How to Find Playlist Curators

Playlists, especially on Spotify, are an effective way to jump start your music career. Not only can they increase plays and monthly listeners, but they also affect the algorithms, giving you the opportunity to be suggested to new listeners and be placed on Spotify editorial playlists. Playlists are also key because anyone with an account can make them. These independent playlists are the ones you should target. Most curators will only place songs that they find themselves and that fits their musical taste, so they don’t accept submissions. This isn’t a problem, because there are also plenty of curators that do accept submissions, for every genre and subgenre.

How to Know if a Playlist Accepts Submissions

It will be easy to determine because they will have some form of contact information in the description of the playlist. Most curators use playlists to build their following on other platforms, mainly, their Instagram or personal website. We have an article on how to approach curators on our blog.

How to Find Independent Playlist Curators

This is what you came for right? Well be warned that this process does take a long time and a dedicated mind, especially if you don’t want to pay someone to do the research for you. With that being said, the process is quite easy.

First, log on to Spotify from a desktop, and enter a keyword related to your music into the search bar. Something like ‘new rap’, ‘underground’, or ‘chill beats’ would work. Once you’ve done this, filter the search for playlists, and click on one. You can also use your ‘Release Radar’ and ‘Made for you’ playlists, but not any editorial playlists. I will explain why later.

Search through the playlist until you see an artist you’ve never heard of and click view artist. Once on the profile, scroll down to the ‘Discovered on’ section. This section shows the playlists in which this artist has received plays from multiple listeners. The artist should ideally have about 30,000 or less monthly listeners, as they are most likely to be on playlists that accept submissions. Find a playlist with contact information and message them submitting your song.

That is all you have to do! If you haven’t already, read our article for tips on how to submit to playlist curators, as that is the hardest part of getting playlist placements, and also our article giving advice on how to package your music. The latter stresses the importance of funneling resources to one song, starting with playlists.

Maximize Playlists for the Spotify Algorithm

Another way of maximizing playlists is to become a curator yourself. Granted you’ll need to find a way to build the list of people who follow the playlist, but it can be very easy if you know your demographic, the people who would enjoy listening to your style of music, and your niche market, where you can find the most success promoting your music. 

One niche market, especially for new artists, is music sharing sites. These sites allow artists to share their music and be heard. The downside of these sites is that there is no paywall, and thus, no payment for plays. Luckily, there is an easy way around this, because you know the needs of the customer, in this case other artists. We cover this topic more in depth in our Marketing on Free Music Sharing Sites blog post. 

In conclusion, playlists are a key tool in the new artist’s promotion strategies. You can get your music heard by many people that didn’t know of your music before, and a higher chance to be placed on an editorial playlist. We’ve shown you the long, but easy way of finding curators that will accept submissions. If you have $2.99 and don’t feel like using a lot of your time searching for curators, then our 100 Curator Contact List is a great place to start. We’ve gone ahead and found 100 playlists/curators so that you can spend your time submitting your music.

Get started on your playlist journey by getting a placement on one of our Stoned Produce playlists.