Confused by music rights? Looking to secure a song for your marketing campaign but unsure of all the licensing options and legalities? You’ve come to the right place.
Think of this blog as music licensing 101, aimed specially at marketers. In it we’ll be covering why licensing matters in 2025, sharing the current UK legal context around licensing, and explaining how brands can safely use music on social media, as well as on YouTube and traditional broadcast channels. So if you’re umming and ahhing about music licensing for marketing videos or how to license music for advertising, wondering, ‘do businesses need a music licence?’ or simply need a little help finding the perfect music for business with the correct clearances, read on.
Why Music Licensing Matters
When it comes to music licensing for marketers, what do you need to know? Well, if you intend to use copyrighted music for commercial use, you’ll need to secure the correct licences. Failure to do so could result in legal challenges, takedown requests and reputational damage, ultimately compromising brand integrity.
The rights you will need include:
- Dubbing (master) rights – These rights allow you to use a specific sound recording of a musical work in your project. The copyright owner is usually the record company or the recording artist directly.
- Synchronisation (sync) rights – These allow music to be used ‘in sync’ with moving images and cover any form of content, from film to TV, games to podcasts. To obtain sync rights, you will need to contact the published of the music. Sync rights are applicable to all music, unless the music falls within the public domain (usually when the composer died more than 70 years ago), and even then you would still require master rights.
In some instances, you will also require performance rights.
- Performance Rights – These allow you to play music in public, be that at an event or on a website. In the UK, you can obtain these rights from PRS for Music, and they are the responsibility of the venue or website owner.
Read more about these in our guide to music licensing and our music licensing glossary.
How Brands Can Safely Use Music on Social Media
It doesn’t matter just how long the piece of music you use is – licences are required for all short-form and social content. And because much marketing content is global, it’s critical that licences are global too. To ensure your marketing content isn’t taken down from the platform on, you should ensure you secure master and sync rights from the rightsholder.
The process of securing the correct licences can be time-consuming and complicated, which is why licensed music libraries are a great option. Here at Audio Network, we offer a huge range of licensed music for business.
How Audio Network Can Help You With Music Licensing for Content
Whether you’re interested in licensing music in corporate video or for social content, we’re here to help. Trusted by major brands, agencies and broadcasters, the music in our world-class catalogue was created specifically for production use, meaning that we own both the master and publishing rights.
From YouTube to traditional broadcast media, our music is licensed for multiple platforms, and we offer flexible, global licences, tailored to the project you’re working on, so you’re only ever paying for what you need. And with copyright claims or legal issues off the table, you’re free to dedicate all your energies into making your marketing campaign the most compelling it can be.
In terms of our catalogue, we’re simply unbeatable. With more than 280,000 high quality tracks, covering every single genre, style and mood imaginable – and with stems and cutdowns available on request – we offer our customers a world of choice.
Thanks to our super-fast AI-powered search tools, it’s easier than ever to find the perfect soundtrack. Use Audio Search to search our catalogue with any YouTube, Spotify, TikTok, Apple Music, Vimeo or SoundCloud link, and filter results by BPM, key, vocals and more. We also offer hand-curated collections and playlists, including regularly updated playlists of background music and new releases. For a more personal approach, we offer a music consultancy service, operated by our expert team who are well versed in UK licensing laws.
Read All About It
So now you know all about music licensing for marketing, why not dig into some more of our licensing-themed blogs, from busting music licensing myths and why licensing music for social media is a smarter choice than using free libraries to how to license a song for video and how to find music for YouTube videos, TikTok or Instagram.
Need Music for Your Project?
At Audio Network we create original music, of the highest quality, for broadcasters, brands, creators, agencies and music fans everywhere. Through clear and simple licensing, we can offer you a huge variety of the best quality music across every conceivable mood and genre. Find out how we can connect you with the perfect collaborator today by clicking the button below!
