A focused radio campaign built around your release, delivered by an experienced specialist plugging team.
£699 per campaign
A different approach to radio promotion
Good Stock offers two distinct approaches to radio promotion.
Our Global Radio Promotion service is designed for broad international reach, discovery and the development of an artist’s radio footprint over successive releases.
Specialist Radio Plugging takes a different approach.
It is a deliberately focused campaign in which an experienced plugger listens to the record, identifies where they believe the strongest opportunities lie, and actively works the release using more than 40 years of music-industry experience, knowledge and established radio relationships.
One isn’t an upgraded version of the other.
They are different approaches for different records and different objectives.
Not every record needs this campaign
Specialist Radio Plugging isn’t something we’ll automatically recommend simply because an artist wants more radio exposure.
We listen to the record first.
We’re looking for releases where we believe a focused plugging campaign has a credible opportunity to attract the attention of higher-profile radio programmers, producers and presenters.
That doesn’t mean we’re looking for mainstream pop music, by the way!
Independent, alternative and unconventional records can absolutely have that potential. The question is whether we believe this particular record gives a specialist plugger something they can credibly work with at that level.
If we don’t think it does, we’ll say so.
There may still be a strong case for Global Radio Promotion, or another approach entirely.
What you’re paying for
The value of Specialist Radio Plugging isn’t the size of a mailing list.
You’re paying for specialist human effort.
An experienced plugger considers the record, decides where it belongs, identifies the people most relevant to it and actively works the release through established knowledge and relationships.
A typical campaign encompasses approximately 500 selected DJs, stations and online radio outlets, together with around 50 US college radio stations.
But the number isn’t really the point.
The campaign is about identifying who should hear this particular record and concentrating the effort there.
Experience and access
Our plugging partner brings more than 40 years’ experience in the music industry and an established network across UK, Irish and international radio.
Depending on the record, that network provides routes to presenters, producers, programmers and programmes associated with names including Amy Lamé, Chris Hawkins, Steve Lamacq, Marc Riley, Gideon Coe, Huw Stephens, Mark Radcliffe, Craig Charles, Jo Whiley, Dermot O’Leary, Gary Crowley, John Kennedy and Mickey Bradley.
It also encompasses important routes for independent music including BBC Introducing and Amazing Radio, alongside the wider commercial, independent, specialist and college-radio landscape.
Those names aren’t a promised recipient list.
Every campaign is built around the record, and the people approached will depend on where the plugger believes there is a credible fit. Access doesn’t imply endorsement and doesn’t guarantee that somebody will listen to, respond to or play a particular release.
What the network demonstrates is the level at which an experienced plugger is capable of working a record when they believe the opportunity is there.
BBC Introducing
For independent and emerging artists, BBC Introducing can be a particularly important part of the radio landscape.
It isn’t simply one national programme or one generic submission destination. The Introducing network provides routes through regional and local BBC teams, with opportunities for independent music to be discovered, supported and potentially brought to wider attention within the BBC.
Understanding that landscape matters.
Our plugging expertise includes practical experience of BBC Introducing and the people and routes around it, helping identify where a release belongs and how it should be presented.
As with every other part of a plugging campaign, there is no promise that BBC Introducing will select or play a particular record. Those are editorial decisions made within the BBC.
What we bring is experience of this part of the industry and the ability to include appropriate Introducing opportunities within a properly considered campaign rather than treating it as another email address on a list.
For independent artists in particular, we think that’s an important distinction.
What happens during a campaign?
Before anything begins, we’ll listen to the music and discuss the release with you.
If we believe Specialist Radio Plugging is appropriate, we’ll agree the release being promoted and the timing of the campaign.
We’ll need the finished music and the supporting material necessary to present it properly. That will normally include artwork, artist information, photographs, release dates and any relevant story or activity around the release.
The plugging team then builds and works the campaign, selecting the radio and media contacts they consider most appropriate for the record and following up where appropriate.
Good Stock remains your point of contact throughout.
What can you expect?
Radio plugging isn’t digital advertising, and it can’t be measured in quite the same way.
We can pass on confirmed airplay, feedback and other responses that come back to us.
What we can’t provide is a complete record of everybody who heard the release, considered it or even played it.
Radio simply doesn’t work that way.
Stations and presenters aren’t obliged to report back to a plugger. Some airplay is identified through monitoring or direct feedback. Some is discovered by the artist or their audience. Some may never be reported at all.
For that reason, we won’t promise a particular number of plays, responses or pieces of feedback.
Where meaningful confirmed results or feedback come back to us, we’ll pass them on.
What counts as a result?
The obvious result is airplay.
A campaign may also generate presenter interest, interview opportunities, requests for further material or other useful responses.
But we’re careful about what we call a result.
Getting a record in front of an influential programmer who ultimately decides not to play it may be exactly the opportunity the campaign was intended to create — but we’re not going to dress an unreported possibility up as a success.
