A music publisher has two main jobs: licensing music and collecting royalties.

“Licensing” here means a publisher will secure opportunities for songwriters they’ve signed.

This can involve:

• Arranging co-writes between songwriters
• Registering songs with Performing Rights Organizations (PROs)
• Copyrighting songs
• Getting songs recorded by artists
• Music promotion assistance
• Distributing songs to streaming platforms
• Placing songs on TV and in films

After a song has been used in one of these ways, the music publisher is responsible for collecting royalties generated from these activities.

Before this, however, a music publisher needs to find promising talent. They want to find songwriters who they believe can write money-making songs or who have already done so.

In exchange for all of this, the publisher will obviously take a percentage of all revenue and royalties generated from songs they’ve signed.

A music publisher can be a strong partner, helping musicians expand their music careers.

Yes, a publisher takes a cut of a song’s revenue. But the opportunities they can bring songwriters can be career- and life-changing.

They can introduce you to labels and artist managers, and even help you get live gigs through their music industry network. Don’t underestimate the potential for a music publisher to add rocket fuel to your artist development formula.

They also take care of many of the business aspects that songwriters typically don’t want to deal with, like copyrighting music, drawing up contracts, securing placements on TV, and just general administrative work.

Copyright literally means the “right to copy.”

Copyrights confer exclusive rights to the creator or owner of a work to reproduce (copy), prepare derivative works (adapt), distribute copies to the public, and perform the work publicly.

1. If you write down the lyrics and notate the music to a song you made up, the composition is automatically protected by a “simple” or compulsory copyright. If you don’t write it down, it will not qualify for protection under copyright.
2. If you record the song you made up, then an additional copyright will apply to the recorded version of the song, known as a master recording copyright.

Music publishers usually only share in the composition rights, not in the master rights (unless they also produced the recording).

If you create a piece of music, this is a form of intellectual property (IP) in which some value presumably resides.

When we commercialize IP, it means we are extracting value from it in the form of revenue (money).

Protecting IP from infringement (theft) requires documenting with the government who created it and when it was created. This is typically done through copyrights.

Usually, the music publisher does not own the copyrights to songs created by their songwriters.

Some publishers do take control of the copyright, but always with the explicit approval of the writer.

The music publisher’s role is usually limited to collecting and auditing royalties on behalf of the artist, for which the publisher is paid the publisher’s share or “administration fee.”

The songwriter will typically maintain full control and ownership of the copyright, unless they choose to sell the copyright outright to someone else.

A split sheet is a document that outlines the percentage of ownership each songwriter, composer, and lyricist has in a song. This makes sure everyone is on the same page (literally and figuratively) about royalty payouts.

It’s a good idea to draft a split sheet before making any recordings, so it’s clear in advance who is entitled to which portion of the rights (rights = royalties).

If there is no split sheet or written agreement in place, the law provides that all contributors will receive an equal share in the proceeds. There have been many court battles over the years resulting from a lack of clear agreements between collaborators.

Here are the main ways your songs can earn money that would then be collected and paid by your publisher…

A mechanical license covers agreements with labels, distributors, and publishers and usually stipulates a certain payment for each copy sold or streamed (including when a song is covered).

This generates a mechanical royalty, which is then collected and paid to songwriters and composers by the publisher or publishing admin company.

When music is licensed to be synchronized with moving pictures in a movie, television show, ad, or video game.

Because of their connections with the film industry, a music publisher can get your songs licensed in this way.

This almost always comes with an upfront fee paid by the persons/company making the visual media. The fee is split between the publisher and the songwriter/composer.

One of the most common types of music licenses (and therefore music royalties) is a public performance license.

When a songwriter’s song is performed and played in a public setting, that generates a performance royalty.

This royalty is collected by the Performance Rights Organization (PRO) and sometimes a music publisher. If a songwriter doesn’t have a publisher, they can get paid directly from their PRO.

A “public setting” includes:

• Concerts (whether performed by the songwriter or someone else)
• Restaurants
• Bars
• Stores

If a song has been licensed, the songwriter(s) can earn performance royalties from it because TV and streaming platforms are considered a “public performance” of the song.

As the name implies, the print rights refer to printed copies of sheet music.

It applies to printed sheet music compilations, and whenever printed copies of sheet music for a song are created or reproduced.

These are less common but the royalties generated would usually be collected by a music publisher.

Widely used in the theater industry, a theatrical license allows for an onstage performance of a song with an audience present.

These are less common but the royalties generated would usually be collected by a music publisher.

There are three main types of music publishers you might choose to deal with:

1. Publishing administrator
2. Independent publisher
3. Major publisher

A publishing administrator takes on the somewhat mundane tasks that you don’t want to do as a songwriter.

These tasks include registering your music with PROs (both in your home country and abroad) and tracking royalties in order to pay them to you.

For these services, they take a small percentage of the royalties they collect (usually 10-15%).

They don’t pay writers any advances and they don’t offer any creative services, but they might help you get licensing placements.

If you’re just starting out as a DIY songwriter, they might be the best option.

An independent music publisher performs all the administrative work done by a publishing administrator, but they also offer creative services to their songwriters.

This can include music production help, artwork design, and promotion assistance.

