Introduction
The use of digital media technologies such as web videos, e-books, and social media is rising at a high pace. The deployment of digital media has revolutionized the mode of communication between organizations. Besides, it has enhanced the manner in which businesses engage and/or interact with their clients. The use of digital media opens another platform where different organizations can interact in real-time, irrespective of their geographical locations. The paper will discuss how social media was successfully used by the cable network academy, namely, Grammy, to attract young viewers who were previously not reached by the network’s traditional means of advertising.
Synopsis of the Article
Grammy, one of the United States’ giant music awards, faced a declined viewership among fans of the 18-49 age bracket. According to Wesley and Rohm (2010) in the article, ‘Social Media and the Grammy Awards: The ‘We’re all Fans’ Campaign’, only 14% of its viewers were found to be in the said age bracket. In 2010, the majority of its viewers were elderly females. The shortage of youthful viewers was reflected in the show’s advertisements, which had also declined greatly.
Grammy was charged with a responsibility to attract more young viewers while at the same time retaining its elderly viewers. An online campaign entitled We’re All Fans was designed to carry out massive marketing of the show to a wider audience through social media. Additionally, the campaign integrated the traditional methods of marketing, including television and press, to carry out an all-round mission. Importantly, the traditional methods were used to redirect attention to the social media platform.
Various artistes were also contacted to appear on the Grammy website as a way of boosting the campaign’s outreach. Of those contacted, Lady Gaga was the most resourceful since she attracted over two million viewers to the website. The campaign resulted in improved ratings for Grammy, as well as a 32% of viewership in the 18-34 age bracket.
The goal of the Organization
Grammy Academy was facing stiff competition from other cable and network platforms. It needed to revisit its marketing strategy or risk being relegated to oblivion. The giant media platform faced unique challenges that had been occasioned by a transformation in technology and demographics. The first challenge was the dwindling viewers, owing to the increased competition from peers (Hanna, Rohm, & Crittenden, 2011).
Secondly, the majority of Grammy’s viewers fell in the older female category. This situation implied that the company had fallen out with the younger population for a long time. Viewers in the age bracket of 18-49 are highly regarded in the world of media. This claim confirms that the management at Grammy had every reason to be rattled.
Therefore, Grammy’s goal was to recapture the attention of the viewers in the age bracket of 18-49 class while at the same time retaining its elderly audience (Wesley & Rohm, 2010). This goal would be advanced through social media. A social media strategy was conceptualized and implemented in line with the 52nd Grammy Awards event that was aired in January 2010. The immediate goal of the strategy was to engage the viewers before, during, and after the awards broadcast (Scarpa, 2011).
A whole-week event surrounding the awards was rolled out for access over the various social media platforms such as Twitter, web videos, Facebook, and Instagram among others as a way of keeping the conversations going on. The campaign, which was dubbed We’re all Fans, marked the network’s entry into social media participation. This strategy was meant to win and keep the younger fans interested in the long term after the awards were over.
Strategies Employed to Accomplish the Goal
Integrating Social Media and Traditional Methods
The pilot strategy for the 2010 Grammy campaign was pitched through a website designed by the advertising agency, TBWA/Chiat/Day. This agency was contracted to develop a marketing campaign dubbed We’re All Fans. The campaign combined traditional and online platforms. The decision of integrating the two ecosystems instead of just focusing on either of the two was made because of various reasons.
For instance, the traditional method of advertising would drive the aspect of ‘reach’ while the online platform was designed to strike intimacy and attachment. Hence, all fans would be accommodated. However, greater emphasis was given to the online drive, although television and press were used mainly to redirect attention toward social media. By focusing on social media, Grammy was inverting the traditional model of advertising as shown in the figure below.
The Back End: Development
The We’re All Fans website was designed internally by TBWA/Chiat/Day under the same title. It used keywords to fetch music content. These keywords were customized according to customers’ search with the help of other platforms such as Twitter, Flickr, and YouTube. Thorough this customized search, fans could access content rapidly and in real-time. For instance, the grouping of keywords could help a fan to navigate to his or her favorite artist’s performance straightforwardly instead of grappling with much content. Additionally, the content was designed to refresh every time one logged on.
It served as an incentive for fans. The design encouraged fans to revisit the platform later (Hanna et al., 2011). The auto refreshment also worked for Grammy since the academy did not own the data. Hence, it would not run into copyright or infringement issues.
