Music distribution for $5 a month – Is it worth it?
UnitedMasters’ invite-only platform offer artists two models, ‘free’ very limited music distribution and SELECT’s $59.99 per year option.
UnitedMasters offer compelling music distribution, however take a closer look at the invite-only platform and you’ll see some of the limitations of both their free and SELECT distribution models.
UnitedMasters Free
While a 90/10 royalty split on the surface seems like a fantastic offer, dig a little deeper and you’ll realise some of the significant drawbacks of their free model. Hidden away in the FAQs, you’ll see free members can only distribute to Apple Music, iTunes, Spotify, YouTube and SoundCloud. Both Free and Premium RouteNote users get access to all of our stores, including all the above and many more.
UnitedMasters SELECT
Much like RouteNote Premium, artists on UnitedMasters’ SELECT model keep 100% of royalties. While SELECT memberships are sometimes advertised as $5/month, 12 months must be paid upfront, leading to a $59.99/year cost. RouteNote Premium is priced per release, with a smaller $9.99/year cost.
Some of the exclusive SELECT distribution features are offered across both RouteNote Premium and RouteNote Free, such as “Release as much music as you want”, “Distribute to all major streaming platforms”, “Get your music on TikTok and Instagram” and “Releases go live in 10 days or less”. RouteNote does not limit any features to their free model.
RouteNote distributes your music to all of the same top platforms such as Apple Music, iTunes, Spotify, YouTube and TikTok, plus many exclusive stores and streaming services such as eMusic, Nuuday, Kuack Media, as well as Asia specific services: Kanjian, Melon, Bugs!, YG and NetEase. Many countries in Asia are experiencing massive growth in streaming.
Another key limitation with UnitedMasters comes for labels, “UnitedMasters is currently built to deliver data and personalized recommendations to individual artists.” RouteNote doesn’t care whether you’re uploading one artist or 100. We don’t limit the number of artists you can distribute and will ensure each gets their own individual artist profile on streaming platforms.
MasterLinks are similar to Fan Links and Pre-saves offered for free (whether you’re distributing through RouteNote or not) via our partner site Push.fm.