# Spotify and YouTube, can they coexist?



## DANIELE (Apr 6, 2021)

Hi all, an interesting question knokced at my door today.

I'd like to open a profile on spotify as an artist, I looked at how to do this and I see I must subscribe to some provider so that my music goes under it on spotify. Then some question raised in my mind:


Can I still monetize on Youtube the same tracks?
I got the permission to use some of my tracks to the users who asked me for, would they receive some sort of copyright claims after I register my music on spotify with some provider?
I tried to look at the provider sites but it is not always crystal clear.

I'm an hobby composer but I spend a lot of money on music, I do this for passion but I'd like some income from it. The actual income from YouTube is very poor and I'd like to try with spotify too. Since having some little income required more than 10 years on Youtube I'd like to avoid loosing it.

Some advice from you would be very appreciated.

Thank you for your time.


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## tf-drone (Apr 6, 2021)

Hi,

Youtube is mainly for video. Audio quality is automatically reduced to 128 kbit/s AFAIK, rather poor.

Spotify is for audio. The current audio quality is 320 kbit/s for paying subscribers, much better.


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## DANIELE (Apr 6, 2021)

tf-drone said:


> Hi,
> 
> Youtube is mainly for video. Audio quality is automatically reduced to 128 kbit/s AFAIK, rather poor.
> 
> Spotify is for audio. The current audio quality is 320 kbit/s for paying subscribers, much better.


Thank you for the information but I asked about monetizing both YouTube and Spotify with the same tracks.

Did you mean something I'm missing?


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## Manaberry (Apr 6, 2021)

To have Youtube at the same level as Spotify in terms of revenue per stream, it would require Youtube to multiply their revenue by 20.

People complain about Spotify paying so few... So imagine Youtube hehe.
You can monetize your work on Youtube, but don't expect anything decent from them if you don't make millions of views.

Usually, distributors send your tracks to Spotify as well as giving you the opportunity to monetize and publish them on youtube (Content ID). Both platforms coexist very well.

Spotify has no power over Youtube. It's all Content ID. Every video with your music will be claimed by Youtube Content ID (except whitelisted channels.) You can ask your distributor what channel to whitelist.

EDIT: What distributor are you aiming for?

Good luck!


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## DANIELE (Apr 6, 2021)

Manaberry said:


> To have Youtube at the same level as Spotify in terms of revenue per stream, it would require Youtube to multiply their revenue by 20.
> 
> People complain about Spotify paying so few... So imagine Youtube hehe.
> You can monetize your work on Youtube, but don't expect anything decent from them if you don't make millions of views.
> ...


Thank you for the explanation, yeah I read about the Content ID thing but I must understand well how it works.

About the distributor I'm looking for the adviced ones like cdbaby or distrokid...there are many more...I really don't know what to do.

I don't expect big incomes but the YouTube one is really the worst one, just be able to pay some library with that money sometime would be good.


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## reborn579 (Apr 6, 2021)

use cd baby, as they have a one time payment and they work with just about every platform. and once you upload something on cd baby it will also be available on youtube as an automatically uploaded audio. via cd baby you can connect those uploads to your official account.

so if your songs get played on spotify, apple music, youtube music etc there will be money coming from there. and if they get played on your original youtube channel - i understand your music is already on youtube - and if you're in the partner program, you will get some ad revenue - separately from the other revenue streams.


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## Jeremy Spencer (Apr 7, 2021)

DANIELE said:


> About the distributor I'm looking for the adviced ones like cdbaby


My band signed up with CD Baby years ago, and they place you on all the major platforms including Spotify. We sold a ton of CD's online, as well as downloads on iTunes, Amazon, etc.....until Spotify and Apple Music killed everything. If you plan on some sort of income from it, good luck. With the current streaming rates, you would earn, on average, $1~ per every 250 streams (per platform). It's sickening, really. I would hate to be a young band/artist right now, the whole system needs a massive overhaul, but that will take years. The only real winners are the platforms themselves, the superstar mainstream artists, and the major record labels.


