Question 1

What is Roster?

Accepted Answer

Roster is an end-to-end music business operating system, one place to run the entire business of music. It brings releases, royalties, publishing, distribution, touring, marketing, fan CRM, deals, contracts and finances together, wraps them in an AI assistant that can act on your behalf, and gives managers and artists a single source of truth for real career decisions. It's built for managers, labels, publishers and serious independent artists.

Question 2

Who is Roster for?

Accepted Answer

Roster is built for the people who run music careers: managers and management companies, independent labels, publishers, and self-managing artists who treat their work as a real business. It starts in Africa, because the founder is African and the market needs it most, but it's designed for emerging markets globally and to be competitive in Western markets too. Whether you manage one artist or a hundred, the platform scales with you.

Question 3

Do I need to be technical to use Roster?

Accepted Answer

No. Roster is designed to be asked, not hunted through. Instead of digging through menus, you can type or speak what you want, such as "show my decisions," "open the tour budget," or "log this expense," and the assistant takes you there or does it for you. Anything financial or legal is always shown to you for confirmation before it happens.

Question 4

How do I get started?

Accepted Answer

Create an account and you'll begin a 14-day trial with Solo-level access: one artist, every module unlocked, the AI assistant, and 20 GB of Vault storage with media uploads. You don't need to add payment details to start the trial. Onboarding walks you through adding your first artist and connecting your data.

Question 5

Is there a mobile app?

Accepted Answer

Roster is a progressive web app (PWA), so it installs to your phone's home screen and works like a native app across desktop, tablet and mobile, with no app-store download required. Just open Roster in your browser and choose "Add to Home Screen."

Question 6

What languages and markets does Roster support?

Accepted Answer

Roster is multi-language and multi-market by design. Pricing is shown in ZAR with 15% South African VAT included, and payments work across South Africa and 30+ African countries, with the platform built to expand across emerging markets and beyond. Scoring and market weighting adapt to each artist's primary market so comparisons stay fair across different platform ecosystems.

Question 7

What can I actually do inside Roster?

Accepted Answer

Roster covers the whole business of music across dedicated modules: releasing music, distribution, publishing, royalties, sync licensing, touring, merchandise, marketing, PR & press, visual production, fan CRM, and money & tax, plus deals, contracts, a decision log and a document Vault. Each module is a working tool, not just a checklist, and they're connected so data entered in one place shows up wherever it's relevant.

Question 8

What is the Roster AI assistant?

Accepted Answer

Roster AI is an assistant that can both answer questions about your business and take actions in it, such as creating contacts and tasks, logging expenses, updating a release, and drafting outreach. It's agent-first: reads happen instantly, while anything that changes money, splits or legal terms is surfaced for your explicit confirmation before it runs. You can reach it by typing or by voice.

Question 9

What is the Vault?

Accepted Answer

The Vault is Roster's secure document and media store: contracts, agreements, artwork, audio and video, e-signatures and more, all in one protected place. Storage scales by plan (from 2 GB on Free up to 1.5 TB+ on Enterprise), and paid plans unlock audio and video uploads with larger maximum file sizes.

Question 10

What is the Power Index?

Accepted Answer

The Power Index is your home base for monitoring how your own signed artists are performing in the market. It turns verified streaming and social data into clear Reach, Momentum and Engagement scores, tracks them over time, and helps you see where a career is heading, built for established and emerging roster artists alike.

Question 11

What is the A&R Index / Pipeline Board?

Accepted Answer

The A&R Pipeline Board is a scouting and due-diligence tool for artists you're thinking about signing. It scores unsigned prospects on their total market footprint, tracks them through pipeline stages, and re-snapshots them over time so you can spot who's breaking out before anyone else does. It's the discovery counterpart to the Power Index, which is for artists you already manage.

Question 12

Can I talk to Roster by voice?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Roster has a voice interface layered over the same assistant core, so you can ask for information or trigger actions hands-free. Voice responses are kept short and conversational, and audio is never stored beyond the single request that produces the answer.

Question 13

Does Roster connect to other tools?

Accepted Answer

Roster exposes a secure connection layer (based on the Model Context Protocol) so permitted tools and assistants can read your data under tightly-scoped access, for example an artist reading their own numbers, or a manager reading a roster read-only without financial detail. Sensitive financial data such as income, splits and deal terms is excluded from shared and third-party scopes.

Question 14

How much does Roster cost?

Accepted Answer

Roster has a Free plan and four paid tiers: Solo, Pro, Agency and Enterprise, priced by how many artists and seats you need. Solo covers one manager and one artist; Pro manages up to 10 artists with 3 seats; Agency manages up to 30 artists with 10 seats; Enterprise starts from R5,699/month for 100 artists and 30 seats and is priced by quote. See the pricing page for current numbers and the full feature comparison.

Question 15

Is there a free plan?

Accepted Answer

Yes. After your trial you keep a permanent Free plan: access to Learn, two tools, and a 2 GB documents-only Vault. Anything you created over the Free limits during your trial stays safe and viewable; it just becomes read-only until you upgrade. Nothing is ever deleted.

Question 16

Is there a free trial?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Every new account gets 14 days of Solo-level access: one artist, every module unlocked, the AI assistant, and 20 GB of Vault storage with media uploads. When the trial ends you drop to the Free plan automatically unless you choose to upgrade.

Question 17

What payment methods and currencies are supported?

Accepted Answer

Payments are processed in ZAR via Paystack, and all displayed prices include 15% South African VAT. Paystack supports card payments, bank transfers, and mobile money (MTN MoMo, M-Pesa, Airtel Money) across South Africa and 30+ African countries.

Question 18

Can I upgrade or downgrade at any time?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Upgrades take effect immediately: your new plan starts the moment payment clears. Downgrades take effect at the end of your current billing period, and anything over your new limits becomes read-only, never deleted.

Question 19

Do you offer annual billing?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Choosing annual billing gives you two months free versus paying monthly, a saving of up to R3,798 per year depending on your plan.

Question 20

How does Enterprise pricing work?

Accepted Answer

Enterprise starts from R5,699/month for 100 artists, 30 seats and 1.5 TB of Vault storage, and is then priced by quote around your roster, team and markets. It adds priority support with a 4-hour SLA, a dedicated account manager, private onboarding, quarterly business reviews and invoice billing. Contact us and we'll shape a plan to fit.

Question 21

How do I cancel?

Accepted Answer

You can cancel from your account settings at any time. When you cancel, your plan runs to the end of the period you've already paid for, then drops to the Free plan: your data stays intact and viewable, and anything above the Free limits becomes read-only rather than being deleted.

Question 22

What is Roster Capital?

Accepted Answer

Roster Capital is Roster's royalty-advance offering, designed to give eligible artists access to capital against their future earnings, with the recoupment tracked transparently inside the platform. It's rolling out in stages, so availability depends on your market and eligibility. If you're interested, contact us and we'll let you know where it stands for your situation.

Question 23

How does recoupment work?

Accepted Answer

When an advance is made, Roster keeps a transparent recoupment ledger that records exactly how much has been advanced and how much has been recovered from incoming royalties over time. The goal is for both sides to see, at any moment, precisely where an advance stands, with no opaque statements.

Question 24

Who is eligible for an advance?

Accepted Answer

Eligibility depends on an artist's verified earnings history and market, and on the checks that responsible lending requires (identity and bank verification among them). Because Roster Capital is rolling out in stages, the best way to find out if you qualify is to reach out. We'll walk you through what's needed and whether it's live in your market yet.

Question 25

Who owns my data?

Accepted Answer

You do. The data you and your artists put into Roster belongs to you. Roster stores it securely to run the platform for you and does not sell it. You can request an export or deletion of your data at any time.

Question 26

How is my data kept secure?

Accepted Answer

Every account's data is isolated by row-level security in the database, so one account can never read another's records. Sensitive documents live in the protected Vault, financial and personal data is access-scoped, and third-party or shared access is tightly limited, for example financial detail is excluded from read-only roster and external scopes. Security is enforced from the first line of code, not bolted on later.

Question 27

Where does Roster's artist data come from?

Accepted Answer

Public artist scores are built from official platform APIs: Spotify for followers and monthly-listener estimates, Audiomack for plays and followers, and YouTube for subscribers and views, fetched on a schedule and stored as timestamped snapshots. Roster does not scrape, guess, or accept manually-submitted numbers, so the scores reflect what the platforms themselves report.

Question 28

Can artists fake or inflate their scores?

Accepted Answer

No. Scores come purely from platform API data, with no way for an artist or manager to submit or adjust the numbers. Bought followers or streams would first have to fool each platform's own fraud detection, and even then the Engagement score would expose the mismatch: lots of followers but abnormally few plays.

Question 29

Is Roster POPIA and GDPR compliant?

Accepted Answer

Roster is built around the principles those laws require: you own your data, it's access-controlled and isolated per account, and you can request export or deletion. For the specifics of how your organisation's obligations are handled, and for a data-processing agreement, contact us and we'll provide the detail your compliance team needs.

Question 30

What's the difference between a manager account and an artist?

Accepted Answer

A manager (or label, or publisher) is the user who runs Roster and monitors, plans and acts on their artists' careers: the Power Index home base is theirs. An artist is a career being managed inside the platform. One account can manage many artists, and access to sensitive detail like financials is controlled by role, so not everyone with access sees everything.

Question 31

How many artists and team members can I have?

Accepted Answer

It depends on your plan. Free covers one artist (view-only), Solo covers one artist with one seat, Pro manages up to 10 artists across 3 seats, Agency up to 30 artists across 10 seats, and Enterprise 100 artists across 30 seats at the floor, scaling by quote from there. You can add more as your roster grows.

Question 32

Can I invite my team or my artists?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Paid plans include multiple seats so you can bring in colleagues, and access is governed by roles so people only see what they should. The number of seats included scales with your plan, from a single seat on Solo up to 30 on Enterprise.

Question 33

How do I get support?

Accepted Answer

Email support@rosterapp.ai and we'll help. Response times depend on your plan: Free is community support, Solo and Pro get email support within 48 hours, Agency gets priority email within 24 hours, and Enterprise gets a 4-hour SLA with a dedicated account manager.

Question 34

How do I delete my account?

Accepted Answer

You can request account deletion from your settings or by contacting support@rosterapp.ai. We'll remove your data in line with your request and applicable law. If you'd rather keep your data but stop paying, downgrading to the Free plan keeps everything viewable instead.

Question 35

What if my question isn't answered here?

Accepted Answer

Reach out to support@rosterapp.ai with anything this page doesn't cover, including partnership, Enterprise and Roster Capital enquiries, and we'll get back to you. If you're already inside Roster, you can also just ask the assistant.