Phase one targeted the show’s core fanbase: we get no commercial support from the BBC (they cannot be seen as ‘advertising’ from their own channels – making this a huge challenge as their audience is the core target for the album) and compilations are a pure marketing exercise (no content, restricted access to artists) so we had to find alternatives to reach our audience.
Learning from past campaigns, we held the digital campaign until we could reveal the final tracklist so as to avoid noise: our message needs to be clear to drive album awareness/sales (not promoting the show).
We were present across all major social channels/platforms/devices, when in the past we cherry picked more specific strategies. Search was set up first, along with the Amazon preorder. We allocated our highest ever budget to Twitter to target conversations around the show (with the TV ad embedded in the new videocard format which gets very high CTRs). Our Facebook ads used the new video format. We also set up an innovative display campaign by leveraging editorial images in contextual spaces: partnering with publishers (ex: NME), we took over any image related to Live Lounge (Fearne Cotton, featured artists, Radio 1) to overlay our ad on them. Clicks went through the roof, especially on mobile. Some artists supported via their own channels, even if signed to competitors, with amazing results.
VOD again was a challenge (as there are no ads on BBC iPlayer), so we went for SkyGo and 4OD.
Lastly, we covered YouTube with our own playlist, an engaging content in which we, of course, inserted the TV ad.
Our online PR team did a brilliant job at getting reviews; again, with no access to artists, this can be a real challenge.
Phase two maximised awareness with the mass market with pre-rolls (again we cannot target BBC channels) ahead of an iTunes price drop. Phase three (Black Friday) focused on gifting as digital sales will drop. Phase four will aim at charting again to be visible when consumers test their new mobile devices.
All this resulted in Live Lounge being a huge success: it went straight in at #1, with 41,690 units sold – its highest week 1 in six years and highest ever digital sales week one with 21,791. It remained at #1 for four weeks (at time of submission), the longest it has stayed at #1 since the first album in 2008.
KEY LEARNINGS
This year, we’ve decided to follow consumer patterns very closely with a phased campaign that had different targets and objectives. The fact that we’ve been releasing Live Lounge for so many years means we know when core fans will buy and when we should switch the campaign to a more mass market one. We also monitor all results week-on-week to optimise towards what performs best (like Twitter). All digital activity follows the wider strategy and supports any offline marketing (TV, posters etc.) to maximise impact.
Project Budget
Demographics
