Two years into releasing music, I’ve learned that most of what gets called promotion isn’t really about reaching listeners. It’s about chasing the feeling of progress. When I first started, I thought SubmitHub, MusoSoup and all the other platforms were just part of the process — the unspoken checklist every independent artist was meant to follow. Skip them and the music would vanish into the noise, or so it seemed.
SubmitHub came first. I poured time and money into it, convinced it was the route forward. Rejections rolled in, a few approvals here and there, but none of it translated into actual listeners. I wasn’t investing in growth — I was paying to feel like I hadn’t stopped trying. That’s the trap: mistaking motion for movement.
MusoSoup looked better at first. Eighty playlists sounded like momentum. But when the data came in, there were three genuine plays, all from one list. The rest were empty shells, the kind that exist for screenshots more than sound. It hit me then that most “promotion” platforms sell the appearance of traction, not connection. The only lasting value came from a handful of written reviews that helped with search visibility. Useful, yes — but still surface-level.
ReverbNation was another system on autopilot, built for an earlier era. No bad intent, just a product of habit. It taught me something though: if I can’t take something away and reuse it myself, it’s not really helping me.
The Unsigned Guide changed that. It gave me tools, not illusions — a way to build my own radio list, to contact people directly, to own my process. That was the moment I understood the difference between renting momentum and building it.
BBC Introducing still makes sense to me because it remembers. It recognises consistency, not one-off campaigns. When you keep showing up, it builds a record of your work. That’s real progress.
Looking back, I wasn’t paying for promotion — I was paying for reassurance. It’s what every independent artist wants when they’re creating in a vacuum: proof that the work is landing somewhere. But the truth is, the only things that ever mattered came from real people. Messages from listeners. Someone sharing a song because it spoke to them. The slow, quiet kind of growth that lasts.
Now I measure success differently. I don’t care about numbers that look good; I care about the ones that mean something. I’d rather have ten real listeners than a thousand empty clicks. The illusion doesn’t interest me anymore.
The goal now is simple — make music, share it honestly, let it find its people. No gimmicks, no treadmill. Just the real thing, at its own pace.