"In the Music Industry, the power of marketing online is the most useful asset in the promotion of music products." To what extent do you agree with the statement?
I agree immensely with this statement as many artists have shown that this marketing strategy works, artists such as Tyler the Creator, One Direction and Childish Gambino. I feel that the old Push marketing strategy is outdated and that the new Pull marketing is good because of the recent popularity of social media sites. Pull marketing allows the artist to be more involved with the fans and makes the experience more personal. One Direction is a great example of how Pull marketing can be successfully implemented.
One Direction use pull marketing successfully because they are constantly updating and interacting with fans. Using sites such as Facebook and Twitter, One Direction can easily give fans updates on everything new with the band this provides fans with constant entertainment and information. Right now, One Direction have over 31 million followers which shows that the more personal Pull marketing works. One Direction created an interactive map on their website, for their “Go1Den” concert, while they were on tour and this allowed fans to be involved with the tour even if they weren’t going to the concert. This campaign was very successful and the volume of traffic for their website was at its highest ever also, they doubled their Twitter followers and their Facebook likes. This shows that marketing online has more power over the more traditional standard.
The hip hop group Odd Future have a pop up exclusive “OF Sweatshop” which offers exclusive clothing to fans at concerts, this allows OF to gain profits, not by selling their music but by selling more personal and exclusive content. OF’s manager says, “There’s no marketing, it’s exposing it at the right place at the right time.” OF’s front man, Tyler the Creator is a social media addict and by using the medium to his advantage he is able to market the OF brand and he is able to promote shows as well as new exclusive merch. This social side of marketing allows for more fan to creator communication and makes the process more personal.
A recent example of the power of marketing online would be with the new Childish Gambino album, Awaken, My Love. Childish Gambino has been pushing out content from this new album slowly by uploading teaser tracks to the internet to see the reception. The tracks are available on Youtube which makes it more accessible for fans to listen and get a feel for the album. This “dripping” of new content proves successful because both of the tracks released so far became trending videos on youtube and they both have over 3 million views. Before this, Childish Gambino hosted a very private concert in Joshua Tree National Park over 3 nights. This concert was called Pharos and it had a no phone policy because Childish Gambino wanted a more personal and intimate connection with his audience. The concert showed off the entire album of Awaken, My Love before it was announced, this gave the show a more premium feel because of its exclusivity.
First Word Records showed off the power of marketing online when they released a compilation album on Bandcamp and charged the listener for their email address for a newsletter. This is great exposure for the company and it allows for fans of a certain artist to listen to another artist on the album creating more exposure and fans for unpopular artists. Tidal is an example of not giving music away for free because it locks exclusive music behind a pay wall. Tidal offers exclusive songs and albums with lossless audio at a high price, this exclusivity can alienate fans of certain artists because they don't want to pay for Tidal to listen to one album, this can make people want to pirate music. Tidal offers three types of exclusives,
- Service Window- the content is only on Tidal for a certain period of time.
- Tier window- album is released across one type of music service tier before others
- Service Exclusive- the content is only on Tidal
Tidal and Apple look set to become the heavyweight players in the Service Window, duking it out for the biggest releases. This seems to be the downside of marketing online and shows that marketing music online can be too powerful that it takes away from the consumer because some companies want more money.
Gamification is a great way to market music in a more interactive way. Gamification adds “game like” qualities such as leaderboards, points and badges to applications and websites. Users are rewarded for doing certain tasks and the app or website must be constantly updated for regular users to provide new content. Turntable.fm is an example of a website with gamification and it allows players to collect points when other players rate the songs they listen to. Another example would be Phantasy Tour, where fans pick which songs they think will be played during each music set, and are awarded points based on how many correct answers they get. Gamification is a great way to involve listeners in other types of media, as Albin Serviant said, “Today’s fan wants more than just a track. They want a participative, personalised experience in a social environment.”
Overall I believe online marketing is essential in today’s social media world. It allows musicians to easily promote their music on many websites such as Youtube and Spotify. Many musicians have not used this marketing type to it’s full potential and if they do they create a new type of bond between themselves and their fans. This connection allows for artists to put out more personal types of merchandise such as a clothing line and because of this connection fans will more likely stay connected as they are constantly updated on Facebook and Twitter. A creator with millions of followers is now able to have the same intimate connection with their fans just like a creator with one hundred followers and the possibilities are endless.
