How TikTok is helping brands tap into trending music—and splitting the profits with artists

TikTok is introducing a new model for brands to tap into trending songs on the platform—and for artists to earn a cut of the revenue generated from brands’ videos containing their songs. 

The platform today launched the “Artist Impact Program,” an initiative designed to make popular music from both established and emerging artists available for brands to include in their content without running the risk of violating copyright laws. The program is an expansion of TikTok’s existing Commercial Music Library, which the platform launched in 2020 to provide brands access to a collection of royalty-free songs to accompany their TikTok videos. 

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But the rapid pace of TikTok’s trend cycle and the prominent role of music on the platform has led many brands to request that TikTok add trending songs into the Commercial Music Library more quickly, said Bryan Cosgrove, director of commercial music & creative licensing at TikTok. The Artist Impact Program is the platform’s solution to streamline this process, with TikTok partnering with 20 music distributors around the globe to help funnel songs into the Commercial Music Library from those distributors’ artist rosters.

“Making more popular music available for brands to use is a huge priority for us, because we think that there's clearly a lot of value that our user base is putting on those sounds,” Cosgrove said. “So, when a brand has the opportunity to tap into either a song that's trending or an artist that's recognizable, they have a better opportunity to really get our user base to stop and engage with their content.”

According to a 2021 Kantar report commissioned by TikTok, 73% of respondents reported they’d be more likely to “stop and look” at a brand’s TikTok ad if it contained audio, and another 88% of respondents said sound is an “essential” element of TikTok content. 

Because audio, often music, is so integral to the platform, brands are often stuck using the generic-sounding royalty-free music included in TikTok's Commercial Music Library, sitting out of TikTok trends that involve clips from popular songs out of the fear that a video containing that audio might result in legal trouble. These fears aren’t unfounded—for example, brands such as Bang Energy and Iconic London were recently sued by major record labels after using copyrighted songs in their videos. 

TikTok began piloting the Artist Impact Program in April 2022, partnering with both established artists, including Ciara and Akon, and up-and-coming musicians such as Inci Gurun, also known as INJI. After being added to the Commercial Music Library last April, her song “Gaslight” has been included in more than 3 million videos—including several made by brands—that have collectively amassed 14 billion views in just eight months.

“If you are an independent artist or an emerging artist, you might not have this full sync team behind you that can help get you placements and ads or films or television,” Cosgrove said, referring to “synchronization licensing,” where an artist or publisher signs a deal with a brand or other entity to include that artist’s song in their video content. “Having an opportunity like this is like a brand new revenue stream. It's a brand new opportunity to kind of tap into a world that [artists] might not have known that was even accessible to them.” 

Artists could also choose to add remixed or sped-up versions of their songs, which are both frequent elements of trending video formats on TikTok, to the Commercial Music Library, Cosgrove added. 

TikTok declined to share the details of the proportion of the revenue accumulated from brands’ videos that artists will receive through the Artist Impact Program.