How to Distribute a Cover Song to Spotify Without Creating the Wrong Artist Profile

Getting a cover song onto Spotify under the wrong artist profile happens when metadata entered during distribution does not exactly match your existing Spotify for Artists identity, causing the platform to create a second, duplicate page instead of adding the release to your established profile. The fix is almost entirely about what you type into the artist name and credit fields before you submit, not anything you do after the song goes live.

This is one of the more common and most frustrating mistakes cover artists make, because by the time it becomes visible, the release is already live and streams have started accumulating on the wrong page.

Why does Spotify create a second artist profile for the same artist?

Spotify builds artist profiles automatically from the metadata your distributor submits, and it matches new releases to an existing profile only when the artist name string is identical to what is already on file. A single extra space, a different capitalization, an added middle initial, or a stylized symbol swapped for a letter is enough for Spotify’s system to treat the submission as a new, unrelated artist and spin up a fresh page.

This is not a manual review process. There is no person checking whether “Jon Carter” and “Jon Carter” (with a double space) are the same person — the system treats them as different strings and acts accordingly. That’s why cover artists, who often release under informal or evolving stage names, run into this more frequently than artists with a single, fixed band name set up once and never touched again.

What causes the mismatch specifically for cover songs?

Cover releases introduce two metadata fields that original songs don’t require in the same way: the original songwriter credit and, in some cases, a “cover of” note in the release description. Artists sometimes instinctively add the original artist’s name into the performing artist field, thinking it helps with discovery or signals which song is being covered. It does the opposite — it confuses the matching system and can result in your release being associated with the wrong artist entirely, or split off into its own orphaned profile.

The correct field for the original songwriter’s name is the composer/songwriter credit, which feeds into the licensing and royalty chain, not the public-facing performing artist name. Keeping these fields separate is the single biggest thing cover artists get wrong.

How do you check your existing artist name before submitting a new release?

Open your current Spotify for Artists profile (or search your own artist page if you don’t have access yet) and copy the artist name exactly as it appears, character for character, including spacing and capitalization. Paste that exact string into the artist field during distribution rather than retyping it from memory. This single step prevents the majority of duplicate-profile cases.

If this is your first-ever release and no profile exists yet, the name you submit becomes your permanent identity going forward, so it’s worth deciding on a final spelling and format before submission rather than adjusting it on your second or third release.

What if the profile has already split?

If a duplicate has already been created, the releases themselves don’t need to be taken down — the fix is a profile merge request filed through Spotify for Artists, which typically takes one to several weeks depending on Spotify’s processing queue. During that window, streams and listener data stay attached to whichever profile they landed on, so the sooner the mismatch is caught, the less historical data ends up fragmented across two pages.

This is a case where fast distributor moderation genuinely matters: a release caught and corrected before it goes live costs you nothing, while a release corrected after the fact requires a manual merge process you don’t control the timeline on.

Step-by-step: submitting a cover song with the correct artist profile

Confirm your exact existing artist name string on Spotify for Artists, or finalize your name if this is a first release.
Enter that name exactly, with no added spacing, punctuation, or symbol substitutions, in the performing artist field during upload.
Put the original songwriter’s name only in the composer/songwriter credit field — never in the performing artist field.
Leave featured artist fields blank unless another vocalist or musician actually performed on the track.
Submit for moderation and review the release preview carefully before it goes live, since this is your last chance to catch a typo before it’s locked into Spotify’s system.

A distributor’s moderation speed matters here too. Globex Music typically reviews and approves releases quickly, which means a metadata error gets flagged and can be corrected before the release reaches Spotify, rather than after it’s already split into a separate profile and waiting on a merge queue.

Does the cover song’s mechanical license affect the artist profile?

No — licensing and artist profile identity are handled as two separate systems. The mechanical license covers your legal right to distribute the cover recording and ensures the original songwriter is compensated through the composer credit; it has no bearing on which Spotify artist page your release is attached to. Globex Music includes automatic mechanical licensing on cover submissions, so that part of the process is handled in the background while you focus on getting the artist name field right.

A quick reference: what goes where

Performing artist field: your name or band name, exactly as already listed on Spotify, with no additions. Composer/songwriter field: the original songwriter(s) of the song you’re covering. Release title: the song title, optionally with “(Cover)” if you want to signal that in search, though this is a style choice, not a requirement. Getting these three fields right the first time is worth more than any after-the-fact fix, because a clean, single, unified Spotify artist profile is what allows playlist placements, algorithmic recommendations, and listener follows to all accumulate in one place instead of being split across pages that look like two different artists to both Spotify and your fans.