Release Radar Push

[hellomoto]

Hey guys,

Just a quick question about release radar. I've run several pretty successful song campaigns in the past all resulting in generally 50,000+ streams.

Usually for me what happens is the first Friday after the release there is little to no traction on release radar but the second Friday it will get a big release radar push. E.g if the song is averaging 200 plays per day the push would be 2000+ streams on the Friday from release radar.

With my most recent campaign I've been getting good play and save results - 2.7k streams, 1.1k Listens, 437 saves, 140 playlists (song came out 28th Jan) all coming from my existing fanbase and FB ads. But there was no release radar push for my song on Friday. Just wondering if the algorithm is potentially changing or I can maybe expect a push this next Friday.

From my experience, the first big push on Release Radar is pretty critical - if you miss that it's hard to get on discovery weekly and with no editorial placements you're not gonna get good numbers.

Just wondering if anyone else can comment on how long it usually takes them to get their release radar push? I was just assuming it was the second Friday which is why I've been releasing on Thursdays.

[Regret Regret]

My latest song didnt get a Release Radar push until week 3 (this week) and it was a lot smaller than others are posting. We had about 900 followers on Spotify when the song was released and we got about 200 RR plays the first week, another 100 the following week. This week we got 700 RR plays which appear to be from people who dont follow us on Spotify. Its not much considering that the song is about to cross 5k plays. Ive got my fingers crossed for another week of being pushed on RR, but I'm not gonna hold my breath.

If you have the time give an update after you start getting next weeks RR numbers.

[capturez]

I also have seen some inconsistencies with the algorithmic playlists. A song released mid December with good stats like you listed took almost a month or longer to get in RR and DW. Now my last two singles from January are both in RR. They're all pretty much getting good numbers (several thousand plays a month or week)

With Discover Weekly my first song did so good. I was getting 30,000+ streams a month from DW. It eventually sloped off but now I have two other songs in discover weekly only getting like 100 plays a month while that first one is still getting 1k+

So yeah idk but I'm with you on being confused lol

[OnyxX]

It's not just about streams. If it was, then playlisting would work. The AI has to have a big enough pool of engaged listeners to know where to send it for the RR push. We don't know exactly what engagement is needed. Saves are a good indicator, but repeat listens, shares, spending time on the profile, listening to other songs, adding to playlists, listening to the song in playlists, etc. - all of that matters, too. If people are only saving the song after listening once and that's it, your number of saves and streams aren't going to tell Spotify who will love the song. We are only getting clues with our stats, but we don't know the whole story.

[hellomoto]

So what I've discovered is that you need to have a popularity rating of at least 20% to get on RR and at least 30% to get DW. What happened with my last release was I was sitting around 19% popularity rating and hence never broke through - only realised this once it was too late for a RR push as well.

I had a song that had been on DW for a few months but then stopped getting put on - I checked and its popularity rating dropped to 29%. So I did a week of ads and pumped it up to 31% and now it's getting DW again.

I've also got a new song that came out about 10 days ago sitting on a popularity rating of 24% but hasn't hit RR yet. But will report back and let you know if that gets the push this week.

For those who don't know you can see your songs popularity rating on Music Stax or using Developers Spotify.

[georgik]

This is exciting! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOQO9wu76VQ in this video Tom talks about how popularity score is not the only metric, rather it is popularity score plus save rate plus maybe other stuff

https://developer.spotify.com/consol...k/?id=&market= btw this is where you can check the popularity score

[OnyxX]

Yeah, I saw his video, too. Our song was at 17% and never got pushed. I think the popularity rate includes save rate, streams, etc. because another track we have is at 16% and it's older. It's some combination of the entire history of the track plus recent history. The recent history might be rolling 7 days or something because it can change from day to day. So the first week only has the recent history and can go up and down quickly.

Good to know for the next one!

[hellomoto]

So I got a bit of a push on Friday - 700 plays but not what I'm used to from RR. Usually get upwards of 3k so no idea why this was so much lower. Pretty much at a loss now honestly don't know how the song could have performed better organically.

[georgik]

So I can confirm, one of my songs just barely got to 30 popularity 2 days ago with a solid 70% save rate from Facebook ads and is as of today in Discover Weekly!

[hellomoto]

Nice congrats man! My song is at 27 popularity thinking about boosting the spend for the rest of the week to try and push it to 30. Not sure how linear popularity scores are though, feel like it will take a bit to get it there.

[mentataudio]

Thanks, really interesting to learn this about popularity index. I've been growing my following and traction on Spotify but not had much success with algorithmic boosts. Looking back, the one time when I did get a release radar boost was when my popularity was at 20, so that resonates with what is said here. Sadly it has dropped now so looking at how I build it up. I think I should have continued advertising some older songs that get very good traction and low conversion costs as well as my campaigns for new songs.

[georgik]

So I just released a song at 3AM New York time this Friday and got a big fat 0 when it came to release radar. Is it because I didn't release it on 12AM and thus missed the RR train until next Friday? Should I be releasing on Thursdays?

[hellomoto]

Yeah, I usually release on Thursdays to make the most of RR.

In other news, my song is at a popularity score of 31% but still no Discover Weekly. Honestly can't figure out this algorithm haha. Maybe next week.

[georgik]

Did it hit 31% before Monday?

[hellomoto]

Yes, pretty sure. I'm still at 31% popularity - hoping for Discover Weekly push this week but not holding my breath. Thinking the algo is not as simple as I thought.

[mentataudio]

Gutted I got my latest and previous singles to 20 popularity today but looks like it was too late for a release radar push.