How to Distribute and Promote Your Music on Deezer
Deezer is an absolute music streaming powerhouse, and an important global platform you should harness to promote your music. If you live in Europe, you’re likely aware of that already. If you live in the U.S., you might’ve only focused on more North American-centric platforms like Spotify, Apple Music, and YouTube. But Deezer is available and growing in the US, and is a major player in a ton of markets you can’t afford to neglect.
Since its founding in 2007, Deezer has amassed a total of 16 million users. In fact, Rolling Stone called Deezer “the biggest music streaming service you’ve never heard of” in a profile of the service published in 2014, two years before Deezer expanded to the U.S. Today Deezer is the 4th largest global audio streaming company.
What is Deezer?
Deezer is a music streaming service that operates in a similar way to competitors like Spotify and Apple Music. Like Spotify, Deezer is mostly the brainchild of a young entrepreneur, French tech wunderkid Daniel Marhely.
After launching in 2006 as Blogmusik, Marhely’s creation underwent a rebranding in August 2007 and relaunched as Deezer. At this time the humble platform had a small library of streamable songs. Deezer would clear up that issue a few years later when it finally signed agreements with the “Big Four” major labels: EMI, Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group.
By 2011, Deezer’s catalog had reached 8 million songs. That number has since ballooned to 73 million, putting Deezer right in line with its competition. Today, Deezer has one of the most diverse international and local music catalogs in the world, with tens of thousands of tracks being added daily.
How is Deezer different from other streaming platforms?
There’s a lot of competition in the music streaming space. So Deezer needed something to set it apart from the rest of the pack. It’s done this in a few ways:
- Deezer focuses on important markets in Europe and Latin America
Deezer has the widest global presence of all established audio streaming DSPs. Today it’s available in over 180 countries around the world. Deezer’s key markets include France, Germany, and Brazil as well as territories like the U.K., Colombia, Mexico, and the U.S. Deezer is also present in fast-growing territories like Russia and other Eastern Europe countries, as well as Latin American regions and the Middle East.
- Deezer offers streaming in a high bitrate
Starting in 2014, Deezer launched a hi-res music streaming tier originally called Deezer Elite, which it has since rebranded to Deezer HiFi. This higher subscription tier allows members to stream music in FLAC, a lossless file codec equal to the audio quality of a CD. FLAC is a higher bitrate than the MP3s of Deezer’s lower tiers, of Spotify’s standard membership MP3s, and of Apple Music’s AAC.
What does this mean in non-audio geek terms? Streaming songs in FLAC sounds better than streaming in MP3 as long as you have the proper playback equipment.
Why should I distribute my music to Deezer?
No matter where you’re located, Deezer should be part of your distribution plan. While it’s taken some time to make inroads into the U.S., Deezer is extremely popular in certain major territories. In its native France, Deezer ranks as one of the most used mobile applications in the 15 to 34 demographic, even beating out major hitters like Google and Twitter!
Plus, as we said above, Deezer has 16 million monthly users around the world.
How do I distribute my music to Deezer?
1710Media distributes to Deezer and more than 150 other digital music platforms — all for a one-time fee. No paying extra for each platform.
How to Verify your Deezer artist profile with Deezer for Creators
Deezer for Creators (formerly Deezer Backstage) is a platform that allows you to officially claim your Deezer artist profile and gain insights into how your music is performing.
After your music is distributed to Deezer, head here and click Request Access.
Make sure you have this information handy:
• Artist name
• Your email
• Your label name (This can be your artist name unless you do have a label)
After you’ve requested access, it may take some time to process (up to 4-6 weeks), so just hang tight while Deezer does their magic and preps your profile.
What features does Deezer for Creators offer?
Verifying your artist profile on Deezer not only makes your presence on the platform look more professional, it also brings a host of enhanced features.
With Deezer for Creators, you can:
• Update your bio (in a ton of languages!)
• Customize your profile picture (1200x1200px minimum)
• Highlight a specific release
• Pin a status update (64 characters max)
• Link to your Facebook and Twitter profiles
• View analytics on your music’s streams
• Gather information on users’ activity
• Watch your new music’s performance in real time
All this is not only accessed through Deezer’s handy mobile app, but also through their desktop app!
