The “treasure hunt” has been a default setting in music marketing for a number of years, with companies like Landmrk helping take them into the real world. There is generally an intense burst of public activity, the winners are revealed and then they all move on. Singer-songwriter Dodie Clark, however, has been playing the long game here.

Last April, she began uploading a series of 20 vlogs to YouTube. So far, so normal. Except in each video she added an extra flourish – singing a few words in each one. When spotted and pieced together, however, they become a whole new song – ‘Arms Unfolding’ – that was uploaded in full in August.

The EP, however, featuring the song was not released until January. She recorded a secret video in May 2018 where she explained what exactly she was doing but did not make this video live on YouTube until January this year. “My plan is to keep going and to keep making these videos that I have been scared of making and build the song scrapbook-style from the clips of each video,” she said.

The video then goes into a rapid-cut montage of all the parts of the song seeded through her other videos. She reveals that some fans did ask if she was singing at moments in the video but claimed that no one fully rumbled her plan. The “reveal” video itself is closing in on 1m views (and her YouTube channel has 1.7m subscribers) so it has clearly worked for her, showing a subtle idea that is not rushed out can deliver results.

Will she try something similar again? Unlikely if her comment below the reveal video is anything to go by. “THAT TOOK FOREVER,” she wrote in caps. “HOLY HECK I’M NEVER SINGING IN D MAJOR EVER AGAIN.”