A step-by-step guide to putting your tracks on the web3 sync market
I’m not a music historian, but I’d feel pretty confident to wager that it’s never been easier to create streams of income from your music than it is today in the world of web3. From Music NFTs to metaverse concerts and beyond, blockchain is enabling new channels for building meaningful community engagement (and monetization).
At Dequency, we’re hyperfocused on sync: when music is added to visuals to layer on feeling, texture, and complexity. With the proliferation of visual content online (NFTs, metaverse productions, etc!), the opportunity to find collaborative sync opportunities is growing. So, as a music rightsholder or indie artist, do want to get started finding those sync placements today? Let’s get your music on Dequency so we can provide the payment rails + legal framework to make that happen.
Participating in the Dequency marketplace as a music rightsholder means uploading your music + adding components + metadata, creating an artist profile, validating the track info (publisher and songwriter data), and ultimately choosing pricing for your license. Seems like a lot… but we’re here to help! Note: this exists as a YouTube video if you want to speedrun through the account creation and upload process with Dequency Community Manager Carla The Poet — check it out below! otherwise, keep reading and we’ll go into ~exhaustive detail~ here).
STEP ONE: ACCOUNT CREATION
It’s super simple to create an account on Dequency.io — simply add your email address and choose a secure password, and then you’ll be prompted to complete your account with additional data. Note: much of it is optional, but if you proceed without adding it, you might be prompted for it if you transact using Dequency later.
STEP TWO: ACCOUNT TYPE
The onboarding flow bifurcates at this step — are you uploading music, or are you looking to purchase a license? For the sake of our tutorial today, let’s assume we’re only here to upload music. However, you ARE able to do both from the same Dequency account.
STEP THREE: ARTIST PROFILE
So, once you’ve selected “upload my music”, you’ll be prompted to enter your artist information, which will help you fully build out your profile on Dequency. Envision your profile as your “Dequency Homepage” where potential licensees and fans will come to learn more about you. To that end, we ask that you fill it out completely (additionally, it helps us verify the songs you’re uploading as YOURS, which is super important).
Things you’ll be asked to upload:
- Featured image: Essentially your banner image, this should be a high quality picture or graphic (at least 1200x300 w/ 4:1 aspect ratio) that conveys the “vibe” of your catalog.
- Thumbnail image: This is the image that will show up around the Dequency app, such as on the homepage. We’d love to see your mug, but an avatar or logo works fine here, too.
- Thumbnail image: This is the image that will show up around the Dequency app, such as on the homepage. We’d love to see your mug, but an avatar or logo works fine here, too.
- Artist name: …who are you? Use the name you want displayed with your songs, styling it however you prefer. Note: if you have one artist name and another name as a songwriter etc, we suggest keeping those profiles separate for now.
- Biography: What do you want the world to know about you? While this field is optional, we’d highly recommend adding anything about you as an artist that you feel is relevant. If this is tough for you, a few prompts to consider: What’s your inspiration? What types of projects would you love to collaborate on? When’d you pick up your first instrument? How do you want people to feel when they’re listening to your work? How would your mom describe your music?
- Website + social handles: Let people know how to find and follow you — you’re building an audience! Additionally, this is just one more way that Team Dequency can verify that you’re not catfishing us (#justiceformantiteo) and enables us to protect artists on the platform.
STEP FOUR: ALGORAND WALLET
Dequency is powered by blockchain because it makes transactions cheap, fast, and safe… all while enabling them to happen peer-to-peer. This crypto transaction happens via an atomic swap on Algorand, which means you’re gonna need an algorand wallet! You can create one through My Algo Wallet here, or through Pera Wallet here (they’re both great).
If you’re new to this, here’s a great resource for creating a Pera Wallet:
…and another video for My Algo wallet creation + setup:
Once your wallet is created (don’t lose that seed phrase!), input the wallet address and nickname (something like “Margaret’s Pera Wallet” works), and BOOM! — we now have a way to pay you instantly.
Note: it’s easy to convert $ALGO to $USD or any other currency of your choice. You can do it within the Pera wallet, or through a centralized exchange like Coinbase. If this is confusing, you can always ping us in Discord for help.
STEP FIVE: ALBUM INFORMATION
Most of the info we’ll need from you here is pretty self-explanatory, but there are a few special tidbits that I want you to pay attention to:
- Genre + sub genre: Do your best to tell us which genre your album most identifies as — it doesn’t need to be a bang-on perfect fit, but the closer you can get, the easier it is for people to find your songs based on their search terms. Sub genre is optional, but adding more detail about your work is always helpful.
- Mood: Adding the “mood” of your song tells potential licensees a lot about how well this album will complement their visuals. Is it dark, uplifting, or chill? Is it celebratory, spooky, or gentle? Do your best to assess the vibe of your work and help us categorize it as best we can. Note: you’ll be able to select up to three moods, and we suggest you use them all! The more metadata, the better here.
- Album Artwork: Again, the higher the quality, the better!
Note: this is for the album itself, not the individual tracks! You’ll enter that info at a later stage.
STEP SIX: PRICING
Dequency is a marketplace, and the price at which your work will be listed is entirely up to you. The type of sync license we’re currently offering is specific to NFT art and metaverse performances, and it’s very likely that this is the first time you’ve priced something for this type of use.
It’s okay to not know exactly what you should be charging here — take a look around the Dequency platform and see what artists with your level of reach are listing songs at, as a baseline. As soon as we have enough transaction volume to pull some real data, we’ll present it to the community as a guide. Until then, embrace being a pioneer in the web3 space and charge whatever you’re comfortable accepting for the license. Note: you can always change this amount later!
STEP SEVEN: UPLOAD TRACKS + ADD METADATA
Upload the full version of the songs (+ stems if applicable). You’ll need to have the following available:
- ISRC Code
- Lyrics, if applicable (optional, but recommended!)
- Moods
- Genre
- Sub Genre
- Tags (this is a new one!) – enter up to three tags that describe your song in order to make it more searchable. Examples might be “cinematic” “new music” or “latin”. This is different from the “mood” tag because it doesn’t necessarily need to describe the feel of the song; think of it as what somebody might search for if you’d want them to find your song.
STEP EIGHT: SONGWRITERS
Credit where credit is due! Make sure that all songwriters and publishers on your track are listed with the correct percentage breakdown and the PRO. This MUST add up to 100%.
Note: additional artists can be added in the last tab on the right, next to pricing. If they’re on Dequency (get ’em on so they can get paid directly!), you can add them to your track by copying their artist ID from their Dequency profile page (hint: there’s a button on the lower right-hand corner of their profile page banner).
STEP NINE: REVIEW AND SUBMIT
Check that all of the data is correct before submitting. If you’re feelin’ good about it, go ahead and send — the ball’s now in Team Dequency’s court and we’ll get back to you if we have any questions about your submissions. You should receive an email with all of this info, as well.
STEP TEN (I promise, last one): PUBLISH!
One the Dequency team has verified the info you submitted, you’ll receive an email letting you know that your tracks are ready to publish. THEY WILL NOT AUTO-PUBLISH FOR YOU; you need to go back to the app and hit “publish” on all approved tracks for them to push live to the marketplace.
I hope this guide is helpful to someone; if you’re made it this far into the post, then maybe you’re the person this was written for.
If you’re uploading tracks to Dequency, let us know! Tweet to us or email us and let us know how the onboarding process could be improved. Our v1 has only been public for about 2 months at this point, so we’re constantly working on new features and platform improvements to make it easier, safer, and more profitable to be an artist on Dequency.
Thanks for playing, and see you in the metaverse!
-Team Dequency
