How To Get The Royalties You're Due as a Songwriter

Let's be clear: If you've ever written a song, you have rights to that song’s musical composition. Those rights mean that your work generates royalties whenever it is streamed (on streaming services like Spotify, YouTube, Apple Music, Amazon etc), performed, and digitally downloaded. This process of earning and collecting the royalties from the use of your composition is called music publishing, which can be a confusing and complex world to navigate alone. How do you discover these royalties your works are generating, and how do you collect them?

If you've signed a deal with a traditional or co-publishing publisher (like Sony Music Publishing, Warner Chappell, etc), this is the responsibility of your publisher to do on your behalf. They'll register your songs with collection societies all around the world who then will track and collect royalties every time your composition is used and pay those royalties (after taking their cut) back to your publisher. Depending on the terms of the deal you sign with your publisher, they'll then pay you your percentage share of these royalties.

As traditional publishing deals aren't as accessible to every songwriter, what do you do if you don't have a traditional music publishing deal? Your royalties are still being generated and collected by collection societies around the world, but you're missing out on collecting a big part of what you're due. Even if you are a member of your local collection society (like PRS in the UK) and are receiving royalties, these are only a portion of what you are earning. Without registering your songs around the world, you're losing out on a large amount of the royalties owed to you.

That's where a music publishing administration company like Songtrust can help. Songtrust is the world's largest global royalty collection platform, administering the musical works of more than 350,000 songwriters, producers, and other rights holders, with a catalogue of more than 3,000,000 songs.

At Songtrust, we register your songs directly with more than 60 pay sources around the world. This way you can easily collect the royalties you're due whenever your songs are streamed, performed live, played on the radio or digitally downloaded, for a one-time $100 registration fee. Unlike a traditional publishing deal, you retain full ownership of your rights, allowing you to exploit your works how you see fit. Songtrust takes a 15% admin fee on what they collect on your behalf, the lowest in the market. With a DIY-platform, it's a flexible, transparent, and writer-friendly solution to accessing your global publishing royalties.

To access what you're due with Songtrust, head over to www.songtrust.com. Songtrust is excited to partner with iluvlive as sponsors of the 2022 Hotlist, and would like to offer a 50% discount off the $100 registration fee to anyone signing up with the promo code 'iluvlive'.

Want to better understand music publishing and your options? Songtrust's Modern Guide To Music Publishing will demystify this confusing part of the business and help you to understand your rights.

Check out our Q&A blog with Lara Baker - Director of Business Development at Songtrust here!