).
> 
> The most important thing is to not be discouraged. There are plenty of reasons why music gets rejected. Many of them have little to do with the quality of the music, and certainly nothing with you as a composer. Try to see it as part of the game and don't let it discourage you. It takes some time. If a library hasn't listened to your music after two weeks or so, send a polite follow-up. You will start to see results after a while.


Ok, I'm trying to keep reminding myself that. But holy crap it's so frustrating when people say "great song, enjoyed it! It just had one tiny element that I didn't like, so I'm not gonna review it." But good to know about following up. Let's hope I don't have to!


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## muk (Oct 28, 2019)

Good luck. Keep at it, and eventually it will work. I have no experience with submitting to blogs. With libraries it's a numbers game. But if the music is good, it will be accepted sooner or later.


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## BenG (Oct 28, 2019)

Is


sIR dORT said:


> I know this is a broad and highly variant question, but I'm going to ask it anyway: if I submit music to 9-10 licensing companies, and it's of good quality objectively speaking, how many should I expect to be accepted? Submitting my music to blogs right now and getting basically universally rejected so far is making me question how I'll fare in the licensing game. I know that submitting to blogs/playlists/etc is super subjective, which is why I ask about licensing.



Is your music of the same quality or better than what the library currently offers?


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## StevenMcDonald (Oct 29, 2019)

Like others (including yourself!) have said, it's difficult to come up with an estimate because of the many variables. But since you made this thread, I can tell it's heavy on your mind and you are dying to hear back! I understand, I've been there many times. I've probably had around a 1 in 10 response rate myself. Could be because I suck, or because my music just wasn't needed by those publishers at the time. We'll never know!

It's best to just forget about it and move on! Keep making tracks and putting together new and improved demos to send to more publishers. Repeat and don't dwell on the potential callbacks, and don't take rejection personally. At some point you'll accidentally send a library exactly what they're looking for!


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## rgames (Oct 29, 2019)

Definitely take a look through the archives here - this topic comes up regularly.

In my experience there are three factors:

1. Networking
2. Quantity
3. Luck

I can't figure out what "quality" means because every time I or someone else comes up with a definition you can find a ton of tracks that violate that definition but are all over the place making money.

So don't focus too much on "quality" - whatever that is. Focus on Networking, Quantity and Luck because everyone agrees that those three are definitely factors and they're easier to quantify.

rgames


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## boinkeee2000 (Oct 30, 2019)

sounds like you are an artist/songwriter whos had experience with such sites as submithub per blog/playlist submissions & reviews. Its a bit different on this side of the pond, while bloggers/playlisters would decline a track for broad & ambiguous artistic reasons, a lib would be more focused on the format/aesthetic/genre/useability of the track rather than personal preference (in most cases)...ive tried that route before with bloggers etc, where a trivial detail would get you declined...over here its more clinical.


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## fairyclown (May 5, 2021)

sIR dORT said:


> I know this is a broad and highly variant question, but I'm going to ask it anyway: if I submit music to 9-10 licensing companies, and it's of good quality objectively speaking, how many should I expect to be accepted? Submitting my music to blogs right now and getting basically universally rejected so far is making me question how I'll fare in the licensing game. I know that submitting to blogs/playlists/etc is super subjective, which is why I ask about licensing.


I know this is an older thread but I came across it while searching "submithub" because I was curious if anyone was talking about that website on here. I just want to say how encouraging these comments are! Because it sounds like we all experience the same thing lol! I haven't submitted to libraries, only a few Spotify playlists. I submitted to about 7 playlists, only heard back from one and they just responded to tell me to submit through a different link  but hey at least they opened my message! And on submithub, it feels like there isn't much variety there to submit to, but I gave it a try. My band's songs were rejected twice so far haha, but I did find it kind of a comfortable way to get feedback. I had a feeling our music was going to be hard to immediately put into a mainstream genre. The feedback we have received has only furthered my suspicions. We do have a rather different sound that I know might take some time to get used to. I really loved reading the experiences everyone has had on here and totally relating to them. Was wondering how it went for sIR dORT? if you ever followed up, let us know!


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