DECEMBER 16 2015 sandboxMUSIC MARKETING FOR THE DIGITAL ERA ISSUE 147 THE YEAR’s BEST MUSIC MARKETING CAMPAIGNS SANDBOX 2015 SURVEY digital initiatives. Tapping into the core of his songs for listening to music and also making use of (namely the lyrics) and letting fans of all ages scarcity that can be so valuable for fans (as we’ve experience the creation of his triptych of hugely seen, for example, with Wu-Tang Clan’s various influential albums from 1965/66 proved thrilling. tactics during the year). PAGE 07 / Bring Me The Horizon PAGE 12 / Iron Maiden An interactive jukebox on Spotify truly captured the An excellent way of building up excitement for attention of millions, helping put the band on the the campaign ahead of release. A fun game radar of a completely new audience. alongside a YouTube activation captured an audience that perhaps interacts PAGE 08 / Disclosure with the band in a different way than A one-stop hub to gather all the its older audience. This campaign thE year’s best music information around the worldwide release managed to entice different of their second album, it showed a drive demographics equally. marketing campaigns for fans to tap into reviewing the album and elcome to our end Contents organically spreading awareness about it. PAGE 13 / j.viewz sandbox Invite your fans to become part of the recording of year PAGE 04 / Asian Dub Foundation PAGE 09 / Fifth Harmony process and they will feel part of the overall project Wwhere we A great way of making the most Great proof of a campaign that used a young and album. This will make them more likely to not present the best music of Spotify as a collaborative international and internet-first fanbase to make only talk about the album with other people but marketing campaigns social platform to entice fans the most of organic word of mouth. This, alongside possibly also put down some money on it. of 2015. This year we’ve and create enough anticipation good partnerships, secured a successful launch had such an overwhelming ahead of an album. number of submissions that into a somewhat unknown territory for the band. PAGE 14 / Jess Glynne A great way of building up fan content and making it’s been an incredibly tough job to PAGE 05 / Avicii PAGE 10 / Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes it a happening as well as optimising formats like whittle them down to the 29 you will A captivating, simple and engaging way Make use of your artists’ creative initiatives; if Instagram advertising and Facebook to great find in this issue. The campaigns are of making the most of Instagram as that turns out to be the development of a familiar advantage. listed in alphabetical order and cover well as taking advantage of free game, you’re in luck. Key to this campaign everything from massive stars all the features on the platform. The was the band’s communication across PAGE 15 / Lionel Richie way down to self-released artists. story fits the demographics socials in order to build close fan A delightful way of making the most of a talked- No matter the budget, we have perfectly and it was engagement alongside more traditional about event and excellent follow- focused on bringing you the highest genuinely creative – and all elements and use of scarcity (e.g. hand- up on from Glastonbury, with quality campaigns. A special thank you for little financial outlay. to Ed Miller and Eamonn Forde for a painted vinyl covers by Frank himself). activities enabling Richie’s back catalogue to be found again by fantastic job, not only on this issue but PAGE 06 / Bob Dylan PAGE 11 / Health existing and (more importantly) throughout the whole year. Thanks for Surprisingly, given his age, Dylan is A truly cutting-edge campaign testing new formats new audiences. reading and we’ll see you in 2016. almost always on top of innovative 2 | sandbox | ISSUE 147 | 16.12.15 SANDBOX 2015 SURVEY PAGE / 16 Lord Of The Mics album title, inspiring a campaign that engaged with the content in the a pop artist can branch out and reach wider A great way of finding the right demographics is as relevant to pop music as it is to long term. demographics if they are tapped into the right and creating upsell on content that is usually classical. A great way of making a channels. free for the target demographics. This, global happening around an album. PAGE 25 / Taylor Swift Asia alongside building up a sustainable amount Even though Swift has a larger PAGE 29 / Vild $mith of data from the demographics, can ensure PAGE 21 / Mysteryland USA Festival global fanbase than most, this Making use of new apps and techniques more accurate decision-making in the future Previous apps such as these have campaign was dependant on the can sometimes really pay off. We’ve seen (the lifeblood of digital marketing). proven both successful as well as unviable. knowledge of the territory, which helped similar moves with dating apps