YouTube allows artists to bring their content together from multiple channels into a centralized location - a YouTube Official Artist Channel (OAC). Your OAC automatically programs your music catalog on two new shelves, including your music videos, songs, and albums. You can learn all the specifics on YouTube’s dedicated OAC support hub, but below you’ll find the info you need to know to get started with TuneCore and YouTube OAC.
The Basics
- An OAC merges views, subscribers, and videos from an artist’s Topic Channels and Vevo Channel (if applicable) into their primary owned and operated (O&O) artist channel.
- An OAC can only contain one single O&O channel. If you have more than one O&O channel (non-Topic or Vevo) it cannot be merged into your OAC.
- Your Topic channel may still exist after the creation of an OAC page, but all of your Art Track videos will be accessible in the OAC.
- Artists will continue to be able to manage their O&O channel once it becomes an OAC.
When a channel becomes an OAC, the following features become available:
- Discography section (organized by album)
- Official Music Videos section
- Featured video slot (choose one video to highlight on the channel)
- Link to merchandise retailers (what’s this mean?)
You must meet the following guidelines to qualify for an OAC:
- Own and operate a YouTube channel that represents only one artist or band, NO LABEL CHANNELS.
- Have at least 3 official art tracks on YouTube delivered and distributed by TuneCore
- Have no policy violations on your YouTube channel
- Owned and Operated channel must have existing public video uploads - at least 1 music video is preferred
How do I connect my releases to my OAC?
- Log in to your account and head to the YouTube OAC banner or YouTube for Artists page
- Once you hit the “YouTube Official Artist Channel” landing page, click the blue “Go To YouTube to Claim Your OAC” button
- You’ll be asked to authenticate your Google account
- Once you authenticate, we’ll redirect you back to TuneCore and confirm that we’ve submitted your request.