The question
A digital marketing agency in Los Angeles had 3 music artist clients and was being asked regularly by new artists for Spotify growth services. Building an in-house Spotify promotion capability would require significant investment in infrastructure and relationships. The question: how does an agency add credible Spotify growth services to their offering without building the capability from scratch?
What was tried before
What Didn't Work
- ✕Referred music clients to freelancers for Spotify promotion — lost client relationships when freelancers pitched directly
- ✕Attempted to run their own algorithmic campaigns using a competitor's self-serve tool — results were inconsistent and required significant time
- ✕Considered not offering Spotify services at all — kept losing music clients to agencies that did
Strategy applied
What We Did
- 1Became a Chartlex reseller — wholesale access to algorithmic campaigns under their own brand
- 2Built a Spotify Growth service page on their website using their own branding and pricing
- 3Created a standard client onboarding form collecting track links, geo preferences, and campaign objectives
- 4Marked up wholesale rates by 40% — maintained a 34% gross margin after management time
- 5Ran monthly reporting calls with music clients using Chartlex campaign data formatted in their own report templates
Observed results
The Outcome
12 music clients added within 6 months. Spotify Growth became the agency's 3rd highest revenue service line.
- 12 new music clients acquired within 6 months of launch
- 34% gross margin on all Spotify campaigns — highest of any service line
- 0 client-facing infrastructure built: delivery fully handled by Chartlex
- Spotify Growth became the #3 revenue service line by month 4
- 3 existing non-music clients referred music artist contacts to the agency after seeing the service
Why it worked
The Takeaway
The agency leveraged an existing trust relationship with their clients. Artists were already paying them for social media and advertising — adding Spotify growth under a trusted brand meant no credibility-building required. The white-label model meant zero infrastructure investment: no Spotify relationships to build, no delivery to manage, no technical capability to develop. The 40% margin on a service they don't fulfil themselves is possible precisely because the delivery is reliable and consistent.
Who this applies to
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