# Building Your Sync Catalog

How to add tracks with metadata that maximizes sync placement chances.

Music supervisors and licensing reps search by metadata. The richer your catalog's metadata, the more often your tracks surface in their searches. Spend the time getting it right — every brief is a potential placement.

## Core fields for every track

Only the title is required to save a track; the rest is what makes it findable.

- Title — plus the audio files: master, instrumental, and stems if you have them
- BPM (tempo) — supervisors filter heavily by tempo (e.g., "100-120 BPM upbeat for ad")
- Key — useful for cue cuts and reharmonization
- Duration — the exact length
- ISRC code (if released commercially) — unique recording identifier
- ISWC code — the composition identifier from your PRO (ASCAP/BMI/SESAC)

## Mood and genre tags (the most important fields)

These are what supervisors search by most. Be specific:

- Moods — happy, sad, energetic, chill, dark, hopeful, romantic, aggressive, ethereal, nostalgic, tense, uplifting. Pick 3-5.
- Genres — primary + secondary (e.g., "Indie Pop, Electronic")
- Lyrics themes — love, loss, freedom, nostalgia, defiance, joy, etc.
- Tags — your own search words, comma-separated (e.g., "road trip, female vocal, trailer"). They show on the track and are matched by the Catalog search; the Metadata Checklist looks for at least 3.
- Sync description — a few sentences for supervisors: energy, instrumentation, vocal type, era, sounds-like references, best use cases

## Sounds-like references

Put 2-3 reference artists in the Sync Description ("Sounds like \[Artist A\], \[Artist B\]"). Music supervisors search by reference all the time — it's one of the highest-value things you can write.

## Audio file + alternate versions

Attach the master WAV, then tick which versions you have — instrumental, clean, stems — and attach the instrumental and stems files too. Each audio box (Master Track, Instrumental, Stems) lists the songs in this campaign's Music Library (Media Hub → Music Library). For a file that isn't there, click "Browse files on disk..." at the bottom of the list. It opens your Mac's Open window, which reaches any drive, including iCloud Drive, or Google Drive if its Mac app is installed; with no songs in the library, clicking the box opens that window straight away. Stems can be a .zip. Supervisors love when you provide all versions upfront — it saves them asking later (and often skipping you).

Deep Analysis (optional): with a Master Track attached, the purple "Deep Analysis (Cyanite.ai)" button listens to the track and suggests its mood, genre, instruments and energy. It uses Cyanite.ai through your own free Cyanite account; the button walks you through adding its key, and the "Change Cyanite key" link next to it takes a new one (for example after you generate a new access token in Cyanite). It uploads a copy of the track to Cyanite's servers (a WAV or AIFF is sent as an MP3), and when the analysis is done, MusicLaunch deletes it from your Cyanite library. Cyanite's own privacy policy covers how they handle uploads.

## Play and Send from the catalog

Each track card with audio has Play: it plays the master (or the instrumental, if there's no master) right in MusicLaunch, one track at a time; click again to stop. AIFF files play too. Send opens MusicLaunch's email window with that file already attached: start typing in To and pick someone from your Contacts, or type any address. Gmail takes up to 25 MB of attachments per email, so for a big WAV or AIFF master, remove it in the email and attach an MP3 (or send a link) instead.

> **Tip: Clearance flags**
>
> Note each track's clearance status in its Notes or Sync Description — "fully cleared / one-stop" (you control 100% of master + publishing) is gold. Tracks with samples or co-writers who aren't pre-cleared go to the back of the line in supervisor searches.

## Related articles

- [Sync Licensing](https://www.musiclaunchapp.com/help/sync-licensing.md): Pitch your tracks for use in TV, film, ads, and games.
- [Sync Pipeline & Submissions](https://www.musiclaunchapp.com/help/sync-pipeline.md): Track submissions through every stage from pitch to placement.
- [Brief Matcher](https://www.musiclaunchapp.com/help/sync-brief-matcher.md): Have your Sync Agent match your tracks to incoming sync briefs in seconds.

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- From the MusicLaunch Help Center (Sync, Budget & Merch). The same guide is built into the app under Help.
- Web page: https://www.musiclaunchapp.com/help/sync-catalog/
- All guides: https://www.musiclaunchapp.com/llms.txt
- Support: hello@musiclaunchapp.com