With CD Baby’s sync licensing program, you earn money whenever your music is used on YouTube. So, one of the obvious ways to boost your YouTube income is to get people to make more videos using your music!

Consider hosting a series of contests where fans upload videos with your music as the soundtrack, including:

1) Fan-made music video contest-

Enlist your fans to make a music video or slideshow FOR you. Let them pick their favorite song, give them creative license to interpret the song their way, tell them to post it to YouTube, and then choose your favorites.  Give out prizes– like free CDs, free house-shows, custom-written songs, etc. Create a YouTube playlist for all these entries.

2) Personal/family videos contest-

Encourage your fans to use your music as the soundtrack to their family videos and slideshows, their weird pet tricks caught on tape, or whatever else they want to post to YouTube.  You can award similar prizes for your favorites, or feature them on your website and social media profiles.

3) Upload your songs to YouTube-

Now’s the time, especially since CD Baby is making it easy to get paid for those plays! Create a simple video for ALL your songs; and by simple, I mean VERY simple,… like, just a static still photo. Basically, this is for the benefit of everyone who uses YouTube as their listening platform. If someone’s going to be streaming your music, better it be from YOUR YouTube channel that you control.

Any other ideas for encouraging people to use your music on YouTube? Let us know in the comments section below.

-Chris R. at CD Baby

Make money from your music on YouTube!

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