Should you register your songs if nobody’s listening yet?

The objection deserves a fair hearing, because it's mostly right about the math. You've got a few hundred plays spread across everything you've put out. Registering properly means an account with a PRO, then a separate registration for each individual work, then doing a version of that again at a completely different organization for mechanicals, and a third one if you want internet and satellite radio covered. That's several logins and a spreadsheet in service of royalties that, at your current numbers, might not cover lunch. Meanwhile there's an unfinished beat sitting in your session. Anyone who tells you that's an obvious trade is not being honest with you.

Registration is a claim, not a payment

Registration isn't how you get paid, it's how you stake a claim. The money accrues whether or not anyone has claimed it, and unmatched royalties don't sit in a drawer with your name on them. They pool, and they get distributed later on formulas that favor catalogs bigger than yours.

Nobody schedules the song that takes off

The other thing is timing. Nobody schedules the track that takes off. If a placement lands or a playlist picks something up in March, the collections that matter started the moment the song went live, not the moment you noticed. Backdating is possible in some cases and painful in all of them.

The order that wastes the least time

Practically, the sequence that costs you the least time:

• Open one PRO account now (ASCAP, BMI or SESAC), then register works in batches rather than one at a time.
• Register at The MLC as soon as anything is on streaming. It's been collecting US mechanicals since 2021 and it's separate from your PRO, which is why it's the one people miss.
• SoundExchange only matters once your recordings are getting non-interactive radio play, so it can wait.

And get your splits in writing before any of it. If a loop came from Melody, the producer keeps ten percent of the publishing and a writing credit, so that's already settled and you can register accordingly. Everything else, sort out over text if you have to, just sort it out.

Corbett's take

Grammy-winning producer Corbett was asked the same question. His answer is in the video at the top of this page.