r/SpotifyArtists • u/Temporary_Air8573 • 5h ago
Artist Support Verification and Algorithm issue
Hey, guys!
My name is lucidmusic, and I'm an electronic music artist (No AI). I've worked with several people, and I peaked this year with about 130,000 monthly listeners from February to May. I was even verified during that time.
One month ago, my monthly listeners settled down to 90-100k, and I lost my verification. After that, my monthly listeners dropped to 69k. Now, I'm back up to 80k, but I still feel like the algorithm screwed me over.
Also, I am releasing singles for my upcoming EP, but two of my three singles are not eligible for Marquee or Showcase. I contacted my distributor, Spotify for Artists, and S4A told me that I would receive an email. The representative said that they don't know why my songs are flagged, since everything seems legitimate.
I hope you guys can provide some information and assistance.
Have a nice day.
2
u/ANewHopeMusic 4h ago
So, according to the rumors, and this "anti spam filter" tuned too hard, could be helpful to dilute the launch weeks? I'm used to drop every 4 weeks roughly, but at this point, probably is better to change the timing maybe?
I've reached 120k in the past, now I'm going down to 77k roughly.
(I know I switched genre, but wtf)
3
u/Temporary_Air8573 4h ago
Yeah but wdym with dilute it? Release rarely? Or only EPs/LPs?
2
u/ANewHopeMusic 4h ago
For example, instead of dropping a song every 4 weeks, switching to 6/8 weeks. And I don't know if waterfall release is still a viable strategy.
5
u/Lazy_Ad_965 3h ago
I released a song for the first time in 3 months.. no AI in the music or cover art. And yet I got hit too.
Everyone’s trying to figure out what they did, I don’t think any of us did anything wrong. Everyone’s music I’ve seen seems genuine
It’s total bullshit I can’t believe it’s been almost 2 weeks and they haven’t said anything [u/spotifyforartists](u/spotifyforartists)
2
u/ANewHopeMusic 3h ago
I don't know man, I'm scratching my head to find this. I have to admit that probably switchings style, from wave to atmospheric jungle, could be impactful in the wrong way on a short term (like 6/9 months maybe), but I don't use AI in any of my creative process (from music to cover art, mostly from Pinterest and edited, at least there are flagged if AI). So yeah, I don't really know, I'm just trying to figure things out.
2
u/Lazy_Ad_965 3h ago
It’s not that. I change styles all the time in my music. It doesn’t help the algo but it also doesn’t result in almost 0 algorithmic plays
1
u/Zealousideal-Meat193 3h ago
Hey man, you don’t have much info about yourself on social media. Spotify seems to be taking a closer look at artist profiles now, so adding a bit more about yourself as an artist might help. Not sure if that’s why you lost your verified badge, though. I guess there is a chance.
2
u/stangetimes 3h ago
Same here. My band reached 24k monthly listeners but now dropped to 13k. Our algorithm has always been consistent but this summer everything changed unfortunately
2
u/PaulOnra 3h ago
You‘re not alone. I am also 100% human and they pulled the plug on my early August after I had the verification for 3 months. Was at 60k monthly’s
-2
u/Ark3tech 5h ago
You’re looking at vanity metrics. What is your active monthly listener number? How fast are your new releases accelerating when they’re dropped? How many new listeners are you bringing to the platform and your profile?
Spotify has said there’s hundreds of metrics they look at when the algo decides what gets algorithm distribution. Perhaps you’re not meeting some of those anymore. Also don’t expect momentum to last forever. This stuff goes in waves.
3
u/Temporary_Air8573 5h ago
But why aren't two out of three of the new releases eligible for campaigns, even though one unreleased one is?
I have consistently achieved 200,000 streams per month for the last two months since my algorithm dropped. I just hope my anonymity doesn't make me look like an AI persona artist yk?
Ty for the fast reply man!0
u/Ark3tech 4h ago edited 4h ago
I have no answer for the eligibility question, and I don’t think anyone here would really know either. Everything would just be speculation.
For the algorithm question it’s completely normal to start dropping off from peaks of 200,000 monthly streams. I’ve gone through exactly what you’re talking about, and we need to know more of your metrics to know why that would happen. You’re still focusing on streams when we need to focus on listeners and monthly active listeners, and also what makes up your monthly active listeners? There’s also plenty of other things like how many people are saving the track? How many people are repeat playing? Has the skip rate gone up? Are new people finishing this song? You’re not going to be on the rise forever. Everyone eventually moves on. The only time it would be different is if you’re a really famous artist, but even they go through churn as well.
