A lot of artists treat Spotify like a library. Drop the songs, wait around, hope somebody finds them. Let that sink in for a second, is that what you do?
That's not how it works, not even close.
I've watched tens of thousands of artists promoting music on our platform, One Submit. Some of them crack it. Most of them don't crack it. And honestly, talent is rarely the reason. It's usually this: they don't understand what Spotify actually is.
This platform is not a library of music, it's got an algorithm which means it shows certain songs to certain people; same as any social platform. Start treating it that way.
Think of it like Instagram for music
Before we talk quality, let's talk quantity. This one reframing changes everything. Instagram doesn't care how good your photo from two years ago was. It cares what you posted this week. TikTok stopped caring about your first video a long time ago. It wants to know what you put out this recently.
Spotify runs the same playbook. The algorithm is watching activity (read: fresh activity). It wants to see that you're releasing, that people are engaging, and that there's something live worth putting in front of listeners. One song from three years ago isn't a career. It's a dead end.
The artists I've seen build real traction on the platform are the ones treating releases like a content schedule. A new track every month, give or take. Quality still matters, I'm not saying drop anything. Consistency without quality gets you nowhere. Quality without consistency, same result.
+Read more: "What Musicians and Critics Get Wrong About Each Other"
Quality first. Always.
I'm going to say this once because I mean it. Releasing often doesn't mean releasing slop. Every single track you put out should be the best thing you can make right now. Good mix. Solid master. A hook that actually hooks. If you're not there yet with the production, hold the release. Fix the thing.
What I'm pushing back on is the artist who spends three years on one track, waits for perfection, releases it, and then goes quiet for another year. That's not a strategy. That's hiding.
The goal is high quality at a sustainable pace. Once a month or so is realistic for most artists if they're working consistently. Some do more. Some do less and make it work. But the rhythm matters. Spotify needs to see you're active.
Don't drop an album. Drop singles.
I get it. You've been working on a full project. Ten songs. You're proud of it and you want to put it all out at once. Don't.
When you release an album on Spotify, you're flooding the algorithm with ten tracks and zero momentum behind any of them. The platform can only pitch one song to editorial playlists per release. Curators on independent playlists want a single, not a tracklist to wade through. And listeners? Most of them check out the first track, maybe the second, and then something else grabs their attention. The other eight songs barely get played.
That's not how you build streams. That's how you burn your best material quietly. The move is singles. One song at a time, every four to six weeks.
Each release is its own moment. Its own campaign. Its own shot at playlist placements and algorithm signals. Each track feeds data back to Spotify about who your listeners are, so the next one gets pushed smarter. By the time you've released six or eight singles, you've got real traction, real followers, real data. Then if you want to package them as an album, do it. Now it's an event, not a blind upload.
Your old, dusty account might be holding you back
If you uploaded a few songs five years ago, haven't touched the account since, and the songs have basically zero engagement, that profile might actually be working against you.
New Spotify accounts are more sensitive to the algorithm. When a fresh artist drops a track and it starts getting real engagement, streams, saves, follows, the algorithm reacts faster. It hasn't written you off yet. It's watching to see what you are.
An old dormant account with one song sitting at 200 streams? The algorithm has already made up its mind about you. It's slotted you somewhere quiet and moved on.
I've seen artists get better results starting over than trying to revive a profile the algorithm stopped caring about. It's a hard call. But if your current account is basically a ghost town, it's worth thinking about deleting it and starting from scratch.
"An old dormant account with one song sitting at 200 streams? The algorithm has already made up its mind about you. It's slotted you somewhere quiet and moved on."
The real goal: trigger the algorithm
Everything you do on Spotify should be pointed at one thing. Generating the signals the algorithm reads as proof that people care about your music. What does it read? Streams, obviously. But also saves, follows, likes, and replays.
When someone plays a track again right after it finishes. When they add it to their own playlists. Those signals tell the system your song isn't just being played, it's being chosen. People are coming back to it. You can't fake this with bot streams. Spotify catches that, and the consequences are real.
