At Sentric, we offer our artists the opportunity to feature in genre or mood specific playlists selected by international firms; placing their music in public places such as stores and venues for customers’ entertainment.
With this opportunity, we empower artists to reach over 50,000 venues and therefore prospective 50 million monthly listeners. When your music reaches a wider audience, it can be a great way to generate more fans. For example, in store you’ve just heard a great song and you want to discover who it was – you could Shazam the track!. Ultimately boosting number of listeners and generating additional royalties.
What music are playlists looking for?
Finding a playlist placement is competitive! So here are some tips from the Sentric Sync team to consider before applying:
Quality of Production
Playlists mix a number of well-known commercial artists with emerging artists that have music which meets similar quality standards, therefore production quality is the most important requirement when applying for in-store/jukebox opportunities.
Released Music
For this type of sync opportunity, the music has to be released and searchable on the most popular streaming platforms. Our clients are always looking for new exciting music, so new releases are favoured!
Clean Lyrics
Playlists will not feature tracks with explicit lyrics. This includes a list of thematics (such as politics, violence, references to drugs or alcohol), as well as offensive language.
Genre
Although requirements follow overall industry trends, certain genres are favoured to others, including: pop, indie, soul and electronic (in particular house, dance and downtempo).
EP/Albums
On top of singles, we are always pitching full EPs and albums for our jukebox playlists! Make sure to submit all of the tracks on your releases to make them eligible!
Registrations and all the boring stuff…
For jukebox playlists, your music needs to be registered to royalty collection societies to cover both the publishing and master sides.
Firstly, your tracks will have to be registered to your Sentric Account. This will ensure that the tracks are correctly registered with the PRS For Music as well as the other relevant international society equivalents.
On top of representing your music on the publishing side, our clients also require Sentric to represent playlisted tracks for Neighbouring Rights too. Neighbouring Rights deals protect the recording of a song (master rights). At Sentric we offer an additional service to artists who own their master rights: we can administer your Neigbouring Rights and register your music directly with several international societies so that your music is covered globally. You can read more about our Neighbouring Rights deal in our insightful blog here.
What kind of stores and countries do we work with?
We deliver your music to a long list of national and international firms primarily in the UK but also key territories across Europe, such as: Netherlands, Germany, France, Spain and Ireland. Some brands we have worked with in the past include: Coca Cola, Hilton Hotels, Nike and Pure Gym.
Please note: we are always looking to expand our territory and client reach, so brands may change in the future.
When do I get paid?
Every time a song is played in public, the songwriter and the performer and/or owner of the recording should receive royalties for those plays. Sentric’s royalties are distributed quarterly: January, April, July and October. If they surpass our system’s £40 threshold, you will receive a statement by email in the nearest distribution. This will include information regarding the usage!
Due to how the playlists are processed and organised, any royalties owed could take up to 9 months after usage for publishing income and 18 months for neighbouring rights income to be paid out.
How do we pitch your music?
There are three steps to obtain a placement on a jukebox playlist:
Step 1
Our sync team listens to all eligible music (refer to our registrations section!!) and pitch 100+ new tracks every month. These are divided into genre and mood specific playlists featuring singles or full EPs and albums.
Step 2
Our third party clients select which tracks are suitable for the brands and venues, they then compile the final playlists to upload on their system; usually taking around two months for a track to go through step 1 and step 2.
Step 3
Brands and venues select playlists from our client’s database based on their specific needs and aesthetic requirements. When a song gets selected as part of a playlist, plays get reported to the appropriate royalty collection societies and payments are successively distributed!
To submit your music, log into your account and head to the ‘Opportunities’ page.