Netherlands-based pop duo JONI faced a familiar challenge when looking to promote their cover of Manu Chao’s Me Gustas Tu (Universal/Goldengate) across European radio:
How do you access multiple territories simultaneously without burning through massive budgets or dealing with cross-border coordination headaches?
The answer came from Listn, the France-born platform that prominent industry players are quietly using to achieve impressive promo results.
According to Listn, within two weeks of launching the campaign through its platform, JONI’s track hit No.3 on Shazam Discovery in the Netherlands.
The final tally: over 4,000 radio plays across the Netherlands, France, Spain, Italy, Germany, and Austria, all for under €1,000.
“This shows how Listn can scale effective, territory-specific campaigns that deliver measurable impact while keeping budgets lean,” claims Robin Hammouti, co-founder of the platform, which, he says, aims to “revolutionize” promotion.
JONI’s campaign success, highlighted by Listn, is just one piece of a larger story. As streaming oversaturation reaches crisis levels, with Luminate‘s 2024 Year-End Music Report showing that 93.2 million of over 200 million available tracks attracted 10 or fewer plays, some industry players are exploring algorithmic solutions that can cut through the noise.
Data published by Chartmetric in January reveals the stark reality: Of the 11 million Spotify artists tracked on Chartmetric in 2024, just 5.31% of them (584,600) had more than 1,000 monthly listeners. In other words: around 95% of artists on Spotify had fewer than 1,000 monthly listeners.
That’s where Listn comes in. It says that it wants to “make formerly inaccessible, high-powered marketing tools available to all — from rising bedroom producers to the world’s biggest record labels.”
The company’s capabilities become clear in a recent campaign for Dariel Amant’s Romeo y Julieta (Platoon).
What started as a strategic decision to focus on fewer than 10 high-engagement social media creators within Spanish-speaking Latin music communities sparked impressive results; over 200 organic posts that generated 10 million impressions and 3 million-plus views.
“The track already had a solid foundation with dozens of organic videos and strong support from DSPs,” explains Hammouti.
“This targeted, community-driven approach quickly sparked over 200 organic posts, generating millions of views and significantly accelerating the record’s momentum and the artist’s career, all while keeping the campaign budget under $3 CPM.”
JONI and Dariel Amant aren’t isolated success stories for Listn, the company tells us. They represent a systematic approach that’s scaling across its 15,000 active users, who launch over 800 campaigns monthly through the platform, which launched just two years ago.
The numbers are compelling. Hammouti points out that, while TikTok ads typically cost between $4 and $6 CPM [Cost Per Thousand Impressions], Listn’s influencer campaigns on TikTok have delivered results as low as $1.03 CPM.
“On the radio side, indie campaigns like TATF from Ahoona and Eric Carter have generated over 1,500 radio spins for less than €1,000 spent,” says Hammouti. “Given the recent nearly 24% increase in BMI royalty rates [from US terrestrial radio], there’s a compelling economic opportunity here for our users investing in radio promotion.”
Adds Hammouti: “It’s not a guaranteed hit every time, but Listn consistently removes the guesswork and uncertainty typical of traditional radio plugging, which tends to focus on a smaller batch of high-profile stations.
“The same holds true for influencer campaigns: rather than relying on luck, our data-driven platform connects you with the right people, making the process smarter, more reliable, and delivering consistent value over time.”
What enables these results is what Listn calls “algorithmic affinity matching,” the company’s proprietary technology that crawls data on thousands of curators, influencers, and radio stations worldwide, scoring each potential partnership based on real-world engagement, historical success, and strategic fit.
“Imagine a super head of promotions working for everyone simultaneously, learning from all previous similar-sounding campaigns on your behalf, including your competitors, and advising you accordingly on what works best for your release within your budget,” Hammouti explains.
The platform connects users to over 2,000 radio stations, thousands of social media influencers, and playlist curators in more than 100 countries. Campaign creation takes under five minutes, and real-time analytics show exactly what’s working in different markets.
“Traditional promotion is a mess: spreadsheets, DMs, email chains. There’s friction everywhere,” argues Hammouti. “Listn takes all the early steps under one roof. We didn’t reinvent the wheel, but we make it spin much faster.”
He adds: “B2B clients care most about efficiency, transparency, and reach to make an informed decision. That’s what we’re all about.”
“Imagine a super head of promotions working for everyone simultaneously, learning from all previous similar-sounding campaigns on your behalf, including your competitors, and advising you accordingly on what works best for your release within your budget.”
Robin Hammouti, Listn
Listn’s rising credibility among prominent music business players is evident from some of the strategic partnerships it notes it has with companies such as Platoon and Symphonic Distribution.
“Based on consistent feedback we gather from our clients, we appear to be an ideal starting point for activating and monitoring early promotion efforts, which can then effectively capitalize on early Listn results and mobilize more resources,” explains Hammouti.
Plus, Listn’s collaboration with Beatport through AMPSuite Distribution brings Listn’s campaign tools directly into one of electronic music’s most respected ecosystems.
“By integrating with Beatport, Listn helps artists and labels amplify their releases through smart curator targeting, simplified campaign launches, and transparent reporting,” notes Hammouti.
