How Drake disrupted the music industry

How Drake disrupted the music industry is a master class in social media marketing.  A few years ago the industry seemed to be, like print media, dying a slow death with the introduction of Napster et al.  Drake has utilised fan engagement and embraced the meme culture to drive sales of his music.  One of his biggest hits, the uber famous ‘Hotline Bling’ has now gone into meme history, being one of the most revered and re-produced memes ever.

meme definition:

miːm/
noun

1. an element of a culture or system of behaviour passed from one individual to another by imitation or other non-genetic means.
2. an image, video, piece of text, etc., typically humorous in nature, that is copied and spread rapidly by Internet users, often with slight variations.

Drake understands his audience and utilises new technologies to engage and humour them.  The Canadian (or is he?)  musician is not afraid to have fun, nor is he afraid of upsetting people or being self deprecating.  He made a decision to just be himself and ‘see what happens’.   The result is highly engaging content which makes him very accessible to his fan base. T Mobile even got in on the action, re- writing the script for the ‘Hotline Bling’ video and running a highly expensive ad campaign for the Superbowl.

In the ad, he can be seen being charming and agreeing to minor changes including adding the text  ‘device eligible for upgrade after 24 months’, and to also add after ‘going places you don’t belong’ that ‘Mexico and Canada are not included’.  In a rare insight to the sometimes ridiculous demands of super brands from super stars, the musician stays calm until eventually he’s asked if the CEO’s of marketing can ‘come in the box’ – watch the video to see what happens.

He’s even taken over the music streaming service, Spotify. Spotify had their first ‘Total Artist Takeover‘ with Drake as the leading man.  For the launch of his new album ‘Scorpian‘, the artists face could be seen on a grid attached to the browse page this week as part of a massive advertising campaign.  ‘Scorpian‘ is currently destroying every streaming record to date with record downloads, streaming 10 million times an hour. In vindication of the huge marketing budget, on Tuesday his music ranked from number 1 to number 13 on the streaming service.  Last year, his album ‘More Life‘ was streamed 385 million times.  Music subscriptions are big business, the American industry doubled its subs last year to $2.5 billion.  Financial pundits predict the industry to double in value again between now and 2020.

The growth of Spotify, and the power wielded by artists like Drake,  has led to the giants of the music industry amalgamating to Universal, Sony Music and Warner Music.  The amalgamation allows them a much stronger negotiation position with Spotify.  The power of streaming is that it allows the music to be discovered via friends, it’s not just a boring download, it’s now a social event.  Such is his popularity, that collaborations continue to stream in for Drake, with massive brands all wanting to be seen to be as ‘cool’ as Drake.  One such company is Sprite who have engaged him in the Spark Campaign, seeing him as an open door to their target market.  Sprite is giving teens a platform to express their creativity through music and film so it ties in nicely with the Drake brand.  You can watch the Sprite collaboration below.

And so we come to the ‘Hotline Bling’ meme.  Released in 2015 the R and B single was a massive success. Drake had used Instagram to announce the launch via the hashtag #hotlinebling (on the day of the launch, the hastag was used 146,000 times on Instagram).  The video became so popular among fans that it spawned parodies and remixes. Like Beyonce and her ‘Beyhive’,  the re-posters even created their own language with the such memes becoming known as ‘Drakeposting‘.

So what has Drake taught us about creating content that goes viral, and breaks the rules?  Obviously, high quality content, video is King (or Queen, depending on your view point) but the key is creating content that can be easily recreated.   Drake’s ‘Hotline Bling’ has been re-created by millions of people all over the world, disrupting the music industry and invigorating it simultaneously.  A successful meme should be easy to copy – in this image Drake has been captured in singular motion, highlighting and stripping out each movement, making it easy for his fans to follow and re-create in all sorts of situations.  Even Ellen DeGeneres has re-created the moves, dancing up and down the audience aisle with a mini Drake on her shoulder and Saturday Night Live even featured it.  You could try your own Drake moves, let us know how you get on with your #Drakeposting.