Deezer is an absolute music streaming powerhouse, and an important global platform you should harness to promote your music. If you live in Europe, you’re likely aware of that already. If you live in the U.S., you might’ve only focused on more North American-centric platforms like Spotify, Apple Music, and YouTube. But Deezer is available and growing in the US, and is a major player in a ton of markets you can’t afford to neglect.
Since its founding in 2007, Deezer has amassed a total of 16 million users. In fact, Rolling Stone called Deezer “the biggest music streaming service you’ve never heard of” in a profile of the service published in 2014, two years before Deezer expanded to the U.S. Today Deezer is the 4th largest global audio streaming company.
Why the hype from a venerable institution like Rolling Stone before Deezer was even available in the States? We’ll get to that, along with how to take your music further with Deezer’s artist tools, how to get verified with Deezer for Creators, and much more. But first, a little history…
What is Deezer?
Deezer is a music streaming service that operates in a similar way to competitors like Spotify and Apple Music. Like Spotify, Deezer is mostly the brainchild of a young entrepreneur, French tech wunderkind Daniel Marhely.
After launching in 2006 as Blogmusik, Marhely’s creation underwent a rebranding in August 2007 and relaunched as Deezer. At this time the humble platform had a small library of streamable songs. Deezer would clear up that issue a few years later when it finally signed agreements with the “Big Four” major labels: EMI, Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group.
By 2011, Deezer’s catalog had reached 8 million songs. That number has since ballooned to 73 million, putting Deezer right in line with its competition. Today, Deezer has one of the most diverse international and local music catalogs in the world, with tens of thousands of tracks being added daily.
How is Deezer different from other streaming platforms?
There’s a lot of competition in the music streaming space. So Deezer needed something to set it apart from the rest of the pack. It’s done this in a few ways:
Deezer focuses on important markets in Europe and Latin America
Deezer has the widest global presence of all established audio streaming DSPs. Today it’s available in over 180 countries around the world. Deezer’s key markets include France, Germany and Brazil as well as territories like the U.K., Colombia, Mexico and the U.S. Deezer is also present in fast-growing territories like Russia and other Eastern Europe countries, as well as Latin American regions and the Middle East.
Deezer offers streaming in a high bitrate
Starting in 2014, Deezer launched a hi-res music streaming tier originally called Deezer Elite, which it has since rebranded to Deezer HiFi. This higher subscription tier allows members to stream music in FLAC, a lossless file codec equal to the audio quality of a CD. FLAC is a higher bitrate than the MP3s of Deezer’s lower tiers, of Spotify’s standard membership MP3s and of Apple Music’s AAC.
What does this mean in non-audio geek terms? Streaming songs in FLAC sounds better than streaming in MP3 as long as you have the proper playback equipment.
Deezer is ahead of the game in this regard, even beating out hi-res streaming platform Tidal’s launch in October 2014 by one month. Spotify and Apple Music both announced just earlier this year that they’re launching hi-res streaming tiers, with Apple Music’s lossless streaming hitting apps about a month ago. The big difference is that where only a portion of Apple Music’s library is available for lossless streaming, Deezer makes 95% of its catalog available in hi-res. Audiophiles rejoice!
Why should I distribute my music to Deezer?
No matter where you’re located, Deezer should be part of your distribution plan. While it’s taken some time making inroads into the U.S., Deezer is extremely popular in certain major territories.
In its native France, Deezer ranks as one of the most used mobile applications in the 15 to 34 demographic, even beating out major hitters like Google and Twitter!
Plus, as we said above, Deezer has 16 million monthly users around the world.
How do I distribute my music to Deezer?
CD Baby distributes to Deezer and more than 150 other digital music platforms — all for a one-time fee. No paying extra for each platform. No annual fees.
Verify your Deezer artist profile with Deezer for Creators
Deezer for Creators (formerly Deezer Backstage) is a platform that allows you to officially claim your Deezer artist profile and gain insights into how your music is performing.
After your music is distributed to Deezer, head here and click Request Access.
Make sure you have this information handy:
- Artist name
- Your email
- The UPC of your releases that are distributed by CD Baby
- Your label name (This can be your artist name unless you do have a label)
- Your distributor (that’s us!)
- Your distributor’s email (cdbaby@cdbaby.com)
After you’ve requested access, it may take some time to process (up to 4-6 weeks), so just hang tight while Deezer does their magic and preps your profile.
What features does Deezer for Creators offer?
Verifying your artist profile on Deezer not only makes your presence on the platform look more professional, it also brings a host of enhanced features.
With Deezer for Creators, you can:
- Update your bio (in a ton of languages!)
- Customize your profile picture (1200x1200px minimum)
- Highlight a specific release
- Pin a status update (64 characters max)
- Link to your Facebook and Twitter profiles
- View analytics on your music’s streams
- Gather information on users’ activity
- Watch your new music’s performance in real time
All this is not only accessed through Deezer’s handy mobile app, but also through their desktop app!
How do I share my Deezer music on social media?
Deezer’s mobile app makes it super easy to share your music across all major social media platforms, including:
- Messenger
- Snapchat
You can even text your song on Deezer to a friend!
To share your Deezer music on social media, follow these steps:
- Select the track, album, artist, playlist, podcast or podcast episode you would like to share
- The player will launch, swipe up to display the full player
- Select the Share icon from within the player
- Choose the app you want to share your music on
How do I get my lyrics on Deezer?
Have you ever heard a song and remembered only a few words of the hook and absolutely nothing else? We all have.
Deezer offers an especially cool feature called “Search by Lyrics” that allows users to search the Deezer library by a minimum of four words. Deezer returns any songs with lyrics containing those words, so listeners can finally track down the song that’s been stuck in their head all week.
You can add your lyrics to Deezer through LyricFind, the same app that sends lyrics to several other major streaming platforms.
Reach even more listeners through Deezer on Fitbit and Alexa
There are a few music apps available on Fitbit, but only Deezer is promoted as the top recommended platform on the device.
Don’t believe us? Google “Fitbit music apps.” The top result is Deezer’s partnership with Fitbit, including an offer to Fitbit users for three free months of Deezer Premium. That’s sure to entice a ton of new Fitbit owners who are looking to stream tunes on their spiffy watch.
This also opens a new set of listeners if you happen to make music conducive to exercise, whether it’s upbeat pop for running, chilled-out indie folk for yoga or heavy metal for pumpin’ iron.
And if you’re not on the exercise kick, Deezer is also Deezer is also compatible with Amazon’s Alexa device. Do you make jazz perfect for a date night? Or ambient lo-fi for studying? All Alexa users have to do is ask! Just make sure you tell your fans to add your music to their workout or chillout playlists.