“This partnership not only underscores industry trust in Listn’s technology but also opens the door for more innovative collaborations.”
Listn’s Co-founders, Nicolas Rabaud and Robin Hammouti bring over two decades of combined experience breaking independent artists and generating hundreds of millions of streams globally.
Hammouti emphasizes that “the product is built by music industry people, for music industry people”. He adds: “We aspire to become an industry standard for Labels and Distributors.”
Looking ahead, Hammouti projects the platform will reach over 35,000 active users and double its monthly campaign capacity within the next couple of years.
“Our smart automation and international reach are unlocking previously siloed markets,” he tells us.
“We make formerly inaccessible, high-powered marketing tools available to all, from rising bedroom producers to the world’s biggest record labels, dramatically leveling the playing field.”
Here, Hammouti explains why industry heavyweights are integrating Listn into their marketing operations, how the technology enables its campaign results, and his predictions for the future of the promo space…
It’s been nearly two years since we last spoke following Listn’s beta launch. How has the company evolved from that initial 3,000-user milestone to where you are today?
Is ‘lightyears’ an answer (laughs)? I do think time gets distorted in Music Tech. Scaling up, we’ve focused heavily on the tech: Influencer marketing features and campaign advertising tools are now integrated on the platform, our dashboard now gives users visibility on every piece of content containing their tracks and sorts stats like views, shares, and engagement in real time. It’s a living system, always learning from what works best.
Looking back, Listn’s evolution has been all about becoming more flexible while never compromising our core mission — actively simplifying music marketing, not adding another layer of complexity.
You’ve grown to 15,000 active users, facilitating 800+ campaigns monthly. What’s driving this rapid adoption, and how are you managing this scale of growth?
Honestly, keeping any campaign creation under five minutes and a crystal clear user interface nearly eliminated all frustration and customer support, leaving us more room to focus on the agency feeling where we can, alongside the technology, assist existing and new users with custom recommendations based on our product experience.
Not to mention clever partnerships with fellow disruptive companies in the industry like Symphonic or Songstats.
Could you give us an update/overview of the tech that underpins your platform?
At a high level: Listn combines algorithmic affinity matching, campaign automation, and integrated analytics dashboards.
Our system crawls data on curators, influencers, and radio stations worldwide, scoring each match based on real-world engagement, historical success, and strategic fit.
“Simplicity on the front-end, powerful logic underneath.”
Everything’s built for flexibility. You can run global radio campaigns powered by Syndicast, micro-target influencers by engagement/reach, and pull live stats on performance. Simplicity on the front-end, powerful logic underneath.
Your partnership with Beatport through AMPSuite Distribution is particularly interesting. How does this collaboration work, and what does it signal about Listn’s industry credibility?
Partnering with Beatport through AMPSuite has been huge: it brings Listn’s campaign tools directly to the heart of the electronic music scene.
Both of Listn’s co-founders are former AMPSuite clients and proud members of AFEM, so this partnership felt like a natural extension of our shared commitment to thriving and helping the electronic music community.
By integrating with Beatport, Listn helps artists and labels amplify their releases through smart curator targeting, simplified campaign launches, and transparent reporting.
How do you price and structure services differently for a bedroom producer versus a label/services company working multiple artists?
Listn is designed with flexibility in mind and operates on a pay-as-you-go model, allowing users to start as low as €2 for a playlist or radio submission.
Especially when it comes to playlisting, you don’t need to spend extensively. Often, targeting a niche playlist can deliver a high success rate from just one placement. The algorithm does that job for you.
Are you seeing different success patterns between electronic music, pop, hip-hop, or other genres on your platform?
I would love to say no, but we certainly do: Electronic music leads in campaign agility, benefiting from global radio and playlist targeting. Hip–hop and Latin music see strong results via influencer engagement, especially where visual or viral social presence is key.
The platform adapts genre strategies based on live data, so success patterns are always evolving, and our users get ongoing insights on what’s working for each style.
If you had to convince a label boss in one minute why they should integrate Listn into their marketing stack, what would you say?
That we’re label bosses ourselves and that there’s no secret product or recipe that we’ve heard of.
That being said, the real challenge with breaking new artists is the uncertainty about where to start and how to spend.
Listn was designed to reduce these blind spots close to zero so that you can feel more confident in your approach.
WHERE DO YOU SEE THE MUSIC PROMOTION SECTOR HEADING OVER THE NEXT FIVE YEARS, AND HOW IS LISTN POSITIONING ITSELF FOR THAT FUTURE?
The music promotion landscape is definitely shifting dramatically with AI.
As AI-generated music grows, so does AI-driven content and tastemaking on social media. It raises big questions: will creators, labels, and agencies trust or challenge AI’s role in curation and promotion? After all, streaming platforms have long relied on algorithms.
The industry could see more middlemen cut out, with creators and labels taking more direct control. It’s an exciting, transformative moment for music.
Our approach at Listn is simple — we’ll embrace technologies and shortcuts that strengthen our community and support the creator economy without losing sight of what makes music meaningful.
Music Business Worldwide