Most importantly, NEVER EVER use bot services to spike up your streams.
Three channels that move the needle
Some artists think that if they just release a really good song, it will gain streams and traction without doing anything. That does not work.
Playlist pitching is the most direct path to streams from real listeners. Submit to independent curators who cover your genre. When your track lands on a playlist with actual followers, those followers stream it. They save it. The algorithm notices.
We see this constantly at One Submit. A good playlist placement from a curator who actually fits your genre does more for your Spotify profile than a thousand followers on social media who never click play. That's one.
Meta ads are underused by independent artists and I think it's because they seem complicated. They don't have to be. A well-targeted Facebook or Instagram campaign sending traffic directly to your Spotify link works. It drives real streams from real people who are actually interested in your kind of music. The key word there is targeted. Broad ads to everybody waste money. Tight targeting by genre, mood, and artist similarity gets you listeners who will come back.
Running a music campaign using Meta ads takes some work, planning, and budget, but you can do it yourself.
Social content is the third piece. Not just "my song is out, go listen" posts. Actual content around the music. Behind the scenes. Process. The story of the song. TikTok and Instagram Reels give you a fighting chance of reaching new people organically. When that content connects and someone goes looking for your music on Spotify, that's a listener who showed up with intent. Those are good streams. You can use the videos created for the Meta ads campaign to run simultaneously on social media.
Run all three together if you can. Coordinate everything to start running on the first day of the song launch. A curator placement dropping at the same time your Meta ad is running and you've got a Reel picking up traction is a different scenario than any one of those alone.
+Read more: "How to Plan a Release Strategy That Spans the Entire Year"
The compounding thing nobody tells you about
Here's the part that took me a while to understand from watching campaigns play out at scale. If you promote a great song right, the first campaign you run will turn on the algorithm and place your music on algorithmic playlists slowly, meaning the algorithm will test your song carefully and to a small amount of users, so the impact will not be dramatic.
The second one will do better, and by the third or fourth successful campaign, something shifts.
The algorithm has now seen you before. It has data on who listens to you. What kind of listener you attract. Where they come from. How long they stay. When you drop a new track, the system already has a reference point. It's more likely to push your new song to listeners who already responded to your previous work.
That's the compounding effect. It doesn't happen after one release. It builds. Four, five solid campaigns in and you're playing a different game than you were at release number one.
This is why consistency matters so much. You're not just trying to make one song pop. You're building a listener base that the algorithm can use to seed the next one.
"When your song lands on one of those, everything changes. The streams, the followers, the algorithmic push that follows from it. It's a genuine game changer."
Editorial playlists: the real destination
Everything I've described so far is building toward one thing. Getting on an editorial playlist.
Editorial playlists are the ones Spotify's own team curates. New Music Friday. Fresh Finds. Mood-based playlists with hundreds of thousands of followers. When your song lands on one of those, everything changes. The streams, the followers, the algorithmic push that follows from it. It's a genuine game changer.
The path there isn't a secret. You pitch through Spotify for Artists before your release date. But here's what most people miss: the pitch is just the application. What actually gets you in is having a profile that looks like something worth featuring. Recent releases. Real engagement numbers. A listener base that's been growing. Evidence that people care about your music before Spotify's editorial team even opens your submission.
That's what the whole strategy above is building. Not just streams for their own sake. A profile that's ready for the moment when the right person is looking.
The short version of all of this
Release music consistently. Make it good every time. Don't let the algorithm forget you exist. Run real campaigns with playlist pitching, paid ads, and social content working together. Build the signals. Build them again on the next release. And the one after that. By the time you're a few campaigns in, the algorithm is your friend instead of a stranger.
Editorial playlists won't come from one song. They come from a body of work that proves you're serious and that listeners agree. Start where you are. Release what you have. Keep going.That's what it actually takes.
Oren Sharon is the Founder of One Submit, chosen as the best music promotion service for 2026.
