Member Tools
The MLC has created a suite of tools that allows its Members to easily manage their musical work (aka song) data. Learning how to use these tools effectively is one of the best ways you, as a Member, can Play Your Part™ in The MLC process and ensure you receive all your digital audio mechanical royalties for streaming.
Look for your songs with the Public Work Search.
The Public Work Search is The MLC's publicly available database that offers the general public access to our registered song data.
When: Anytime and all the time! It is easy to search and share song data while you're on the go.
Why: Ensuring the accuracy of your song data is an ongoing process. We encourage all songwriters, lyricists and composers (and those who work with them) to utilize the Public Work Search. It’s an “all-hands-on-deck" approach to ensuring the data is correct so that rightsholders get paid what they are entitled to.
How: Anyone can use the Public Work Search to search for, review and share song data. If you notice one of your songs is missing information, you can share a link to that specific works page (by clicking the “Copy Work Link” button) with your publisher or co-writer. If you are an MLC Member and want to view the same song with more detail or make changes, log in to your Portal account. If you are not a Member but you notice an error in your song data, please contact our Support Team here.
Claim your shares of songs using the Claiming Tool.
The Claiming Tool allows Members to easily search The MLC’s database within The MLC Portal for partially claimed songs and claim their shares.
When: After you've logged into your Portal account, use the Claiming Tool to search for your song and to see if all the shares are claimed.
Why: Claiming your share of a song is an important step in collecting all your royalties. Our database contains a lot of song data, so check to see if yours is there first. Sometimes only a portion of the song shares have been claimed (and sometimes no shares have been claimed!), which means someone is missing out on money.
How: If you find a song that is missing your share, you can easily claim your part using the Claiming Tool to start receiving your royalties. So if you see your song, or a song you’ve worked on, listed without your name attached to it, claim it! If you see that a song is missing altogether, you can move forward with the Works Registration Tools to get the song in our system.
Register new songs using our Work Registration Tools.
Our Works Registration Tools within The MLC Portal allow Members to register songs that are not already in our database.
When: Before you register a song in the Portal, check the Claiming Tool first! Someone could have already registered it for you, meaning all you need to do is claim your share. If your song does not show up in the Claiming Tool, go ahead and register it.
Why: The only way to receive your streaming royalties is to register your songs with The MLC. Once a song is registered, The MLC gets to work to pay the royalties.
How: Depending on how many songs you need to register, there are a few options. From Individual Work Registration to Bulk Works Registrations to Common Works Registration (CWR), you can choose what works best for you.
Match sound recordings to your songs with the Matching Tool.
The Matching Tool within The MLC Portal allows Members to propose matches of sound recordings (ISRCs) to their songs.
When: It’s always a good time to check the Matching Tool to see if you have a missed connection! Since we continually receive new recording data from DSPs and add it to our database, it’s important to regularly make sure all the data lines up so you can get paid.
Why: If we don’t have all the data to match a rightsholder to their song, we can’t pay them properly! Making connections gets you closer to getting paid your royalties.
How: The MLC performs both an automated and a manual matching process to attempt to match as many sound recordings to songs as possible. The data in the Matching Tool is what remains unmatched after The MLC's process. Here’s where you come in — if this data remains unmatched, The MLC can't pay out the royalties! Looking (and listening) through these recordings to match yours ensures you get paid the royalties you are due.
And here's your friendly reminder!
Don't forget to manage your contact details, add your banking information and fill out your tax forms in Member Settings (within The MLC Portal) so you can get paid.