High approval rates are almost always a red flag. There are two exceptions, though:

1. The outlet only approves submissions (you’ll see a note to this effect)
2. They have a low response rate.

All other scenarios are probably trouble. In this blog post, I’ve laid out what to expect from high-rate approvers and how you can navigate them successfully.

Why is having a high approval rate a bad sign?

Let’s try a little exercise. Imagine that each curator is hosting a talent show. The more people on the stage, the less likely that you’ll get noticed in the crowd. Pretty easy to see how that makes things difficult, right?

High approval percentages almost always mean songs are shared on a “stage” that is impossible for the intended audience to stay on top of.

Unfortunately, high approval rates also mean that the quality of the material shared is likely to be less. That means your song will either land in a crowded playlist, or, the corresponding blog post won’t have as much thought put into it. NB: Outlets with lower approval rates are way more selective, which means that if approved, your song gets a lot more care when being shared. NB2: Outlets with high approval rates may not count toward the popular chart.

If you’ve identified someone who looks like bad news, you can hide them from your list by clicking the button circled below.

Are there upsides to being shared by a high-approve outlet?

Possibly, yes. It’s widely believed that on Spotify, getting lots of shares signals to the algorithms that your song is one they should pay more attention to. And if you want people to find articles about your song when they search Google, approvals can also help.

Does a high approval on SubmitHub mean they’re bad news? Nope!

As mentioned in the opening paragraph, there are a select group of blogs who refund you if they don’t approve your song.

Submitting to them means that won’t find out why your song was declined, but it means that if you do get a response it’s almost always an approval.

You’ll be able to identify these outlets by looking at the “Worth knowing” section, as shown below.

The second category of “not-so-bad” outlets are those who have high approval percentages, but low response rates. Essentially, it means that they’re perusing their submissions queue and only picking songs they want to approve, ignoring (for the most part) what they’re not interested in featuring. The screenshot below shows an example.

And that concludes today’s lesson! If you’re a submitter who likes to filter blogs based on approval rates (from high to low), then this hopefully helps.

So, what can outlets do with their earnings?

We’ve always seen the money earned from SubmitHub as a way for blogs to cover hosting costs, and that is what many outlets do. Sometimes though, you get an outlier who ends up taking something to unimagined places. Podcart, is one such outlier, using the money earned from SubmitHub to launch a project called The Respite Room.

The Respite Room

Launched June 1st, 2017, The Respite Room is a site, podcast and blog offering a space of understanding and informal support for people suffering with mental health issues. It is run by four Glasgow-based women (Halina, Paula, Mel and Megan), who aim to raise awareness and understanding of mental health issues, including anxiety and panic disorder.

When speaking to Halina, she shared the following:

We’re not experts or professionals, but we do have lived experiences — this is a space of understanding, for us to get honest and realistic about what it’s like to live with mental illness. We’re sharing the challenges we face, our experiences and mistakes, and how we manage our conditions in the hope that this will help others to further understand their own situations — maybe even find new techniques for dealing, but at the very least make some people realise they are not alone in dealing with these things.

With regards to SubmitHub earnings, it has enabled these inspiring women to pay for hosting, running costs of the site, podcast costs including a PRS license and more. It has essentially funded the set up. So we reached out and asked some questions.

What’s the BIG vision here?
The BIG vision is to develop the site into a “go to” resource for help. The BIGGER vision is to create a physical space for people to come and frequent, to use for workshops, respite, guilt-free breaks, education and to meet people that are going through a similar thing. The aim is also to help as many people with mental health issues as we can.

How can people help?
People can help by spreading the word, by being open about their own mental health issues and the journeys they have been on. People can help by contributing their stories and ensuring that this is a subject that is talking about widely without ostracising people and making them feel like there is something wrong with them or their struggles are not important.

Where should we be looking to keep an eye out for this?
You can find us at:
therespiteroom.com
facebook.com/therespiteroom
twitter.com/therespiteroom
instagram.com/respiteroom

Ever since SubmitHub launched, one of the most important practices of our founder — Jason—has been to focus on simplicity. At the core of that simplicity was the idea that, where a pricing model is concerned, one credit for one blog is very easy to understand.

