Kim Dolengowski, Head of Strategy, Foundation Australia breaks down what we can learn as marketers from Taylor Swift’s Midnight album launch.
From a meticulous online rollout that had Millennials and Gen Zer’s eating out of the palm of her hand, to The Atlantic basically dubbing her as the ‘True Metaverse’, Taylor Swift successfully did what’s on every brand’s brief – build brand meaning in culture.
The interesting part of all this isn’t about the What meaning of her music, it’s about the How. This wasn’t your typical new album launch. You don’t even have to be a ‘Swiftie’, a Taylor Swift super fan, to consider it one for the marketing books.
It’s worth saying upfront I don’t consider myself a Swiftie. My fascination has nothing to do with the music but everything to do with her campaign launch strategy.
If you can’t admire the sheer clarity, creativity, and connectedness of its go-to-market strategy or how she’d managed to win the hearts of the coveted Gen Zers, the real proof is in the pudding, results. Through this launch and in a matter of days, Taylor Swift became the first musician to claim the entire Top 10 on Billboard Hot 100. Talk about a brand uplift.
Here’s the how of it all.
Ecosystems should tell a story. The launch of this campaign was a carefully crafted ecosystem. The singer-songwriter teased a weeklong circuit of activations before the Midnight album came out. Each channel had a clear role and goal to play in the build-up of the campaign. Then each channel activity was executed flawlessly. Swift, pre-seeded the launch with a TikTok video series where she released the 13 track names one by one via a bingo game. Next, the following week the release was a full launch schedule for fans via Instagram. Finally, the album dropped on Spotify, nearly breaking the internet. To top it off, Swift rebranded all Spotify videos on her whole discovery to play a "midnights" video. But that’s not the interesting part. The launch tells a story. The campaign has a beginning, middle, and end. Marketers could take notes on how to create a more poet journey for the consumers to experience their brand, moving away from “get as many eyeballs as possible at launch.” While that does the reach job, it misses the meaning part that Swift seemingly landed so well.
Water your brand’s Swiftie. Brands are so focused on recruitment they often overlook the audiences who already love them. Ask yourself, who are our Swifties? How can you reward them and rust them onto your brand? By drip feeding the album release and drumming up anticipation of the launch, she knew her own Swifties would drive talkability and fame of her album, later capturing the attention of the masses.
Build fandom over fame. Fandom is doing it for the consumer. Fame is doing it for the brand. Taylor Swift has grown her own consumer brand love for years. Every intricacy of this launch demonstrates at the heart of it all, she creates experiences for her fans. The Atlantic says, “The Washington Post’s Emily Yahr recounts Swift has left puzzles and secret messages for fans for more than 15 years, embedding them in her album liner notes, music videos and social-media posts.” In addition, Swift released a 3am version of midnight which for some fans felt like a direct response to fandom love of her “from the vaults” releases. Taylor Swift obsessively listens to her fans and does everything for them. Marketers should ask themselves, is my campaign really consumer centric and how can we genuinely build fandom around our brands?
My typical source of inspiration falls from marketing experts and thought leaders. But for a strategist who is culture obsessed, the launch of this album was thought leading.
And with that I tip my marketing cap to Taylor Swift.