before, but This clearly proved beneficial for the festival its success. It not only collected massive this was a fun and interactive way to make PAGE 17 / Ludovico Einaudi – the key being promising great prizes for the amounts of eCRM data but also showed the most of a well-known ‘party’ band and A classical artist can and should make use of app-based audience. how influencers in specific regions can be promote a stronger connection between the same tactics as pop acts. A well-executed key in making sure that campaigns run fans and band (as well as making the most and well-structured campaign, playing with PAGE 22 / New Order successfully. of a happening). new methods of reaching potentially new Proving that a legacy band can use innovative audiences. methods to reach a new audience alongside PAGE 26 / The Chemical Brothers PAGE 30 / Whitesnake core fans as well as establishing a way of Excellent mobile-first thinking with Allowing fans to reminisce about the PAGE 18 / Madeon prolonging the album campaign. visuals that not only allowed users band’s history and playing on singer David A number of well-thought-out tactics to listen to the new songs but also Coverdale’s links to Deep Purple proved contributed to the success of this campaign PAGE 23 / One Direction creatively displayed their back judicious here. – mainly understanding the target Innovative initiatives included using catalogue while allowing fans demographics enough to be able to make Google’s Street View to build up to easily put together their own PAGE 31 / Yacht wise decisions that resulted in a database a landing site for fans who wanted playlists to drive additional streams A great campaign that tapped into what of engaged fans. On top of that, the game to discover the album. A global Twitter on Spotify. everyone experiences when living in LA – has been highly successful, with impressive competition with emojis worked perfectly bad traffic – which thus ensured proper results and dwell time. to entice the 1D fans as well testing out PAGE 27 / They Might Be Giants impact for the music while reaching new Snapchat, which perfectly fits the target Great grassroots marketing and updating fans. Plus this was just one part of a wider PAGE 19 / Mana demographics. techniques from the past (that have been campaign that drew on Google Maps, A great use of platforms to ensure that used previously by the band in their early BuzzFeed and the annotations on Genius. awareness is raised around tour dates, while PAGE 24 / Steve days) by utilising new formats such as making the most of the most engaged fans The importance of messaging apps has Drip.fm to drive and gather fans to a PAGE 32 / Years & Years (which can prove particularly important for been talked about for some time now dedicated website. Alongside all the other cool elements of bands that are trying to establish a foothold and this campaign, by focusing this campaign, the interactive TV ad was in new markets). purely on mobile signups, was PAGE 28 / Tove Styrke genuinely daring and innovative. Credit also very interesting and could prove Great use of a YouTuber that ties in to the Polydor team for playing with newer PAGE 20 / Max Richter valuable, as the audience who nicely with the associated game. It platforms like Snapchat to reach the right This campaign really made the most of the sign up will be more naturally was a strong campaign that proves demographics. 3 | sandbox | ISSUE 147 | 16.12.15 SANDBOX 2015 SURVEY BELIEVE REC. ASIAN DUB FOUNDATION TEAM MEMBERS ASIAN INVOLVED DUB James Farrelly – head of trade marketing, Believe Digital OVERVIEW OF CAMPAIGN As More Signal More Noise was the CAMPAIGN BREAKDOWN band’s first album in a number of years, we wanted to develop a strategy that CAMPAIGN BUDGET £0–£500 would engage existing fans and also bring potential fans into the fold. AUDIENCE DEMOGRAPHIC - GENDER We also knew that Asian Dub Female - 20% / Male - 80% Foundation had a fanbase which may be slightly older and may not have adopted AUDIENCE DEMOGRAPHIC - AGE 25–44 streaming as their chosen method of music consumption; so we wanted to AUDIENCE DEMOGRAPHIC - LOCATION create something that would act as a UK ‘companion’ to the album – regardless of whether the fan bought a physical copy, LINKS AND EXTRA INFO downloaded it or streamed it. More Signal More Noise Asian Dub Foundation created a http://moresignalmorenoise.pushexp.com/welcome/ playlist of white noise, chants and radio static on Spotify. We asked fans to like, share and follow RESULTS & the playlist; the more of these activities they did, the faster the ‘noise’ tracks KEY LEARNINGS would be replaced, one by one, to reveal The Believe Digital marketing team also set up social shares new and exclusive content such as track around the launch and throughout the campaign, which helped talks, album tracks, remixes and live fans to hear about the campaign in the first place.