Inside Stories: The Secrets Behind A Profesionally Curated Spotify Playlist
We had a chat with Kit Germans about working as a playlist curator, about editorial playlists, about fake streams,
Offering a potential audience of hundreds of millions music lovers, it’s no wonder that Spotify has become the Holy Grail platform for musicians world wide. This the main reason why there are curently 60k new songs released on the Swedish music streaming platform every single day! That’s an average of 2500 songs per hour!!!
This is where the ingenious playlist system within Spotify comes to give a helping hand for the listeners, avid for discovering new music. Editorial playlists, curated by Spotify, automated playlists created by complex algorithms or independent playlists, owned and curated by music passionates.
Having the power to influence algorithms and at the same time to offer the much needed exposure for artists at the dawn of their musical career, independent playlists became an important element in the digital music promo eco-system.
Somewhere in this vast ocean of independent playlists we stumbled upon a playlist followed by 128,000 listeners for its easy going summer vibe: Summer Hits 2021
We were really curious about what is going back in the backstage of a successful independent playlist, so we invited Kit Germans, owner of Summer Hits 2021, for an extended chat about the daunty job of a playlist curator, about fake streams as well as editorial playlists and much more. Enjoy as much as we did!
Since when is music an integral part of your life?
Music has been part of my life for as long as I can remember. My dad had a collection of vinyls, consisting of the greatest musicians and rock bands - the likes of the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Jimmy Hendrix, Electric Light Orchestra. Even before I started primary school, I have already fallen in love with their and especially the emotions they were able to express. This has made me want to play an instrument of my own. I wanted to play an instrument that was not in demand, something that other kids were least likely to play, so I chose to pick up the violin. I have truly fallen in love with music as I was able to immerse myself into a whole different world. Since then, I have joined an orchestra, started to learn other instruments like the piano and guitar, and began discovering the vast amount of genres that music has to offer.
How did you end up becoming a music curator?
A year ago when I finished university, I was still discovering my passions and hadn’t found the path I would like to officially step on. When an opportunity presented itself to join Soar Music Group as a Business Developer and A&R curator, I immediately knew this is where I wanted to be - amongst like-minded people sharing one true passion in life - music.
What drives you to curating music playlists? What’s your motivation?
Did you know that over 60,000 songs are being released on spotify every single day? Unfortunately, the music scene nowadays is as competitive as it ever has been. Most of the songs don’t breakthrough, no matter how good and unique they are. This is especially true if artists do not have the support of the big players behind them. Playlist curation gives me the power to offer this first push to artists and give their songs the exposure they deserve. Besides that, you are discovering new music every single day, and when you find that one song which gives you goosebumps and makes your body vibrate, you think to yourself: “This is why I do this”
Can playlisting be a full-time job? Is it for you?
I believe that building Spotify playlists can offer a lot of opportunities in the music scene, and whether you can sustain yourself from playlisting depends solely on your entrepreneurship and creativity. For people who are looking for a passive income, curating playlists is a great option as there are a number of platforms compensating playlist curators for their efforts. Playlisting revolves around listening and discovering new music every day, so becoming a curator should be no trouble at all since most people do that every single day for free. However, if we are talking about building a steady full-time income, curators must be a bit more creative and think out-of-the-box to find their own sustainable revenue streams.
One track that really defines your playlist sound
Since it is currently summer, this track represents our current playlist sound
How can you sustain yourself, financially, from doing playlists? In order to keep doing this as a professional activity…
In the past years, playlists have become an integral part of Spotify. Getting on a good Spotify playlist is crucial as it helps artists get discovered and increase their streaming numbers. This is especially the case for new and upcoming artists who are not known in the industry. Having spotted this gap in the music space, we started to utilize our playlists to perform campaigns for artists to help them gain visibility in the music sector. By working with other like-minded third-party playlist curators, we place the songs to as many genuine playlists as possible, whilst returning the favour and placing curator releases in our playlists. We call this performing a trade.
Unfortunately, since this became one of the most effective ways an artist can increase their streaming numbers, people have started to take advantage of this by creating non-authentic playlists with so-called “fake followers”. You would be surprised that not only third-party consumers started to engage with non-authentic playlists, in my experience as a playlist curator, I have personally found both labels and artists who have been creating their following with fake audiences. Therefore, it is absolutely crucial for both curators and artists to find legitimate and credible playlists curators.
What are you looking for in a track to add it to your playlist?
Once you start receiving over a hundred submissions daily, besides listening to the quality of the song, you start judging its uniqueness and the emotions it is making you feel. The song may have been mixed by the best engineers, the vocals and instrumentals are superb but if it does not arouse any emotions, there is not much you can do.
It is also important to understand your playlist sound and the audience that listens to your music. Having built a large playlist following, I know what kind of music our audience values and expect to find, so it is imperative to stay credible to the music style and think whether a particular song would complement the current flow of the songs within a playlist.
Can you name one track you received recently that didn’t fit your playlist?
A song that was really nicely produced and I liked a lot but did not fit into the genre.
What tools and methods do you use to discover new music?
When we are talking about new music by emerging artists, there are quite a few platforms that connect new fresh talent with established curators. Since paying for a playlist placement is technically against Spotify’s terms and conditions - it is termed as “payola”, these platforms charge artists to have their songs considered, rather than placed. So if you have paid to submit a song to a particular playlist, you are not guaranteed a placement and it will depend on the curator whether they like the record. However, even if the song was not placed, in some platforms you are guaranteed feedback about the song from the curator themselves. Platforms that we use almost daily are PlaylistClub, Groover, HumanHuman and SoundCampaign as these offer top song quality as well as a good amount of versatility and diversity of genres.
