The Ladders Method

Let's talk about why every artist with good music should be able to drive at least 40,000 streams a month on Spotify.

Let's start with the Feedback Loop.

The more you stream a song on Spotify, the more that song gets fed back to you through algorithmic playlists like Daily mixes, Artist radio stations, On Repeat, Repeat Rewind, and things of that nature.

When the user streams a song on demand multiple times, it results in that song breaking into their feedback loop and getting served up on those playlists. This results in them hearing the songs more, which tells Spotify they like the songs more, which results in Spotify serving up the songs more, and hence the feedback loop.

When the users stream the playlist or their library on shuffle, the platform has to pick the songs they are most likely to enjoy to be the first 10 or 20 songs to serve up. That selection is based on the feedback loop. Those playlists are the soundtrack to a listener's routine. They're the songs they shower to, they're the songs they stream when they're on their commute to and from work or to and from school. They're the songs they use for their workouts. The top 10 or 20 songs on those lists is their Routine Rotation.

The Routine Rotation drives at least 40 streams per listener per month from user commutes alone. That means that an artist who is in the Routine Rotation of 1000 listeners should get at least 40,000 streams per month.

Now, I had a couple of artists who were kind enough to share their stats with me, and here's what I saw. Both had over 6,000 monthly listeners and under 40,000 monthly streams, which told me that neither artist cracked the Routine Rotations of their listeners in a major way. Effectively, they’re picking lemons and not squeezing to get the juice.

The problem is that artists don't have a system that reengages listeners and drives repeat streams. The Ladders Method uses Lead Generation techniques applied to advertising that breaks feedback loops and Routine Rotations. The result is repeat streams that last for years, driving return on investment and allowing artists to profit.