Jasmine Birtles
Your money-making expert. Financial journalist, TV and radio personality.
Make Money By Listening to Music
Reading Time: 5 minutesHere at MoneyMagpie we like to share good news and the fact there are ways that you can make money by listening to music is definitely good news.
Music is everywhere and part of our everyday lives. We listen while we work, play, drive, walk, exercise, clean, cook… you name it! These days, we can access music wherever we are, create and share playlists instantly, discover new artists and book gigs whenever we want.
As the great Jimi Hendrix said, “Music doesn’t lie. If there is something to be changed in this world, then it can only happen through music.”
Nicely put, Jimi. But did you know you can earn a little extra money on the side just by listening to music? Yes, really! There are apps and websites out there that let you do just this. Some take a bit of effort on your part, others take a lot of effort but for a bigger reward.
Read on to find out how you can make money by listening to music…
Slicethepie
When we say music scout, we don’t mean a boy in shorts with his trusty Swiss army knife, warbling next to a campfire.
It’s what Slicethepie calls a music reviewer. Get paid to share your opinion on new songs before they’re released.
Luckily, you don’t need to know much about music to write a good review! Explaining how it makes you feel and comparing it to the other artists and songs is enough to be useful. If you still feel a bit daunted, you can find some handy tips via this link.
- To review a piece of music, you need to listen to at least 90 seconds of the track before you can start writing. The more in-depth and specific your opinion, the better. However, you will need a minimum of 45 words in your review
- Next, rate the track from 1-10
- Then, fill in a checklist for how you would describe the song if it was a person. For example, is the music funky? Playful? Sexy?
And you’re done! Just click ‘Submit’ to move onto your next review.
Getting Paid…
The tricky bit is getting the maximum amount of money out of your review.
Rather than a flat rate, Slicethepie pays you depending on your star rating. This, in turn, depends on the quality of your reviews. Reviews are judged on the following criteria:
1. How close your rating of the track is to the average score the track has received from other reviewers. For example, you will have a low accuracy if you think a track deserves a 9 when most of the other scouts only gave it a 3.
2. Whether your feedback is detailed and meaningful, and will actually benefit the artist.
3. How active you are as a scout is also a consideration. The more reviews you do, the higher your rating. However, this doesn’t apply if you aren’t taking the time to correctly review the tracks.
Based on our tests, your rating goes up one star for every 30 tracks you review. That’s assuming that you listen to enough of the song and put effort into your reviews.
When you first register with Slicethepie, they’ll ask for your email address. This is important, because you must make sure it’s the same one as your PayPal account, which is how you get paid. (For some reason, despite it being a UK company, Slicethepie pays everyone in US dollars. But not to worry: you can convert it back easily with your PayPal account.)
Although it’ll be a little while before it starts mounting up, as soon as you hit $10, you can make a withdrawal and access your cash. Just remember to keep an eye on that star rating.
To sign up to Slicethepie, click here.
Playlist Push
Spotify is pretty ubiquitous these days. According to Statista, Spotify has over 602 MILLION active subscribers across the world.
You can’t actually earn money listening to music directly via Spotify itself, but for those of you with a big enough following on Spotify or TikTok, there are ways and means to earn money as a music curator by submitting reviews via Playlist Push.
On Spotify you need to meet these criteria:
Minimum of 1000 followers per playlist as well as playlists that are focused on genre or a specific band or artist; playlists with ‘follow me’ in the title; and a minimum of 30 active Monthly Listeners per playlist.
If you meet these criteria Playlist Push give you songs to review and include in your playlist. If they like your review you can earn up to $12 per track, paid weekly via bank transfer.
On TikTok you need to meet these criteria:
Be a TikTok video creator – Playlist Push will give you songs to use in your videos. You must have at least 30,000 followers to qualify as a creator.
This way you can earn up to $10 per TikTok video you make. Earnings have to reach a minimum amount of $20 before payments are made.
We won’t lie, it isn’t easy to earn money this way and it really is for the dedicated music aficionados amongst you – there is some serious effort involved to get set up and maintain your listeners – but once you do there is the chance to make a decent amount.
Click here to find out more.
SubmitHub
SubmitHub connects you directly with performers who want to pay for reviews of their new music. Even better, their Marketplace allows the sharing of skills (to earn money!) to help artists create merchandise, digital content, and even help with the mixing and mastering of their tracks.
You can sign up either as an influencer or curator. Influencers use their Instagram and TikTok accounts to drive popularity of artists’ music by using it on their platforms. SubmitHub is very transparent, so when you go to sign up as an influencer you can see what each of their influencers has earned to date with them – and some are in the tens of thousands of dollars.
Sign up as a curator to create playlists and earn money writing music reviews – so you can make money by listening to music without having a huge online following.
Earnably
Earnably is an established online reward site that pays you to do things like complete surveys, review podcasts, download apps or play games, amongst others. It will also pay you to listen to music (often via radio stations) or watch music videos.
It’s quick and easy (and free!) to sign up to – you just need to fill out a quick demographics survey to get started.
Once you’re in, you can scroll through and select whatever you want to do to earn. You will never make enough to live off, but it’s a nice little earner with payments made in points and then converted into cash either via a Paypal account or gift cards, such as an Amazon voucher.
Have you tried one making money by listening to music? Tell us about your experience in the comments below!
[…] Team 6th Feb 2024 25 Comments Here at MoneyMagpie we like to share good news and the fact there are ways that you can make money […]
that works well
Please i wanted to pay my college fees so please give me a part time job please
I wanna make money