Music Marketing: A Process

 Beginnings

    When it comes to the process of making a musical artist and then marketing our creation, my group and I realized there was a lot to play with. However, we first have to hurdle through the issue of working with a genre we were all unfamiliar with: Country. Neither I nor group members actively listened to that type of music let alone understand how country music is marketed and presented. I myself am a person who listens to the metal genre, in which its marketing is a completely different look compared to the country whether it is the classic Heavy Metal bands or modern Death Metal. The issue of not understanding country as a genre and the artists that reside in it heavily inspired us to get the best research possible. it was through this research that we realized just how much we can do as our project essentially became a sandbox. 

    During the early stages of our talent development, we felt we could deviate from the typical images that country music can evoke. We established a fictional duo of Oscar Newbourne and Lila Yeager as we used Country star Lady A's "Need You Now" as a template for our work. We brought a nightly aesthetic to our brand using dark colors to contrast with a minimalist white tone in our brand logo seen below. 

Music Video Pre-Production 

    Establishing the overall look of our brand would be a heavy influence on how my group and I wanted to present our music video. Along with the nightly aesthetic of the brand, we also discussed giving the video the look of a small town where its typically warm lights would contrast with the night sky. We came up with the plan to shoot our video towards this time in Town Center. This location would serve as the center setting location for our video. The music video would also be a storytelling-based video as the song's lyrics and our locations would serve well in its creation. As for the story itself, we went for the typical love plot due to the lyrical nature of the song. However, to also deviate from typicalness, we plan to use our locations such as Town Center and a local park to become symbols of the story at hand. During this time one of our group members began formulating a storyboard, which as of this writing is finished. our next step in this section is to actually film the material we have in order to finalize it. 

 Brand Creation and Merch

    Along with the filming process, the ongoing marketing plan has been a personal favorite of mine. With an established look to the music duo, we were able to start working on different aspects of our campaign. We had created social media accounts for such sites as Youtube, Twitter, and Instagram. each site is bare of any content currently as we plan to use the video, BTS pictures, and merch to be placed in these accounts. Merch has also been a very enjoyable aspect of this project. We kept the nightly aesthetic as our merch typically used black and white. Still, we continue to create different merch items such as a Denim jacket, face masks, and even cards. Below are some of my personal favorite designs we have come up with.

Twitter Page

Instagram page

(name updated from initial photo)

Youtube

Conclusion

    As the project continues I overall feel very confident about it. My group and I have found ways to truly enjoy our creation despite it being based on a rather unknown genre for each other. we continue to work on our band and are very excited about its outcome.

-LUISIII