So What Changed?

One of the biggest and most frequent questions we get is whether a site like Pitchfork (the largest music blog in the world) should cost the same as a relatively new or niche music blog. Not all blogs or channels are created equal, and as such, it follows (rationally) that the price for communicating with one of these outlets should reflect that difference.

Challenge/Opportunity

SubmitHub’s original model — one credit for one blog — has proved quite successful, and so tinkering with this approach naturally brings a fair bit of uncertainty. However, we feel that introducing this differentiation now, is essential to the future growth of SubmitHub.

The Experiment

We’ve begun an experiment that increases the price of submitting to 10-15 of the largest, most-influential and highest-value outlets on SubmitHub. Over the coming weeks, we’ll slowly introduce more blogs to this tiered system where the value provided by these outlets is appropriately reflected in the increased price.

The Results

In the 5 days since the rollout on Wednesday (17 May), we’ve been watching the data closely. Two things seem apparent:

• Submitters are not changing their behavior.
• The 10–15 participating outlets are (more than) happy with the results.

Want to come on board as a blog, radio station or record label? Check out www.submithub.com. Want to learn more about SubmitHub? Read about our logo, or lack thereof.

Everywhere one looks, with regards to business and logos, the accepted opinion is that logos top the list of priorities. There’s mention of logos being the ‘identity of the company’, an ‘essential part of business strategy’, and ‘the anchor of the brand’. Why then, don’t we have one?

The short answer: laziness!

But there’s a little more to it than that. Let’s get into it.

When SubmitHub originated, and Jason was busy coding it, he had to fill the square that shows up on the browser tab…so he just filled it with the color purple.

Once the site was up and running, some people started to ask for the logo…so they were just sent a purple square. When it came to social media, we decided to ‘use’ those platforms essentially just to book the space, and from there, basically just tell people ‘we’re not online or contactable here’. But again, a logo was required, and voila! the purple square featured.

Eventually Jason thought ‘fuck it, let’s just stick with the purple’, and so, our non-logo logo, became a purple square.

Then it dawned on Jason that it actually wasn’t appropriate for SubmitHub to have a logo. Yes, a logo is the anchor-what-what and target-market-this-that and identity-so-and-so, but SubmitHub is not about SubmitHub! SubmitHub is about connecting artists to curators.

Our site is not a destination, a brand or a service…it’s a tool for connecting people. Your experience should not be about SubmitHub; it should be about the connections. By keeping things ‘brandless’, so to speak, we were able to convey that a little better. And that is why we don’t have a logo.

Have a thought on the matter? Let us know!
Interested enough to keep reading? Read about SubmitHub’s highest rated feedback here.

If you’ve ever tried emailing music to blogs, it’s more than likely that you’re aware of what it feels like to be ignored. For all that effort, it’s nice to know at least that someone has heard your music.

However, not everyone enjoys the heavy handed approach of some bloggers when giving feedback, and furthermore some just want to know that the music has been heard. To handle the different preferences of submitters we’ve gone ahead and rolled out a new option so that users can select if feedback ‘just isn’t that important to them.’ In this instance, blogs/labels/channels are able to dial back on how technical they get when responding. For those who still love detailed responses, the blogs/labels/channels will continue to provide the goods.

To understand more about what ‘quality-feedback’ is, we reached out to two blogs with some of the site’s highest rated feedback: mp3hugger & Sphere of Hip-Hop. Here’s what they had to say!

Interview with Kevin from Mp3hugger:

How do you keep-up giving such good feedback?

Thanks for saying that, I suppose from an early age certain pieces of music had the ability to stop me in my tracks. My Dad was a little worried about me in fact because my mood would change based on the music that was on the radio at the time. So all I do when I hear any piece of music is write down how it is affecting me, sometimes it barely registers but other times it affects to the point where I get emotional. The only other thing capable of doing that to me (apart from family) is football.

