Questioning if Music Diffusion’s Spotify promotion is price your cash? Right here’s my quick reply:

No, it’s not. Based mostly on my expertise attempting an $86 marketing campaign with this firm, I’d advocate that you just keep away from them.

The track I examined was positioned on 5 playlists. The entire lists have been owned by Music Diffusion (which, as I’ll get into under, isn’t a superb signal), they usually all confirmed indicators of bot exercise. Worst of all, the streaming knowledge that our placements generated in Spotify for Artists regarded completely pretend.

We ended up cancelling the marketing campaign a couple of week after we began it to attempt to decrease the harm.

If you happen to’d like to take a look at Music Diffusion’s website for your self, you are able to do that right here – however I’d strongly advocate that you just keep away from working a Spotify playlisting marketing campaign with them for the sake of your music and your sanity.

Over the remainder of this put up, I’ll element precisely what occurred. If you wish to see some sketchy playlisting outcomes for your self, preserve studying.

The background on my Music Diffusion marketing campaign

In an effort to replace my checklist of really helpful companies, I’ve been testing 15 totally different Spotify promotion firms over the previous few months. The outcomes have been about what I’d anticipated; most companies have supplied a spike in authentic streams, a few companies have pushed some vital longer-term development, and, sadly, two companies have appeared downright sketchy.

Music Diffusion was one of many sketchy firms.

I trialed the service with the track “Isolation” by Mori Metanoia. It’s a poignant piece of songwriting that falls someplace inside the vast, fantastic world of rock. The band claims a “various musical palette of rock, metallic, industrial, ambient, electronica, and goth” and lists 9 Inch Nails and Radiohead as references, in order you may guess, pinning down a particular style for his or her work isn’t precisely easy.

I favored the guts on this track, and I believed it might discover a match on sub-genre playlists. So we determined to offer it a shot.

The outcomes have been… not good.

The outcomes from the Music Diffusion marketing campaign

Honestly, I used to be slightly cautious of the service simply from trying on the entrance aspect of the web site. Music Diffusion claims to supply a very vast number of promotional companies, together with distribution to streaming platforms, ringtones distribution for $11 (what?), and sure, Spotify playlist placements. The whole lot is out there as a one-off product, which is type of unusual as a result of most companies providing a large swath of companies operate as companions quite than point-and-click outlets.

Nonetheless, the corporate lists a whole lot of critiques from supposed prospects claiming to be extremely glad with their companies, so I made a decision to go forward and see for myself.

Spoiler: I might not give these guys 4.3 stars.

To get began with the promotion, I crammed out the front-side order kind and submitted cost: $86 for submission to Spotify playlists with a complete of fifty,000 followers. From there, I instantly obtained an e-mail affirmation of the acquisition:

And settled in to attend for the outcomes.

Every week later, nothing had occurred. I used to be beginning to get slightly antsy after I obtained this e-mail:

Type of bizarre, since I’d enter the hyperlink to the observe after I’d submitted the shape. However hey, techniques have glitches, so I replied with the hyperlink they usually confirmed that they’d be beginning the promotion.

Then, 5 days later, I obtained an e-mail reply in the identical thread letting me know that the observe had been positioned.

This was bizarre on a number of ranges. Initially, the e-mail was from a gmail.com account when their earlier communication had been from a musicdiffusion.com account. Second, they signed off as “Musically,” which was the unique title of an organization that grew to become TikTok.

However, third and worst of all, every of the playlists to which we have been added regarded… sketchy. Right here’s the total checklist if you wish to verify them out for your self:

There are two huge purple flags right here. The primary is that every considered one of these lists is owned by Music Diffusion. That’s a foul signal; quite than accepting cost to pitch music to curators, it’s clear that Music Diffusion is accepting cost so as to add music to their very own lists, which is dangerously near payola. On the very least, it’s in opposition to Spotify’s consumer tips.

The second is that every of those lists exhibits clear indicators of bot exercise.

Take a look at a few follower graphs:

These graphs are precisely what you’d anticipate to see if an organization was shopping for followers for his or her playlists. It’s ridiculously apparent that spikes like these should not the results of regular individuals discovering these lists by way of regular means.

Sadly, issues regarded simply as sketchy within the Spotify for Artists account.

The observe obtained 10,000 performs on 4 (non-consecutive) days. Since then, it’s gotten just about nothing. You’ll additionally see that it obtained zero saves, which is totally absurd; playlisting campaigns do end in decrease engagement charges, however I’ve seen sufficient of them to know that if 10,000 individuals actually had streamed the track, any individual would’ve saved it.

Possibly weirdest of all, try the playlists tab for the track:

I notice you may’t actually inform from that picture as a result of it’s all white area, however right here’s what’s taking place: Spotify is saying that the track has been streamed on 10 playlists since 2015, but it surely’s solely displaying Radio.

There are not any playlists displaying up under that. It’s like the opposite playlists we have been on by no means even existed.

We instantly requested to cancel the remainder of the promotion.

I despatched Music Diffusion an e-mail:

They by no means responded to that, however the track was faraway from the playlists, and the pretend streams stopped coming in. I ended up working a SubmitHub marketing campaign for the observe to try to offset a number of the pretend knowledge. We solely obtained a few approvals, so it didn’t make a lot of a distinction, however hey, no less than they have been from people.

One attention-grabbing level is that Spotify’s “Radio” checklist nonetheless offers the track slightly little bit of play.

My guess is that the bot accounts are set to autoplay sure playlists, and after they end, they begin going by way of “Associated” songs, which might present up as Radio streams. There are not any different algorithmic playlists, as you may see, so it’s not like they’re checking their Launch Radar or working by way of On Repeat.

However I don’t know. Principally I’m simply weirded out by it.

Ultimate ideas on Music Diffusion

Normally after I wrap up considered one of these critiques, I checklist out some execs and cons of the service. On this case, although, there actually aren’t any execs. Sadly, that is simply pretend Spotify promotion.

To recap my outcomes:

I spent $86 to strive Music Diffusion’s Spotify playlisting promotion. The corporate positioned the track on 5 playlists that have been all owned by Music Diffusion and clearly constructed with bots. The track gathered about 10,000 streams on 4 (non-consecutive) days, after which went again to near-zero streams per day instantly. The information may be very clearly pretend.

I’m on the report as saying that artist’s overuse the phrase “rip-off,” and that, for probably the most half, promo firms are simply attempting their finest to market music in a tough business. I nonetheless assume that’s true, however clearly, there are nonetheless scams on the market.

Music Diffusion is considered one of them. My recommendation is to keep away from them.

If you happen to’re in search of authentic Spotify promotion, I’ve an entire checklist of firms that present actual outcomes (or, no less than, do their finest to place your music in entrance of actual curators). You possibly can verify that out right here.

No matter you do, right here’s wishing you nicely as you search for actual human individuals who will like your music.

Your music issues. Good luck.