They do pay the songwriter an advance, but it’s usually not a large one. In exchange, they ask for a certain number of songs or compositions per time period (usually a year). Their commission will be higher than a publishing admin’s.

Independents are always looking to discover new talent and might be a good option for songwriters who are up-and-coming and intend to make a big splash on the scene.

A major music publisher would be companies like Universal, Sony, BMG, and Warner Chappell.

They pay out big advances and provide songwriters with a full suite of creative services.

They take a much larger commission, but they’re very involved in aggressively promoting their writers’ music in the marketplace.

They’re typically most interested in signing artists who already have a big following. They want established writers who can be counted on to earn a recurring stream of revenue.

Artists often enter into publishing deals where the music publisher acts as administrator, registering works, processing paperwork for synch licenses, and working with other collection entities to collect royalties and distribute these to the artist.

Some of these deals might pay an advance to the artist, which the publisher will recoup from the earnings stream.

The publisher’s share is negotiated in this case, and would usually be from 15% to 25%.

There are two main types of music publishing deals…

A co-publishing agreement is when the artist gives up a larger share of royalties and control in order to incentivize the publishing company to pitch music supervisors, labels, and popular artists.

The company will also help develop the writer’s professional career by setting up co-writes with other songwriters and having the artist perform at industry showcases, in addition to handling all the administrative tasks.

Co-publishing deals pay a cash advance, which will need to be recouped by the company before additional royalties are paid to the artist.

A work-for-hire agreement is when creators offer to write and record material for other artists or companies for a flat fee.

In this case, you would be signing away all future rights to a song, and might not be credited as the composer, since whoever hired you would be listed as the writer.

Music publishing is changing fast because new platforms and new tech keep creating new ways songs earn money. Streaming is still the main engine, but short-form video, smarter royalty tracking, and blockchain experiments are changing how money moves. If you write songs (or want a job in publishing), you don’t need to be a tech nerd. You do need to understand where the new royalty pools live, how they get paid out, and what basic steps protect you when your song pops off in a clip, remix, or meme.

TikTok and YouTube Shorts can break a song in days. That part is fun. The less fun part is learning that viral doesn’t automatically mean paid. Short-form platforms can have their own licensing structures, and the money often flows through deals your distributor, publisher, or publishing admin needs to have in place. If your track isn’t properly delivered, matched, and licensed on the platform, you can end up with a “huge moment” and a tiny payout.

Think of it like this: social platforms are the billboard, not the bank. The bank is your rights setup. Make sure your releases are distributed everywhere people use music (including social libraries), and make sure you have a PRO and a publishing admin (or publisher) that can actually collect what you’re owed. Otherwise, you’re basically going viral for exposure, which is not a retirement plan.

AI is changing publishing in a practical way: it helps find usages that used to slip through the cracks. Modern royalty systems can scan giant piles of data across platforms to catch mismatches in titles, writer info, and recordings. That matters because a lot of unpaid royalties come down to metadata being incomplete, wrong, or inconsistent. AI tools are also helping publishers and admins spot patterns faster, flag conflicts, and speed up matching.

There’s also the creative side of AI, which is messier. As AI-generated tracks flood platforms, publishing is getting stricter about documentation, ownership, and what counts as original authorship. The short version: if you’re writing songs, keep clean records and don’t get cute with ownership. Future you will thank you.

Blockchain in music publishing isn’t about hype. The real promise is transparency. A shared ledger could show when and where a song is used, and smart contracts could split and send payments automatically. In theory, that means fewer delays, fewer disputes, and fewer “we can’t find the right songwriter” problems. In practice, adoption is still uneven, and you should treat it as an emerging lane, not the only lane.

You might also hear about NFTs or “royalty shares” sold to fans. That model can be legit, but it’s not magic. You’re basically trading future income for upfront money, and the paperwork needs to be airtight. If you go down this road, talk to an entertainment attorney. Publishing is one area where guessing can get expensive.

If you’re beginner-to-intermediate, here’s the move: get the boring setup right so you can enjoy the fun parts. You don’t need a traditional publishing deal to start collecting. You do need solid registrations, clean splits, and a system that can collect globally across the platforms where your song actually lives.

1. Join a PRO and register as a publisher, too. A PRO (ASCAP, BMI, SESAC, etc.) collects performance royalties. If you set up your own publishing entity, you can collect the publisher share as well. This is one of the biggest “why didn’t anyone tell me?” steps for new writers.
   
   
2. Register every song and lock down splits early. Register works with your PRO and keep split sheets for co-writes. Agree on percentages while everyone is still excited, not six months later when the song starts earning. Accurate titles, writer names, and IDs are how royalties find you.
   
   
3. Use a publishing admin if you don’t have a publisher. A publishing administrator can help collect royalties your PRO won’t catch (especially internationally and on certain digital uses). If you’re independent, this is often the cleanest way to collect more completely without signing away ownership.
   
   
4. Distribute with social platforms in mind. Make sure your distributor delivers to TikTok/Instagram music libraries and that your releases are eligible for YouTube Content ID where appropriate. The goal is simple: if someone uses your song in a clip, it’s trackable, matchable, and collectible.

The punchline is not “tech is scary.” The punchline is: publishing rewards the people who do the paperwork. If your song takes off, you want to spend your energy making the next one, not begging platforms and middlemen to find your royalties.