Have their been any cases where people have reached out to you afterwards and thanked or berated you for something you’ve said?

A few times, by email and via the SubmitHub chat facility, and thankfully it has been mostly positive. In fact, sometimes I even hear thankful noises from those whom I’ve declined which really surprises me.

If you could say something to artists reading this about blogging and the submissions process, what would it be?

Be yourself, when you are writing music/emails, because originality is a dying art so I always side with acts that try something new even if it mightn’t be totally to my taste it goes further with me than a perfectly crafted piece of same-same.

What do you feel are the benefits of providing such high-quality feedback?

Up to the arrival of SubmitHub I never really wrote about the music I didn’t like and I have to say doing so has opened my eyes and ears. It is important that the music being created by artists is valued and by giving, hopefully, useful feedback it might spur them onto even greater things.

Interview with Josh from Sphere of Hip-Hop:

You have some of the highest rated feedback on SubmitHub, do you have some sort of formula? Why do you think that makes for good for those those on the receiving end?

As for formula, I try to offer as much constructive criticism as I can. It’s easy to think, after hearing 20–30 seconds, “This doesn’t work for us” but I still try to offer up some positive feedback. Nothing forced, but if the song is great… I say so, even if it’s not gonna work for our audience.

Many years ago I heard about a technique called the "compliment sandwich"–start off with a positive, middle is critique, end on a positive. By nature, we're all very sensitive about our art so I try to take that into consideration.

This approach has worked well for Sphere of Hip-Hop for the last 20 years. I'm a normally blunt music critic but I learned early on, that a harsh technique wasn't fruitful.

Is there something in particular that motivates you to give such good feedback?

I’ve got some experience in PR,radio, and with record labels. That has helped me to navigate the nuances of truly understanding what people are looking for. I’m also a big fan of teaching, and of sharing information. One reason our brand-affinity is so strong amongst our fans/regular visitors is because of that. Yes, we’re gate keepers so to speak… but we’re not so hung up on holding tightly to that stuff. By giving value, we’re able to build a positive vibe around our brand. That matters. It’s come back to benefit us in many practical ways and we’ve earned positions of favor just by being respectful.

On average how much time do you spend responding to submissions each day? How does that work with your schedule?

The time ebbs and flows but generally 1–2 hours per day, during the week. SubmitHub makes that work easier and more efficient. I block out time right away in the morning until 8:30–9 am to go through our inbox and SubmitHub.

What would be your main tip to other blogs/labels about giving solid feedback?

Kill with kindness ;) I think the same things most bloggers do… “here we go, another trash XYZ styled copy-cat track” but… that feedback while honest, and even warranted sometimes, isn’t helping the artist or your platform. I want these people to think enough of Sphere of Hip-Hop to continue trying to land on our outlet. I want to hear better music and see these artists grow in their approach.

Curious to see what the founder of SubmitHub thinks? Check out his article ‘Why SubmitHub Sucks.’

Lammoglia entered the music industry only ten years ago as a beatmaker. Five years after that he mastered sound engineering, and now, only eight years after entering the industry, he owns his own record label — ALM Productions.

His idea for 2017 was to make a compilation album from artists across the globe. The plan: to unify tracks from all over the world into one coherent album. The question asked: which songs “make me fly?” All that was left to do, was find the artists. Based in France, he needed to find a platform that would give him access to artists across the globe.

There’s no denying that the music industry is constantly changing. These days, new entrants into the industry have numerous channels that can be utilized in order to make some waves.

In this case, using SubmitHub as a primary channel, gave Adrien access to artists from across the globe that would have previously been too difficult to reach. The majority of the songs on the album were found using SubmitHub.

He tells us, “I selected chilled music from different genres: rap, RnB, soul, trap, chillwave etc. I think there is a rich diversity of songs with a coherent progression. I mastered all the songs to have a real sound identity. I really wanted to give a beautiful album, not a mixtape or a playlist.” Fast-forward to releasing the album and Adrien has found that his network has grown exponentially, especially his international network.

Interested in giving the album a listen? Check it out here and let us know what you think in the comments!