Branding Exercise

 Branding:

Branding has always been a major core element in being an artist, and promoting music. With Spotify adding over 60,000 tracks to their platform on a daily basis, artists need to ensure they brand and campaign their music beyond creating an album and artwork for it.

Branding campaigns for musicians need to work across video content, merchandise, social media, band logos and more. A musician's branding needs to be synonymous with its music and members, instantly recognisable and above all, timeless.

Musicians that nailed their branding campaigns:

1) Ed Sheeran
Back in 2015, Ed Sheeran announced via his social media platforms that he was taking a break to travel the world and see everything that he's missed. Exactly one year after that, Sheeran returned to Instagram posting a simple plain light blue square. This marked the beginning of the branding campaign for his album 'Divide'. It took his almost another month to post again, this time officially announcing the record. The use of the one bold colour along with a simple divide symbol made this one of his most successful branding campaigns.

The last two pictures show illustrations within the divide album, which link to titles of songs within the album. For example, the third photo is referring to the song 'Dive'. In the last photo there are illustrations of a fiddle (Galway Girl), a heart with a crack in the middle (Hearts Don't Break Around Here), a smiley face (Happier), a shield (Save Myself), a question mark (What Do I Know?), an eraser (Eraser), a bouquet of flowers (Supermarket Flowers) etc, and other illustrations for every song on the album.

2) Slowthai
With an album titled 'Nothin' Great About Britain', the artist had billboards placed all over the UK with facts about the country's problems including statistics about climate change, homelessness, the gender pay gap, hate crime, mental health and more. Encouraging fans to send him pictures of the various billboards in London is a great way to engage with listeners and create a buzz around an album, weeks ahead of its release. By placing the album's name of the album at the bottom of each billboard, the cryptic message intrigued many people.

Billboard texts include: '78% of large companies in the UK pay men more than they pay women', 'Recorded offences of hate crime in the UK have increased by 123% in the last 5 years', and 'If you're black you are 8 times more likely to be the subject of a stop and search than if you're white'.

3) Taylor Swift
As one of pop's biggest stars, Taylor Swift 'reinvents' herself for each album release. Upon the upcoming release of her 'Reputation' album, she deleted her entire Instagram feed, then teased fans with an image of a snake that flipped her previous bad press as a sneaky back-stabber into someone who was unapologetic, ruthless and inspiring.

Branding Power of Music Videos:

When music videos were fist introduced, it allowed the artist to convey a more comprehensive message, portray an image and create a brand for themselves. Originally, MTV introduced music videos, allowing audience engagement to go beyond just hearing the song on the radio. When MTV stopped playing music videos, there was a lull in the widespread influence of the video as a key element of the artists' ability to effectively brand and gain a larger audience.

However, the improvements in technology and its proliferation has made it so that artists can now use music videos as one of their most powerful branding tool, regardless of whether or not its played on tv or not. No longer are videos being played on program's such as 106 and Park, which was one of the most viewed music video airing program, but now the artist can tweet or post on social media platforms such as Twitter and Instagram, and reach millions more people in a matter of minutes.

Accessibility:

With the unlimited access of the internet, fans can now search out their favourite artists and watch their music videos whenever they like, an unlimited number of times. This accessibility gives artists the opportunity to brand themselves or change their image,knowing it will be seen over and over again. Accessibility leads to repetition, which helps develop a strong brand. However, this unlimited access also means that artists need to be extra careful about how they present both themselves and their music. The internet magnifies everything that goes into an artist's image. Every little detail needs to be thought out and treated carefully, otherwise there might be some bad backlash or bad press. Often, artists won't be in charge of their social media pages and online presence, but rather have their own manager to look after it and manage it for them, and they are in charge of the artist's image. 

Ed Sheeran Digipak - Previous Albums:

These photos are from the CD album the greatest hits of Ed Sheeran, released in 2017.  There is a different, but clear theme identified in these photos. using the contrasting blues and oranges. They use simple shots of the artist, which is common with many artists, and something we plan on doing.

The photos above are taken from the No.6 Collaborations Project, which is the album that 'Best Part of Me' is in. The overall theme is black and white and shows the process of Ed making and producing his music. I like these photos because it brings a realistic feel, is consistent with the theme, and includes lyrics from the songs that relate to the photos. For example, the second and third photo includes the lyrics 'You know it ain't my time to call it a day' and 'Wanted to make it big, wished it into existence' which are lines from his song 'Remember the Name' featuring Eminem. The photos link to the lyrics, which adds meaning to the lyrics. We see Ed at a mixing desk, obviously working on his song, and the lyrics suggest that this could have been a long and tiring day for him, but he pushed through and didn't give up, implying the 'It ain't my time to call it a day'.

Ed Sheeran does majority, if not all of his branding and marketing on his instagram page. His posts often show him standing in front of a crowd as he is performing, but as seen in the photos above, he is not in a position that would assume superiority or dominance above the crows as other artists do. He often includes more down-to-earth photos and videos of him having fun, playing music not for fame but because it something he loves to do. In his most recent photo from his concert where he sung with Stormzy for one of his collaborations song, 'Take Me Back to London', his friendship is shown with th rapper.

The photo on the right further proves that Ed Sheeran doesn't act all 'high and mighty' as some artists do when reaching fame and success, but shows that though he is still famous on a global scale, and a dad, he finds ways to remain down to earth and have fun.

This was posted a couple of days ago to announce his new album 'Harry's House' coming out in May. It is a very simple post and a good way to intrigue his fans without giving away much about the album.

However, in the past Harry has been known for hiding things about his songs and album in plain sight, and fans of his have revealed that reversing this video sounds like a song that could possibly be from a song in his new album.

When promoting his upcoming tour he uses bright colours that match the artwork from his most recent album that was released, and uses a simple and casual typewriter font. Showing him in front of a crowd both suggests how well-known he is and how many people enjoy his songs, but him holding his guitar in the air makes it feel as if its not him, but the music. Although he is above everyone in a physical sense, he doesn't make it seem that he is above everyone in a way that means he doesn't associate himself with other, 'more poor' people. Also, Ed always dresses casual - often in jeans and a t-shirt, and not dressed to impress, which also helps make audiences feel that they can relate to him more - but Harry Styles is always seen wearing something that either makes a statement or is fancy and sophisticated, which has become part of his brand and image. Furthermore, his posts about tours and album releases often have a more sophisticated and fancy feel to them as opposed to Ed's more casual ones that have taken on a more handwritten approach.

Although Harry Styles has made it 'his job' to help make others feel included, as seen by his inclusivity in his concerts, both by his songs and also waving around different flags to represent one's sexuality, his Instagram posts have him in the center of many shots, in what some would say are powerful positions. This makes him appear to be slightly above others and have him being the 'star' of his shows and life, which is something that Ed Sheeran doesn't have in common as he is often seen with other people, and in one post, he was wearing a matching hoodie.

Compare this

To this

Some more shots of Harry Styles being the subject of each Instagram post, and in positions that suggest higher power and authority.

Both Harry Styles and Ed Sheeran have a similar target audience when considering the age range and the genre of the song, however Harry Styles would probably have a slightly larger range as more people, especially those who grew up listening to One Direction would most likely still listen to him. Additionally, both of these artists are the same/similar genre to what we are doing for our music video, so we can take inspiration from them when taking into consideration ideas for our digipaks and creating an instagram account for Ed Sheeran to promote his music.

The photos for our digipak would ideally be more casual than if we were doing a Harry Styles song. They would show him being more at one with the crowd, and photos of him working on his songs - using behind the scenes type of shots, rather than showing the final product which represents the difference between Ed and Harry.