People don’t want to miss out on good stuff. If they love your music, they will hit the like button, put it on repeat, save it on their private playlist, or maybe share it with friends. But – and this is the only but – you must be discovered to be desired.
The algorithmic playlists are where upcoming artists become popular on Spotify. This is your chance to go viral. This article is all about giving you the oft-ignored Spotify playlisting hacks that have worked for major labels and successful indie artists.
Are you ready? Let’s roll.
What are Spotify Algorithmic Playlists?
As the name suggests, Spotify Algorithmic Playlists are playlists that are curated by the Spotify algorithm. Unlike editorial playlists and listener playlists, artists can easily hop on algorithmic playlists by following the rules explained later in this guide.
Spotify algorithmic playlists are not the same for everyone. The algorithm curates private playlists for every user based on individual listening habits. Factors – such as save rate, replay value, like, share rate – help the algorithm decide what music is best for its users. The implication of this curation technique is that a song can remain in the playlists of millions of Spotify users for as long as the users keep listening to the song. Editorial playlists are updated weekly or monthly but algorithmic playlists tend to feature songs for longer periods of time.
These are the 5 Types of Algorithmic playlists on Spotify – Don’t Miss Out on Any!
The five types of algorithmic playlists on Spotify include Discover Weekly, Release Radar, Daily Mix, On Repeat and Repeat Rewind, and Spotify Radio. In this section, you will learn the nature of these playlists and how the algorithm places songs in these playlists.
Discover Weekly
After several weeks of using the Spotify app, the algorithm creates a Discover Weekly playlist for users and updates the playlist content every Monday. The playlist contains exactly 30 songs.
Although the playlist is personalized like other algorithmic playlists, Discover Weekly is also influenced by the musical taste of other like-minded users who listen to the same genre or artists.
‘Stealing’ new music recommendation from 356 million Spotify users prevents the Spotify algorithm from suffocating users with their favorite songs; hence users can discover new releases that align with their old stuff.
How Does Discover Weekly Work?
The Discover Weekly algorithm is influenced by three factors, namely – collaborative filtering, natural language processing, and raw audio track analysis. These three factors determine what song makes it to the playlists and what song stays for long.
Collaborative Filtering
Collaborative filtering is defined as the ability of the algorithm to analyze user interactions with songs using a matrix-like rectangular array of user stats of 356 million users against its 70 million track archive. Simply put, collaborative filtering is dependent on user activity. The stats used include saves-to-listener ratio, skip rate, share rate, number of likes, and number of times a song was repeated.
The save rate is one of the most important factors that can help your song get on several playlists in the first week of release. Running a pre-save campaign gives your song the boost it needs to appeal to the algorithm.
Natural Language Processing
The NLP models crawl the web and analyze texts to know what the internet is saying about you or your upcoming release. It is important that you get word out about your project using your social media account and blogs.
Raw Audio Track Analysis
Like industry tastemakers and playlist curators, the Discover Weekly algorithm wants to get a feel of your music. Raw audio track analysis is the algorithm’s way of listening to your music. The factors it considers are liveness, danceability, loudness, energy, key, and positiveness. The standard for how loud a song depends on the genre. Note the best practices in your genre and adopt these qualities when mixing and mastering your songs.
Release Radar
Unlike Discover Weekly, Release Radar is updated every Friday. Release Radar is a playlist Spotify users depend on for new music. It is a playlist that greatly differs from user to user. If a user has skipped or listened to your song before, the song cannot be included in the Release Radar of such a user.
How Does Release Radar Work?
One thing that gives Release Radar an edge over other algorithmic playlists is the desire for fresh songs. To get your music into Release Radar, you ought to pitch your song on Spotify for Artists seven days before the release day. The playlist does not accept songs from remixers or re-released versions. Users who follow you will be notified when you make a new release.