What does a good song pitch mean to you when you are approached by artists?
This is a very good question as artists and managers sometimes underestimate the power of a first impression. Imagine that the artist is the sales person and the product is their song. Artists cannot expect that their song will be listened to by curators, let alone placed in the playlist if they put zero effort in their sales pitch. You would be surprised at how easy it is to distinguish a mass generated email pitch from a genuinely personal one targeting your playlist. The problem with the mass pitches is that the artists sometimes fail to prospect the relevant playlists and end up sending their Hip-Hop submission to a Deep House playlist. Not only will you be rejected straight away, you probably won’t even receive any kind of response.
When I see a well-crafted song submission that was meant for our playlist, I am happy to listen to the song and give it feedback even if that is not what we are looking for. However, when I see the same general song submission that I receive on a daily basis, chances are it will not even be listened to.
How many daily submissions do you receive and how do you handle all this volume?
At times, we can receive up to a hundred submissions per day so we have to be critical when deciding which songs to place in our playlists. To help ease the submission process, we have started a Patreon account which helped us take control over countless submissions and build an audience of artists who are serious about placing their music with us. By becoming a member of our patreon, artists and labels alike can submit their songs to us every single month and stay up to date with our developments. This way we are attracting artists who chose our network for a reason and will stay for us long-term, continuously pitching their new music to our playlists. The support that we receive from Patreon is reinvested back into our playlists so we can continue to grow, create more playlists and offer better performance for our artists.
Are you building or have you considered building a record label around your playlist activity?
Building a record label is quite a big step and we are holding off any of the discussion around this topic until the time is right.
Do you think that at some point the DSPs should pay you for your work as a playlister / music curator?
This question sits on a very thin line. I believe that curators who spend their time and money to keep building their playlist audience absolutely should receive some sort of recognition. Whether playlisters should get paid monetary value, really depends on the performance and the impact a playlist is making on the artists. Nevertheless, I believe that there must be some kind of incentive offered by the DSPs to serious third-party curators who are able to help artists get discovered and increase their streaming numbers.
Would it be better for the industry (not just for you) if Spotify and other platforms allow charging for playlist placement? Who would this benefit mostly? The big spenders or the quality?
Again, I believe that this is a very delicate issue. Paying for direct placements will not work unless there will be some structure around this process. For it to work and be beneficial for artists, guidelines must be created that would allow for transparency and fairness. It is imperative to understand what kind of value the playlist placement will bring. If playlist placement were ever to be allowed, the “paying for placement” process should be monitored, centralized and more transparent. Most importantly, the lemon problem in the Spotify playlist scene must be eliminated. All that artists see are playlists with huge amounts of followers, beautiful covers and professionally written descriptions and don’t have the information whether the playlist is active, will generate any streams to their songs or worst of all, is filled with a fake audience.
Let’s say you receive this track below. Please give us a feedback on the track, the way you normally do for a submission
"Right from the start, the track creates such a funky and uplifting feeling. The soulful vocals are captivating and demonstrate an impressive high pitch. My favourite part was the vocal transition into the retro disco autotune, it was done smoothly and brilliantly. This unconventional element gives the track a fresh feel and puts it out of the traditional "pop" genre box. Overall, I loved the production of the song and especially the uplifting feel that it managed to create".
If payment for playlist placement is not an option, how do you see other forms of remuneration for your work? Advertisement, submission review (Submit Hub etc.), other?
I believe that growth is an essential part of the playlisting game. You always want to continue building your audience and for people to share your playlists. It is not as much about the money as the recognition that the music that you curate attracts people from all over the world. That is the kind of remuneration that I believe curators would be happy with.
How do you feel about major labels playlist operations (Warner, Sony, Digster)?. Is it a fair competition against independent playlists? Is this (placement of own label content) a masked form of monetising playlists?
I would not say that algorithmic playlists are in direct competition against independent playlists. Spotify’s algorithmic playlists such as Release Radar, Discover Weekly and Daily Mix do not posses the human factor and are created based on statistics and data. The songs are added more objectively as it does not depend on the curators’ subjective interpretation. The algorithm will analyze track’s quality, influences and most importantly how often the song is being picked up by independently curated playlists.
When we are talking about Topsify, Filtr and Digster, the playlists of these labels hold the advantage of being more credible amongst any other label. As a result, songs placed in those playlists have a higher chance of being picked up by the Spotify editorial team. Being placed in the editorial playlists is not only an achievement that shows the song’s potential to be amongst the best, they also generate a lot of streams due to their large and active audience. Having said that, independent curators and labels have been growing impressive playlists over the years, some even generating over tens of thousands streams per day.
Playlists give artists and labels an additional source of streams. If a playlist has an active audience and is able to generate a large amount of streams, labels will always prioritize their own releases. Same thing goes for artists and their personal playlists. Even if it can be seen as a form of monetisation, it is a win-win approach that provides qualitative music for listeners whilst generating revenue for labels and their artists.
Apart from this, what do you do for a living?
Soar Playlists is only one of the verticals that we are active in. Our company Soar Music Group is a full-service music agency that does management, events, bookings & sync. We always try to find ways on how to be active in all of the corners of the music space. We are entrepreneurial by nature so coming up with new innovative ideas is my full-time job.