The attached article “The Timberlake Brand Carried Along on a Media Storm” by Ben Sisario in The New York Times published 27 March 2013 was recently tweeted on Twitter by a friend of a Great Big Sea member.
Justin Timberlake recently released his new album and sold over 960 000 copies in their first week through a carefully planned marketing strategy over many months. This article in the New York Times discusses how important a carefully planned promotion of a new single and album are for sales. They include traditional marketing methods for example public appearances at big events, radio exposure and promoting well known brands but also the use of social media. The extended timeline attached to the original article documents the evolution of the album over the last the couple of years including some announcements and promotion through Twitter, Youtube and Justin Timberlake’s webpage.
The article states the importance of being where the fans are at including the use of social media in particular Twitter “Yet the master stroke, music and marketing executives say, was the personal touch that Mr. Timberlake brought to every aspect of the campaign, giving his fans the impression of direct contact and feeding them a steady stream of topics to amplify through social media.”… “They want to feel that they know the artists, that they are insiders, and now through social media they can literally and figuratively be friends with the stars.” Musicians and artists recognise the importance of social media in promoting and selling music. Some musicians and artists use it to inform people about concerts and appearances and promote their music. They are in control of their own publicity, can make announcements and defend themselves against the traditional media reaching millions of people with the click of a button. Musicians and artists control the personal information they release. There are those who are genuinely interested in making connections with fans and those who are not really interested in the fans and who have limited contact mainly to create good will and those who have no contact at all. But for those that do use social media like Twitter they have to carefully monitor what they write because they can say a lot more than they want too. Fans who push buttons can be quickly blocked or ignored as quickly as they are responded too and are considered friends by celebrities. A well known actor comes to mind. What ever the interaction with fans using social media it is on the musicians and artist's terms. Friendship I think not and the fans know this.
Although musicians and artists using social media to promote music is nothing new it raised the issue of how important it is for marketing to be carefully planned. It involves a lot more than a few bootlegged videos, photographs and blog by an over enthusiastic fan floating around on social media.
“The Timberlake Brand Carried Along on a Media Storm” by Ben Sisario in The New York Times published 27 March 2013. (No copyright infringement intended)
The term has become shorthand for all the ways a star can exploit popularity through product endorsements, media partnerships and side deals. As a celebrity career strategy it has become de rigueur.
But for an illustration of celebrity branding elevated to the virtuoso level, look no further than the marketing of Justin Timberlake’s comeback album “The 20/20 Experience (RCA), which sold 968,000 copies in its first week out, according to Nielsen SoundScan.
The campaign behind the release was a barrage of media. Mr. Timberlake was in commercials for Bud Light Premium and Target and made a breathlessly promoted appearance at the Grammy Awards. iTunes streamed the album before its release, stoking huge advance sales. Then there were his performances around the Super Bowl and South by Southwest his fifth time hosting “Saturday Night Live” a full week as a guest on “Late Night Live with Jimmy Fallon”.
Yet the master stroke, music and marketing executives say, was the personal touch that Mr. Timberlake brought to every aspect of the campaign, giving his fans the impression of direct contact and feeding them a steady stream of topics to amplify through social media.
“Now everyone wants V.I.P. access,” said Jayne Charneski, a marketing executive at the Intelligence Group, a division of the Creative Artists Agency, who was not involved in the Timberlake campaign. “They want to feel that they know the artists, that they are insiders, and now through social media they can literally and figuratively be friends with the stars.”
The planning behind the campaign began last summer, according to Tom Corson, the president of RCA, through meetings with Mr. Timberlake’s manager, Johnny Wright. (As Billboard has documented in an extensive timeline though, fan expectations have been stoked for years.)
But when it came time to announce his return to music after nearly seven years Mr. Timberlake insisted on doing it through his Twitter account and Web site, well before the news release and radio promotions.
“Justin smartly wanted to deliver the news to his fans directly, through the tweet and the countdown video,” Mr. Corson said. “The single went out across all radio formats, but it felt organic because it came from him.”
“The 20/20 Experience” is only the 19th album to sell more than 900,000 copies in its first week of release since SoundScan began keeping accurate count of record sales 22 years ago. Of its sales last week 47 percent were digital.
While album sales have slid precipitously over the last decade, nearly each year tends to bring at least one blockbuster with around one million sales in its opening week. Last year Taylor Swift’s “Red” had 1.2 million; in 2011 Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way” had 1.1 million, and Lil Wayne’s “Tha Carter IV” had 964,000.
The campaigns behind these albums show how high the bar has been set to market a megahit. The advertising budgets of big consumer brands or major retailers is essential, as are appearances galore and a constantly evolving story for social media.
The extent to which a high-priority album can be promoted wherever fans might be is startling. When Ms. Swift released “Red” she was promoted not only by Target, Walgreens and Keds sneakers, but also on pizza boxes from Papa John’s.
As the center of power in the music industry has shifted away from record companies, top artists also require resourceful managers and agents who can book those deals, sometimes independently of the record company. In the case of Mr. Timberlake he and his management control his image rights, while the label controls only his music.
For the thousands of artists who lack the benefit of such marketing blitzes sales are less impressive.
Also on the Billboard album chart this week, Kacey Musgraves’s “Same Trailer Different Park” (Mercury Nashville) opened at No. 2, with 43,000 sales; Bruno Mars’s “Unorthodox Jukebox” (Atlantic) is No. 3, with 41,000; Luke Bryan’s “Spring Break ... Here to Party” (Capitol Nashville) is in fourth place, with 38,000 sales; and at No. 5 is Pink’s “Truth About Love” (RCA), with 36,000.
David Bakula, a senior analyst at Nielsen, noted the disparity between the few Justin Timberlakes of the world and everybody else.
“No one will look at No. 5 and say, ‘Oh, those numbers are great,’ ” he said. “But the top of the top is doing really well.”
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
Correction: March 28, 2013A previous version of this article referred incorrectly to the brand of beer featured in a commercial with Justin Timberlake. It was Bud Light Platinum, not Bud Light Premium.
A version of this article appeared in print on March 28, 2013, on page C7 of the New York edition with the headline: The Timberlake Brand, Carried Along on a Media Storm.