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## DANIELE (Apr 8, 2021)

Jeremy Spencer said:


> My band signed up with CD Baby years ago, and they place you on all the major platforms including Spotify. We sold a ton of CD's online, as well as downloads on iTunes, Amazon, etc.....until Spotify and Apple Music killed everything. If you plan on some sort of income from it, good luck. With the current streaming rates, you would earn, on average, $1~ per every 250 streams (per platform). It's sickening, really. I would hate to be a young band/artist right now, the whole system needs a massive overhaul, but that will take years. The only real winners are the platforms themselves, the superstar mainstream artists, and the major record labels.


I know but Youtube is even worst. I work as an engineer and I do this things in my spare time, my income as engineer is enough to live but not very high as I would expect, at least in proportion to the role and amount of work. Since I work really hard for music I'd like to have something to add to my first income but there are not so many choices in front of me actually, this is why I'm also trying to walk this way. I don't think I will ever part of a big label, big studio, big something....so what should I do more?


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## Arbee (Apr 8, 2021)

I use Apple, Spotify and Youtube and all peacefully co-exist with the same content (with income in that order from best to worst). I enjoy having the video dimension of Youtube. I use CDBaby and happy with it, but do manage my own Youtube artist channel these days.

All great for building a public presence, but synch licencing (e.g. via quality libraries) is my preferred channel for income. 

And, it all takes time, continuous improvement, and resilience.


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## DANIELE (Apr 8, 2021)

Arbee said:


> I use Apple, Spotify and Youtube and all peacefully co-exist with the same content (with income in that order from best to worst). I enjoy having the video dimension of Youtube. I use CDBaby and happy with it, but do manage my own Youtube artist channel these days.


Thank you for your feedback.

How did you manage to get views and plays, especially on Apple and Spotify? Did you use any specific platform to make yourself known?


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## Arbee (Apr 8, 2021)

DANIELE said:


> Thank you for your feedback.
> 
> How did you manage to get views and plays, especially on Apple and Spotify? Did you use any specific platform to make


I find promoting my Youtube channel (occasionally I use cost effective Google display ads for some videos) spawns a surge of plays on Apple and Spotify (and Amazon). 

Getting on, and/or making your own, playlists seems to be quite successful for many. CDBaby has a useful guide to getting on Spotify playlists. Hope that helps.


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## Rachel (Apr 26, 2021)

Sorry I am a bit late, but this thread is very interesting as I have the same questions as you Daniele. I am using CDBaby to release my tracks on major streaming platforms. I like it as there is a one-time payment, and not a yearly subscription. But it can get a little bit expensive if you release many tracks a year.

A part of that, I also have a personal Youtube channel and I promote my music on it. When you send your music to CDBaby, they automatically create another youtube channel for your songs, but I don't promote this one at all, and I think it is not very useful.

As it has already been said, the revenues are nearly inexistent. I have hesitated a lot before to use CDbaby and release my music on Spotify, Apple and so on, as for the moment I must say it costs me more than I get, but I think that in terms of exposure it is good. I am trying to develop playlists on Spotify, I think it is the key to be heard.

There is also a sync possibility with CDBaby, but if someone can explain me how it works, I would be very grateful, thank you


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## DANIELE (Apr 27, 2021)

Rachel said:


> Sorry I am a bit late, but this thread is very interesting as I have the same questions as you Daniele. I am using CDBaby to release my tracks on major streaming platforms. I like it as there is a one-time payment, and not a yearly subscription. But it can get a little bit expensive if you release many tracks a year.
> 
> A part of that, I also have a personal Youtube channel and I promote my music on it. When you send your music to CDBaby, they automatically create another youtube channel for your songs, but I don't promote this one at all, and I think it is not very useful.
> 
> ...


Hi Rachel, I'm doing the same thing, I'm trying to promote my official YouTube channel even if they will put my music on another channel.
I ended doing a subscription to DistroKid after some evaluations because I have A LOT of tracks to upload (> 100 tracks) and my incomes are very very very (did I said very?) low so I cannot spend for every upload. Let's say I'm trying to see how it goes and then I'll decide if I want to keep doing this or not.

I'm still doing some "testing" as actually I have very few streams but I'm not so hopeful about the fate of my music on the various stores.


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