How Much Does SoundCloud Pay Per Stream?

From the artist’s point of view, it is required to have an idea about how much they will be paid if they struggle to make their active presence on Soundcloud. This is particularly essential for new artists who have to start their careers on SoundCloud. Now, you may be pondering how much you can make through Soundcloud. There are many factors that affect the earnings one makes through Soundcloud. You will get to know more about it in this blog. 

SoundCloud operates on the basis of a revenue-sharing model whereby payments to artists depend on the platform’s overall ad revenue, subscription income, and the total number of streams across the platform. In contrast to some other streaming services, SoundCloud doesn’t have a fixed per-stream rate.

Factors that Influence SoundCloud Payment

The following are the factors that influence your Soundcloud earnings:

• Account Type

SoundCloud provides various accounts to the artists, including Pro and Pro Unlimited, mothers with more excellent facilities for ad options for monetization. Only artists at the Pro account level can cash in their streams provided they are part and parcel of the SoundCloud Premier monetization program.

• Geographic Location

A stream is mostly paid based on the listener’s country. If the streams are from terminations that generate more money by ads, then the artist will earn more money from their streams.

• Monetized Streams

A particular stream won’t earn money. Only all those streams which have an ad before or in the middle, or which came from a listener who has a subscription generate money for an artist. Since it is like that, then it can be assured that the more streams that an artist gets, the more money they will earn.

• Ad Income Vs. Subscription

This varies depending on the amount of money that SoundCloud has made from ads and subscriptions from users. In simple words, the more the amount of ad revenues and subscribers leads to a higher number of dollars and vice versa, to be distributed amongst artists.

What is the SoundCloud Pay Per Stream?

SoundCloud, on average, pays out between $0.0025 and $0.004 per play. On 1,000 plays, then, an artist would make $2.50 to $4.00. Once again, this is an estimate, and the actual payout may run both higher and lower, though the factors discussed above would have an impact on it.

For example, a big and well-attached artist’s audience in high ad returns countries can bring about more money per stream than another artist with a smaller audience or whose audience is in countries with lower ad revenue.

How to Make the Most Revenue on SoundCloud?

The following are the ways to generate maximum revenue through SoundCloud:

Grow Your Audience

The more streams you garner, the more you earn. Be interactive with your listeners, and share your tracks on social media to gather more streams.

Geographic High-Revenue Targets

Though at times it is beyond everyone’s control where a listener could be, still attempt targeting geographic markets with higher ad revenue in your marketing and promotional moves to increase your revenue.

Monetize the Music

Ensure you are in the SoundCloud Premier Program and have a Pro account if you aim to monetize tracks with SoundCloud. You can also consider other income streams like YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Music.

How are You Paid through SoundCloud?

Once you’ve generated the revenue through your music directly with SoundCloud, or distributed a track through SoundCloud for Artists, you’ll begin earning money from streams. You will become eligible for the collection of revenue when your earnings hit $25 and Soundcloud will begin to pay you:

• Go to the Earnings section of your SoundCloud for Artists account
• Choose the Payouts option
• Press +Add Payout Method and choose either Bank Transfer or Paypal
• Enter your details, either as an individual or as a business based on what way you file your taxes
• Opt how you would like to get paid
• When you have entered your payment method information, select Submit a Tax form
• Complete all required information and proceed through the dialog to process your tax form
• Select your option for how you want to get your end-of-year tax form, E-Delivery, or Postal Mail

In Summary 

While SoundCloud does provide an artists’ marketplace to share and make money with their music, the royalty rates per stream are very low in comparison to other platforms. But then again, understanding what really brings your streams and downloads can help you maximize your audience and revenue. However, growing your SoundCloud followers, optimizing tracks, and continuously promoting your music through various channels is a definite must-do if one is planning to get real success from it.