Publishing
The business of owning, registering, and collecting income from the songwriting side of your music, separate from the recording.
Why this matters
What is it?
Publishing is the umbrella term for everything to do with owning and monetizing a musical composition, meaning the lyrics and melody as written, independent of any specific recording of it. When you write a song, you automatically own the publishing rights (unless you sign them away), even if you never record it yourself. A publisher, if you have one, is a company that administers those rights on your behalf: registering the song, chasing down royalties, pitching it for placements, and taking a cut in exchange.
As an independent artist, you're often both the songwriter and your own publisher, which is called self-publishing. That's completely fine and normal, it just means the administrative work (registering with the right organizations, filing metadata correctly) falls on you instead of a publishing company.
Publishing income comes from several places: mechanical royalties (when the song is reproduced, like a stream or download), performance royalties (when it's played publicly, like radio or a bar's speaker system), and sync fees (when it's licensed for film, TV, or ads). A publisher's whole job is making sure all of these actually get collected.
A simple example
Why you should care
When you'll use it
Common mistakes
- Confusing a publisher with a record label. A label deals with the recording; a publisher deals with the composition. They're different businesses.
- Signing away publishing rights early in a deal without understanding what percentage of future income that gives away.
- Not registering as your own publisher when self-releasing, which can mean losing a portion of royalties that were meant to be yours.
If nobody else is administering your publishing, you are your publisher by default, so register yourself as one.
Keep reading
A unique numeric code assigned to an entire release (single, EP, or album) that identifies it across stores and streaming platforms, similar to a barcode on a physical product.
A unique identifier assigned to a specific recording of a song, used to track plays, streams, and royalties for that exact version, distinct from the song's UPC.
The set of text information attached to your release, like song title, artist name, genre, and release date, that DSPs use to display and organize your music correctly.
A promotional tool that lets fans save an upcoming release to their streaming library or playlist before it's even out, so it appears automatically on release day.
A running list of every task that needs to happen before a song can go live, used to make sure nothing gets missed.
The recurring payments you earn every time your song gets streamed, sold, played on the radio, or used somewhere else.
The royalty paid to songwriters whenever their composition is reproduced, including every stream and download.
The royalty paid to songwriters when their composition is performed publicly, including radio, live shows, and some streaming plays.
A simple written document that records who wrote what percentage of a song, signed before disputes can happen.
The organizations, like ASCAP and BMI, that collect performance royalties on behalf of songwriters and pay them out.
The company that takes your finished song and delivers it to Spotify, Apple Music, and every other store or streaming service.
DSP stands for Digital Service Provider, the industry term for streaming platforms and download stores like Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music.
A widely used digital distributor known for its subscription-based pricing and fast turnaround from upload to release across DSPs.
One of the earliest and longest-running digital music distributors, offering artists a one-time payment model with no subscription required.
A long-established digital distributor offering distribution, publishing administration, and other artist services, historically priced per release.
The specific day (and often time) you choose for your music to go live on streaming platforms and stores, set in advance through your distributor.
The full schedule of everything that needs to happen between now and release day, and after it, laid out with dates.
Playlist pitching is the process of submitting your song to curators, whether that is Spotify itself or independent playlist owners, hoping to get added.
Editorial playlists are playlists curated by a streaming platform's own staff, like Spotify's 'New Music Friday,' rather than by an individual listener.
An EPK is a one-page digital packet with your bio, photos, music links, and contact info, built so anyone from a journalist to a booker can learn about you fast.
How and roughly how much artists actually get paid for streams, and why the amount per stream varies so much between platforms.
The number of unique people who played at least one of your songs on Spotify in the last 28 days, shown on your artist profile.
The final audio polish applied to a finished mix, making it loud, consistent, and ready for release across all platforms.
The square image that represents your song or album everywhere it's sold or streamed.
Put this into a real release plan
Diamond Release turns terms like this into dated steps for your single, EP, or album — with the full 160-article Encyclopedia inside.