Equally, absence of reported airplay doesn’t necessarily mean that the record wasn’t played.
We select records we believe have a credible opportunity, put specialist human effort behind them, and give them the strongest opportunity we can to reach the right people.
Programming decisions always remain with the broadcaster.
From plugging to airplay
Radio campaigns don’t always produce a neat trail of statistics. Sometimes the most meaningful evidence is much simpler:
The record gets heard, and somebody decides to play it.
Here are two examples from a previous campaign — and one we’re working on right now.
The Goodstock Project — Demands of Reality
BBC Radio Ulster — Mickey Bradley
Demands of Reality by The Goodstock Project went through this plugging service and subsequently reached Mickey Bradley at BBC Radio Ulster, resulting in airplay and discussion of the track on his programme.
It’s a good example of what specialist plugging is intended to create: getting an independent record into the hands of an established broadcaster who is in a position to hear it, make an editorial decision about it and put it on air.
The Goodstock Project — Demands of Reality
Frank Skinner — Absolute Radio
“Tremendous — That was The Goodstock Project with Demands of Reality.”
Frank Skinner
Demands of Reality went through this plugging service and subsequently received national airplay on The Frank Skinner Show on Absolute Radio.
And here’s the slightly extraordinary part:
We didn’t know it had happened.
Good Stock only discovered the play afterwards when somebody mentioned it on social media.
That’s a useful real-world illustration of both the potential of specialist radio plugging and the difficulty of measuring its results. Not every play, conversation or response makes its way back through the plugging chain.
Sometimes a campaign has travelled further than either the artist or label knows.
What we do know in this case is tangible: an independent release worked through this service reached a major national broadcaster, was selected for airplay, and Frank Skinner’s spontaneous on-air verdict was “Tremendous.”
Currently working — June Holland
We’re currently working June Holland’s Get Outside through the Specialist Radio Plugging service.
This is the other side of the proposition: not a retrospective success story, but a record we’ve heard and chosen to put forward for a specialist campaign.
We don’t know what the outcome will be — and we’re not going to pretend that we do.
What we can say is that we believe the record has the qualities to justify focused specialist plugging, and the campaign is happening now.
Real records. Real campaigns. No promised outcomes.
These examples aren’t intended to suggest that every campaign will result in BBC or national commercial radio airplay.
They demonstrate something more straightforward: the experience, relationships and routes into radio described on this page are real and have resulted in tangible national radio exposure for independent music.
Every new record starts again from zero.
We listen to it, decide whether we believe this approach gives it a credible opportunity and — if it does — put the specialist human effort behind it.
Specialist Radio Plugging or Global Radio Promotion?
Global Radio Promotion
Global is designed for broad international reach, catalogue discovery and the development of an ongoing radio footprint.
Each campaign features a particular release while making the artist’s wider catalogue available. Over successive campaigns, that can allow stations to discover and retain more of the artist’s music.
Much of the resulting activity can also be observed through independent radio-spin data.
Specialist Radio Plugging
Specialist deliberately narrows the field.
Experienced human effort is concentrated on selected programmers, producers, presenters and higher-profile opportunities appropriate to the particular record.
That activity is inherently harder to observe. Important conversations and editorial decisions taking place within stations aren’t necessarily visible to either Good Stock or the artist.
Global is about reach, discovery and building a radio footprint. Specialist is about judgement, relationships and concentrated human effort.
Neither is an upgraded version of the other.
Depending on the record and what you’re trying to achieve, we may recommend one approach, the other, or potentially a combination of both.
Why can’t you guarantee airplay?
Because nobody legitimately can.
The decision to play a record belongs to the station, programmer, producer or presenter.
A plugger can use experience and relationships to identify opportunities, put a record in front of the appropriate people, make the case for it and follow it up.
They cannot make somebody play it.
We think it’s important to be clear about that before you spend any money.
What does it cost?
Specialist Radio Plugging costs £699 per campaign.
Before accepting a campaign, we’ll listen to the record and discuss what you’re trying to achieve.
If we don’t believe this particular approach represents a sensible use of your promotional budget, we’ll tell you.
If you’re planning several singles, an EP or album campaign, or you’re also talking to Good Stock about distribution, physical production or wider label involvement, talk to us before treating each part of the project separately.
There may be a better way to structure the overall release.
When should we talk?
Ideally, before the release is out.
A plugging campaign needs enough time for the music and supporting material to be prepared, the campaign to be planned and the record to reach people before and around its release date.
If the record is already out, don’t automatically assume you’ve missed the opportunity. Tell us where things stand and we’ll give you our view.
The earlier we’re involved in the planning, the more options we have.
Tell us about the record
Send us the music.
Tell us what you’re releasing, when you’re planning to release it, what’s already happening around the artist and what you’d like the campaign to achieve.
We’ll listen to it and tell you whether we think Specialist Radio Plugging is the right approach.