TikTok and Believe strike global distribution & marketing deal

22 July 2020 - Press release

TikTok, the world’s leading destination for short-form mobile video, has signed a multi-year partnership with Believe, a world leading digital music company, helping artists and labels to build their audiences and careers, at all stages of their development.

This innovative deal will provide in-depth analysis of market trends and will allow Believe’s artists and labels to benefit from more marketing coverage and optimise revenue opportunities. Effective immediately, the deal will mean that Believe’s entire music repertoire will continue to be licensed for use on TikTok globally. The partnership also includes access to Believe’s subsidiary, TuneCore, and its wider distribution network of independent musicians.

With more than 1,200 employees in 45 countries, Believe distributes more than a third of the world's digital music in volume. As an artist-centric platform, its mission is to serve and support artists’ development in all countries across the globe. With an agility mindset built in its DNA, Believe has the capacity to train the best teams and artists, in order to meet the latest market trends. Within 12 months, Believe has not only invested in dedicated ‘TikTok audience development’ experts, but also regularly supported its producers with training sessions and webinars in conjunction with TikTok during Covid-19. At Believe, sharing knowledge and expertise with the artists and labels in a truly collaborative and transparent manner is a daily drive and commitment.

TikTok is super-charging music discovery through its short-form video format. It is also playing an increasingly important role in helping independent artists connect with global audiences and drive their business forward. This new partnership with Believe means that even more artists will have access to a wider discovery network on TikTok, helping them to succeed and increase their opportunities to get their music heard globally.

TikTok has already been used extensively by a diverse and vibrant group of Believe members. These include artists such as The Limba (Russia) with 2.5 Million videos created on TikTok with his song Smoothie, generating more than 1B views. The French electro star Petit Biscuit became famous at 15 years old with his worldwide hit “Sunset Lover”. Four years later with his fanbase exploding on the platform, “Sunset Lover” went viral with users illustrating their Sunset videos with the song. The song re-entered all streaming charts. Petit Biscuit also noticed that TikTok users loved another song called “You”. He decided to perform his track in an exclusive version live on TikTok: this initiative allowed him to increase his fanbase from 16K fans in March to 100K fans in June. Another example of the impact of TikTok on the artist development is Inder Chahal. This Indian artist is a massive influencer on TikTok with 1.2 million followers, creating huge engagement. These collaborations on TikTok have helped drive these songs up the charts or raise awareness of new tracks with a global audience.

As TikTok has become an important destination for crowdsourced music discovery, Believe’s subsidiary TuneCore’s independent (and sometimes unknown) artists, have the opportunity to get their music discovered, promoted and showcased by hundreds of millions of users across TikTok. Since TuneCore launched distribution to TikTok in October 2019, over 200k of its artists have distributed 300k releases to the platform. Many of these songs have already gone viral, giving some of TuneCore’s lesser known artists the ability to breakout in a way that wasn’t previously possible. Last year, Chinese New Year, a song distributed by TuneCore artist Sales (US) went viral and there are 2.2m TikTok videos using the track. Also, their song Renee, which was the first song Sales distributed through TuneCore back in 2014, has already been used in 631k TikTok videos and is still growing. While viral success isn’t guaranteed, by following some simple best practices, independent artists can maximise their music on the platform. Through this new partnership, TuneCore’s TikTok team has put together an exclusive guide, called “TikTok For Musicians 101 Survival Guide”, for the independent artist community. Together TikTok and TuneCore will continue to help independent artists seize opportunities that the platform provides. 

Ole Obermann, Global Head of Music at TikTok, said: “We're excited to be partnering with Believe and TuneCore, with their incredible track record of empowering the independent music community. Bringing their family of labels and musicians to TikTok will help our global and diverse audience discover new music while also delivering creative ways for artists and fans to come together on our platform. Supporting independent artists has always been hugely important to TikTok, and this partnership is the next big step in bringing a more diverse range of music to our community.”

Denis Ladegaillerie, Founder and CEO at Believe, said: “We are thrilled to strengthen our distribution deal with TikTok, adding an innovative dimension to it. I would like to thank both teams for their collaborative effort to further increase marketing coverage and revenues for our independent artists at all stages of their career. This is a fantastic opportunity for Believe’ s artists to engage deeper with their audiences.”