Daily Mix
The daily mix consists of six pre-shuffled playlists. The playlist contains songs from the various genres you love in addition to songs from the On Repeat and Repeat Rewind playlist. The daily mix playlists vary with the listener’s mood. The playlist continues to suggest infinite music to the listener so as to prevent the music from halting.
How Does Daily Mix Work?
Daily Mix is not the kind of playlist listeners’ go-to for new music, as it majorly focuses on their favorites. Your music will show up in the Daily Mixes of your Spotify fans.
To keep the fire burning, you may want to post engaging videos that remind your fans of your songs on your social media accounts. If they remember you well enough, they will keep listening to your songs. The more they listen to your songs, the higher the probability of your songs landing on their Daily Mixes.
On Repeat and Repeat Rewind
There are times when listeners just want to shut their doors on new music and focus on the songs they love. This playlist contains songs users have highly interacted with in the past and the songs that are currently repeating.
How Does On Repeat and Repeat Rewind Work?
This is a playlist for throwback faves and current faves. Artists have little or no influence on this playlist.
Spotify Radio
Spotify Radio is a functionality that allows Spotify users to create a playlist based on any artist, genre, song, album, or playlist. The playlist can contain up to 50 songs. Users can download their Spotify playlists except the radio created using a playlist.
How Does Spotify Radio Work?
Like the On Repeat and Repeat Rewind playlist, artists have little or no power over Spotify users’ Spotify Radio. They listen to who they want and they want you really bad, they will create a Spotify Radio based on your songs/albums.
Practice This Leading Playlisting Ritual to get your tracks on Spotify Algorithmic Playlists
Having a well-thought-out plan will improve the effectiveness and timeliness of your campaign. Follow the steps below to increase your chances of being playlisted on Spotify.
Be time conscious: Timing is of the essence
Your track performance during the week before and after release can help increase your Spotify popularity index; hence it is advisable to make hay while the sun shines. Start a pre-save campaign one to two weeks before release and intensify your efforts a week after release.
Getting your music on independent listener playlists can be helpful, but stick to playlists within your genre. Paying playlist curators to put your music on an unrelated genre or hiking your streams using bots can get you banned from the Spotify platform. If a rap song gets featured on a playlist made for rock artists, there’s a high probability that the song will get skipped. Also, the data from such a playlist can mislead the algorithm into ‘assuming’ that the song would appeal to rock listeners.
School the algorithm
Unless you are Justin Beiber, The Weeknd, or some big Asian superstar with a huge fan base and immense historical data on Spotify, the algorithm does not know you well enough to predict what audience would resonate best with your music.
It is necessary you school the algorithm by pleading with your core Instagram or Facebook fans to follow you on Spotify. You should also get featured on blogs, so the algorithm would extract a lot of valuable information on you when it crawls the web using Natural Language processing.
Bribe You Tribe
How your song performs boils down to the support you get from your tribe. Your tribe is not necessarily the same as your fanbase. These are the people that know you and have a somewhat personal relationship with you for instance your colleagues, current or former schoolmates, family, mutual friends on social media, neighbors, and pretty much everyone you know.
Let’s be real, not everyone who knows you as a singer or follows you on social media is a fan of your music. This might sound harsh but don’t take it personally. It is what it is. Use your connections to your advantage and reach out to them directly to stream, like, save your songs and follow you on Spotify. Before you do so, please ensure your music is good enough. People won’t take you seriously in the future if you force them to listen to trash.
You can announce that you are going to reward one or two people who follow you on Spotify with money, tickets to your next show, or a special shoutout on your page. This would definitely spur people to follow you on Spotify. Not everyone will respond, but it is okay. A few more trials may convince them.
Rinse and Repeat
One mistake artists make is forgetting to repeat a method that works. They want to move on to the next trick without milking the previous one. Be smart; rinse and repeat.
Final Thoughts
Unlike Apple Music, which runs an in-house playlisting model, the Spotify playlisting model is fair, decentralized, and easier to use. If the editors don’t think you are a good fit for the editorial playlists, the algorithm or some independent playlist curator might give you a shot.