The Front end: Artist Support
Another frontier of the campaign reached out to artists to elicit further support for the online drive. The support came in the form of featuring entertainers on the Grammy website. However, many artists viewed the online platform negatively by perceiving it as a major drawback to music sales. This negative view of social media by the music fraternity has existed for some time. Nevertheless, Grammy was able to enlist the support of artists such as Lady Gaga, Coldplay, and Nine Inch Nails who resonated with the growing importance of social media in the music world. Twenty out of the one hundred artists contacted by the network agreed to feature in the campaign.
Lady Gaga was the first actor to confirm her appearance on the television announcing the campaign’s website to fans. More acts by Lady Gaga followed, including YouTube video postings and links shared to Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace. The YouTube video, which gained over a million views, dramatically increased the traffic to the We’re All Fans website (Wesley & Rohm, 2010).
Monitoring and Analyzing Online Discussions
Data obtained from online discussions were collected and presented for analysis by an outside vendor (Wesley & Rohm, 2010). This data was captured by the use of keywords that were typed into the various social media databases. The importance of this analysis was to establish the popularity of artists in a nonbiased manner. Popularity was the criteria used for giving out awards at Grammy. Under this feature, which was dubbed Fanbuzz Visualizer, discussions involving over two million fans were captured and analyzed. The captured data was then entered into the front-end display, which would rank artists based on their reputation.
Lady Gaga emerged as the most popular artist. This outcome confirmed the usefulness of the criteria in producing nonbiased outcomes (Hanna et al., 2011). In addition, a separate social media conference allowed the most influential bloggers to offer their views about the effectiveness of the We’re All Fans’ online campaign. This conference was designed to amplify the conversations around the campaign with the view of reaching newer niches of the social media ecosystem.
Measurable Success Factors
The We’re All Fans campaign helped Grammy to attain its highest ratings in many years by serving as an important measure of the campaign’s success (Hanna et al., 2011). The awards remained at the top of the rating charts for a week. They also attracted nearly twenty-six million viewers. The number of viewers in the 18-34 age bracket rose significantly by a 32% margin. The new number of viewers in the 18-34 brackets stood at 9.1 million.
The increase was also projected to boost advertising rates at Grammy considerably. Grammy also won the attention of over 2 million fans who visited the website during and after the awards. However, the number of viewers during the awards day was considerably lower, although it went up the day after. Hanna et al. (2011) term this trend as consistent with the ‘water cooler effect’ incident, which refers to the surging interest that occurs as an after-effect of an event.
Another indicator of the project’s success was its ability to generate a non-biased list of winners using the Fanbuzz Visualizer. This measure of fandom provided a rather straightforward format for assessing the ratings of artists using raw data. Through this platform, unbiased views of fans were collected and digitally presented to maintain the credibility of the awards.
Conclusion and Analysis
Hanna et al. (2011) observed how most marketers do not comprehend the dynamics of online marketing. They fail to understand the importance of integrating social media with traditional methods of advertising. Hanna et al. (2011) advance several aspects that every marketing manager should consider when approaching the issue of online marketing. The first one is the desired target. The second factor includes the traditional and social media platforms where the targets exist. The third aspect is marketing the content or story that needs to be passed on to the audience.
The case of Grammy, especially the We’re All Fans campaign, is an indicator of the powerful potential that digital media possesses, particularly when integrated with the traditional methods. Grammy was able to boost its ratings considerably. It also increased its audience by a huge margin. Marketing managers can learn from Grammy’s decision to integrate online marketing and the traditional mode of advertisement to maximize marketing outcomes.
An important strength in the We’re All Fans campaign that propelled it to great success was the ability to design a unique brand. The Fanbuzz Visualizer was a distinctive feature that resulted in much success for the campaign, achieving unbiased rankings for the participants of the award. Kaplan and Haenlein (2010) emphasize the need to be unique as an online marketer. Hanna et al. (2011) identify authenticity as one element that can keep the consumers of online communications interested, hence averting boredom. Therefore, marketers can no longer ignore the role of digital media in modern marketing. The best method of tapping this potential is through integrating social media and traditional advertising platforms.
Reference List
Hanna, R., Rohm, A., & Crittenden, V. L. (2011). We’re all connected: The power of the social media ecosystem. Business Horizons, 54(3), 265-273.
Kaplan, A., & Haenlein, M. (2010). Users of the world, unite! The challenges and opportunities of social media. Business Horizons, 53(1), 59—68.
Scarpa, M. (2011). 3.8 million Grammy live fans can’t be wrong: Case study. Web.
Wesley, D., & Rohm, A. (2010). Social media and the Grammy Awards: The ‘we’re all fans’ campaign. Boston, MA: Northeastern University.