Wavr.ai = Scam
Recently I have noticed many bands in my genre that have the ”Wavr.ai” playlists on their discovered on section at Spotify.
Playlist 1
This makes me really concerned as I have noticed this scam site before but never thought anyone that takes their career seriously would use it.
It is literally pay for streams.
Rule #1 in the ”how to not get scammed” handbook.
But people really fall for this?
In this article I will write about why this service is nothing but fake plays and that you do exactly the opposite than you think.
Although It has come to my awareness that this site occasionally add random songs to their lists from the Distrokid wheel playlists. This is to lure possible new clients to them. With that said.
I am aware that some end up on these lists without buying their service.
The purpose of the article is to raise awareness of this trap and get people to avoid being scammed.
What is Wavr.ai?
This is a site that claims to curate a playlist from where their ”partners” such as coffee shops, lounge and even McDonalds restaurants. Whenever a ”partner” stream the your song they get a cut from the plan you bought.
The part with McDonalds felt realistic to you? Okay, let’s continue.
The plan comes with you literally choosing amount of streams to buy (hello red flag).
All from a thousand for six euro to one million streams for 1.4k euro. Take note that the price is in euro. This is an interesting detail. Among others.
Scrolling down their one page website it looks more or less like the Matrix.
After the price list they show some random screenshots of huge results from Spotify for artists but for some reason have blurred out the artist. Not so proud after all?
Last there is a contact section with an email and a location adress. In Los Angeles USA. Thought it is dollars over there. Well, they maybe have their reasons as I have got several sources stating the data coming from Finland. The location and currency is an interesting detail.
Time to get this cleared out.
Getting streams are nice?
To me this is full of Red flags and I honestly can’t wrap my head around that anyone can believe this is legit. But for some reason a lot of people do, musicians in all genres.
Well, maybe it is just that no-one cares about it being fake. They are getting streams, right? Maybe can trigger some algorithms and play a ”fake it until you make it” game.
If this is the case. Begin with reading my first ever article about how potted traffic hurts your career. "Swim with sharks.."
As a recap.
1- You risk getting the music removed from Spotify
2 - They put you in an all genres playlist and the algorithms will break against you
3 - Your stats will be totally off and hard to wash away. You will no longer know who likes you.
4 - No serious label or company want to touch your music or be a part of your career.
It is simply nothing but hurting yourself for a long time forward with the fake it theory.
Work hard, create good content and grow consistent with engaged fans.
Why this is scam.
The Website ---> Enter The Matrix
To begin the site looks like you will get a virus from pushing any button. It has no personality. No showcase of any clients or who works there. Why? Because it is fake. If they were actual mastermind promoters they would have a ”team” section.
Real trackable people with images.
They would have testimonials and actual bands they are proud to have worked with.
It is similar to the Averia Agency website I wrote about in the end of this article:
Payola
As always in the industry.
Do not pay for playlist placements.
Definitely do not pay for streams.
I shouldn’t have to go more deep here but doing this means:
They fund bot-traffic to your song.
It is against Spotify terms and rules.
Impossible to give you exact number of streams from a playlist (again, bots)
The playlist
All genres end up in the same playlists. They have almost a million of playlist ”followers” and:
1. All genres in the same place
2. Only small artists and some with questionable production.
This means you are being associated with musicians way out of your genre and style. This is where the algorithms will get confused and you end up on the whole wrong sections. As follows, your skip rate will be high as cyber clouds.
When there are only small artists in the list it is because all paid to be there. Think about how realistic it is that a million of real people follow a list that has all genres with only small artists and some songs sounds awful in production.
The songs are also only in the playlist for a couple of days. Buying these streams will result in a huge spike in streams to later drop off a cliff. It is not realistic and the "Spotify bot detector" can go rampage on a stat like that.
Testimonials (Screenshots)
We’ve been touching this aspect but the ”proof” of results are screenshots that blurred out the artists. It doesn’t really make it very trustworthy or transparent. Even these small aspects add up to the statement of this being a scam.
Contact info
Email, a location and social media.
Looking at their instagram they got a lot of followers and 12 posts all made in March 9. Here they wanted to look trustworthy so they bought 1000 likes for ten of these posts. Why I say that?
Well, they have almost the same amount of likes for these posts.
Reading the comment section from the latest post there are a lot of naive musicians
who they randomly added to reel them in. But gladly there are also some people that see through the fake polish.
The location is an old office building in LA. I can’t find them listed there on google either but I wasn’t expecting that. Transparency hasn’t really been their top priority so far.
Final
I hope this will help to hold up anyone being on the edge of considering this to avoid getting a big set-back in your career. By sharing this article to your musicfriends we can together get one of the more nastier sharks exposed and give them less to eat.
Don’t hesitate to discuss this topic with me.
Always available at social media @aristicmusic
Remember that it is a marathon, not a sprint!
Learn how to evaluate and spot fake playlists with this article: