According to an unofficial poll done through his YouTube advice channel, WordPlay T. Jay has discovered about half of his viewership does not know something very important — how to get paid for their music.

To help with this, T. Jay offers a full-fledged publishing guide for U.S. artists, and he is giving some of this advice out for free this week. For starters, there are a number of things you must know or do to collect royalties. They include:

• Know what you own

• Understand YOU are the music company

• Sign up with a performing rights organization (PRO)

• Determine your need for publishing administration

• Sign up with SoundExchange

• Sign up with the Mechanical Licensing Collective (MLC)

• Build your split sheets

• Register songs with all agencies

• Promote music to earn royalties

“Promoting is probably the most important part of this that everyone forgets,” T. Jay said.

When it comes to royalties, many go unclaimed. The MLC reported about $424 million in unclaimed money, and ASCAP, one of the PROs, collected $1.3 billion in revenue last year, much of which is unclaimed royalties.

If unclaimed, those royalties go to the state of the artist’s residency, or in the pockets of other people.

To start getting paid, you must first know what you own, whether it’s the lyrics, the music or the recording, and you may not own them all. Different agencies collect and distribute royalties for each piece of a work.

One type of agency that does that is a PRO, like ASCAP, BMI or SESAC. They are all non-profits that work with artists to collect royalties for music use in everything from TV, radio, live performances and streaming services.

You may sign up with one of these agencies as an individual with your Social Security number, which is the easiest way, or as a business with a business license, typically an LLC.

You also need to sign up with the MLC. More on that organization may be found in this video.

Once signed up, you have to report all your catalogue’s metadata to the PRO, and they will then track your music’s use and pay you accordingly.

To report this data, you can use a publishing administrator, which is a company that makes sure you are registered and information is reported everywhere you need to get paid. Ultimately, you don’t need an administrator, but it can help streamline the process.

Another place to register that many artists forget is SoundExchange, which collects digital royalties from places like digital radio, such as SiriusXM or iHeart Radio.

Finally, a way to note who should earn what for your music is by completing a split sheet. This will help you determine the percentages each person on a track gets, like producers or features, and T. Jay has a free sample available.

For more on how to get paid for your music, check out the video below!