Dear Upcoming Artist: Music Distributor vs Music Aggregator

Dear Upcoming Artist, 

Don’t overthink this one as it's more semantics than substantial difference. As the music industry evolves, so does the nuances of digital distribution. Every knowledge is invaluable, if anything, at least for better management of our expectation and perspective while reaching for certain services. Also, to enable asking the right questions while having certain conversations.

Aggregators: They are paid a flat fee and in exchange, they will just ensure your content is available on every digital platform of your choice at the right date and time. Aggregators are not obliged to market/promote your content; it’s up to you. In that case, you keep nearly all your revenue. Aggregators mostly make money by charging upfront fees for the transaction and in few cases charge a % of revenue earned from streaming of your music. All Aggregators do is just get your music on platforms - which is what most ‘distributors’ do anyway.

Distributors will most likely acquire your record, handle aggregation and go ahead to market it - which includes ads, playlisting, OOHs etc. The hope of every artist no longer revolves around a record deal, as distributors are sufficing for many. Artists pay more and entrust distributors to market their music to the right audience while they probably move on to keep creating. Sometimes, the distributor comes correct, sometimes they don’t. Distributors will also in certain cases invest resources (might be an advance) to the record and in exchange for a share of rights, territories and for an amount of years.