In late 2012 there were only rumours of a new Bad Seeds album. Nick Cave didn’t have a YouTube account and had not really engaged in new media. We decided to launch with a teaser trailer, which would do just that – tease the fans and alert them a new album was coming. Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard of Pulse Films created it, using footage of the band in the studio.
We set up a YouTube channel and published this as our first asset on the channel, then pushed it on the socials as well as via YouTube advertising.
Retargeting was key and, from the beginning, we gathered retargeting data on everyone that watched the trailer (and subsequent promo videos) as well as all visitors to www. nickcave.com, the band’s new website.
We also engaged with new media, but in a “Nick Cave” way, keeping it cool and credible (i.e. no Instagram selfies or silly tweets). We also released the whole album as lyric videos, but using Nick’s handwritten lyrics (that were a key part of the physical product).
Results:
We had a great reaction to the trailer and it spread through the fanbase rapidly. The proper promo videos (and lyric videos) were also well received, with the latter getting tweets from the likes of Amanda Palmer.
All of the fans that interacted with these assets built our retargeting list – now at hundreds of thousands – and we were able to then serve them ads and pre-rolls pushing the album, but in a label voice, keeping all artist interaction non-sales-based and credible.
We also pushed the boundaries and got Nick to do a Twitter Q&A in his own style.
In the end the album, Push the Sky Away, debuted in the top 4 in 18 countries with seven #1s.
Key learnings:
We tested the theory of allowing an artist to remain themselves and yet engage with social and new media in a way that fits them. This preserved the image of Nick Cave while allowing us to build up an invaluable market database to then market to, but in a label voice, keeping all activities from the actual band as simple “watch, listen, and engage”, but not “buy”.
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