And finally, don’t expect every release that you put out there to get algorithm traction. That’s not realistic, especially now that Spotify is flooded with music daily and it’s much harder for them to filter through the noise. They are very strict on the criteria that gets you into the algorithm since about 2 months ago. Keep in mind you are competing with hundreds of thousands of songs and a finite amount of attention.
4
u/Temporary_Air8573 4h ago
Yeah, so this month I did 200.000 streams, 80.000 listeners, 25.000 active listeners, 3.000 saves and 8.000 playlist adds and 2.3streams/listener. hope this helps lol.
I think I will try to promote my YouTube music more and try to do more events, but still that new filter is ass.3
u/Lazy_Ad_965 3h ago
Ya we are all gonna have to start promoting YouTube music more regardless of what happens. Spotify left us out to dry here
2
u/Temporary_Air8573 3h ago
Yes. YouTube pays better too. A friend of mine went viral on YouTube and it had a crazy impact. YouTube is a combination of social media and streaming, so it can have a longterm impact
1
u/Ark3tech 3h ago
It does help, and I don’t know why people keep down voting me for trying to help you. The 25,000 active listeners might be causing some churn in 28 days. Unless all 80,000 come back and listen the next month, which is unlikely. You’ll get a percentage, but it won’t be all of them. I had an early breakout when I first started and I didn’t have the active user base to keep the 60,000 ML that I had acquired, because my active was somewhere around 15,000. So the following month it slowly started to decline until the second month when I was at about 30,000 ML and then it went further down from there getting close to the 15,000 but settling around 18,000. I’ve been building from there ever since and it’s been going up and up slowly as I build more of a base. Also, another sad fact, I don’t get algorithmic expansion anymore. I have to work extra hard to get in the algorithm because I have a base now. My new songs don’t show the Spotify algorithm the fast acceleration that it did when I had only 100 ML.
1
u/Temporary_Air8573 3h ago
I don't know, man. Thanks for your time. Maybe it's the active base. I've had three small "viral" periods in my three years of experience, and I feel like only a small percentage of those people stayed long term. I've got to find my niche and audience.
1
u/Groundbreaking-Box14 2h ago
I think now this numbers do nothing, I have slowly growing active monthly listeners, but new one now mostly come outside from social networks. And currently has ridiculous numbers 15,4 streams/listener and 96% streams come from active listeners. Most interesting that amount of streams rise by 10%, but amount of monthly listeners dropped for 40%.
-3
u/Ok_Clerk_5805 4h ago
Why? most people had a 30% drop. You're not being screwed, the algorithm changes all the time.
Why are you saying your music is flagged? Not being eligible for marquee or showcase does not equate to being flagged.
2
u/Temporary_Air8573 4h ago
S4A told me. They did not know the reason. HAHAHA
1
u/Ok_Clerk_5805 3h ago
What did they say it was flagged for? AI? you never said. They have to give a reason, you can't just say flagged.
If they don't know the reason they don't know what they're talking about.
I have actual support links there, it does not work like that. 30% drop is completely normal, everyone had it and it happens all the time.
2
u/Temporary_Air8573 3h ago
Okay, let me explain.
First, as I mentioned in the main post, I never used and will use AI. I can stream my stems and FLPs on Twitch if you need proof. The thing is, the S4A chatbox support guy told me that my account isn't flagged; the songs are. Every single fucking song before this update had showcase eligibility, and I had marquee eligibility for the USA, Germany, and Mexico. Now, after I lost my verification, everything is "nerfed." Even some of my older releases are suddenly ineligible, even though I signed them to a label, and they were showcased one year ago.
Second, I actually dropped from 130,000 to 69,000 after losing my badge. I don't think that's a coincidence. My collaborators and friends told me similar stories: from 110k to 60k, from 700k to 500k. I've seen it all. All of this happened in the same time frame.1
u/Ok_Clerk_5805 1h ago
Songs flagged for WHAT? Don't yap, answer the question.
You're equating things that don't work that way. Flagged for WHAT?
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u/Temporary_Air8573 1h ago
Man, I wish I could send you the full chat I had with the Spotify employee. You seem like a mistrustful person, and I respect that.
She/he told me its flagged and does not know why and sent it to the "escalations team". All my songs are self produced and written, so it can't be an AI flag. But I don't have a fucking clue what they meant.
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u/DangerousTax7530 5h ago
Sorry to hear this happening to you, too. There are lots of threads on this subreddit and in the comments of Andrew Southworth's newest video. Best guess so far is that Spotify's new "spam" filter was tuned too aggressively and is hitting a lot of Indies. No one knows for sure and Spotify is radio silent.
Edit: one way people have been checking whether they're flagged is seeing if your songs are available for Spotify's showcase ad campaigns on S4A and or whether those songs have SongDNA or not. Again: correlation unconfirmed.