Oddisee Fights “The Good Fight” [Case Study]
When D.C. hip hop artist Oddisee decided to release his sophomore album The Good FIght this year, it presented an excellent marketing opportunity for his promotional team, who utilized the artist's interest in coffee as a means of pitching the new release to the masses.
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Guest Post by Mary Elizabeth Adams of The Orchard on The Daily Rind
GOALS
D.C.-based Hip-Hop artist Oddisee decided 2015 was a good year for an album, his sophomore project The Good Fight to be specific. For the US-based digital and physical marketing campaign surrounding the release, out on Mello Music Group, we knew we’d have no trouble getting people excited about the album drop. Through forward-thinking marketing tactics, we aimed to spread the word about the album and grow awareness for this multi-talented musician.
TACTICS
One thing we discovered while getting to know Oddisee: the man has a deep appreciation for coffee. We’re talking… connoisseur level. We thought we’d have some fun and put together a café-inspired portion of the campaign. We created branded coffee sleeves with Oddisee’s logo that spotlighted the new album and release date, and worked with eight notable coffee shops around the country to promote and distribute the sleeves. We then used Oddisee’s, the coffee shops’ and our social reach to spread the word: our first post went up via Brooklyn’s Daily Press Coffee and featured a hyperlapse video to showcase the entire sleeve design. Nationwide, other retailers posted pictures on socials to push promotion, like Minneapolis’s Peace Coffee and Denver’s Purple Door Coffee.
For two weeks, we also utilized our college marketing program and had college reps promoting The Good Fight in their respective cities, six in total. They promoted various track and video premieres on their social networks, like Pitchfork’s feature of “That’s Love” and the Billboard premiere of the “Counter-Clockwise” music video, and hung posters, distributed the aforementioned coffee sleeves and passed out copies of the album to be played in record stores or on college radio, ultimately increasing exposure on college campuses.
To continue engagement around The Good Fight’s central theme as Oddisee toured, we created an Instagram contest where fans could submit their daily inspiration for “fighting the good fight,” using the hashtags #thegoodfight and #mygoodfight on the social platform. After a 3-week run, 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners were announced and received prize packs that included signed copies of the new album. One noteworthy post among many came from Mr. Gary Clark Jr, who reposted @bavublakes’ original ‘gram to his 68k + followers. The contest wrapped up the campaign perfectly, emphasizing individual, daily efforts of perseverance from fans, while organically hyping Oddisee and his latest release.
RESULTS
- The Good Fight debuted at #11 on Billboard’s Heatseekers chart, #33 on the Current Hip-Hop/R&B chart, #44 on Independent Albums chart and #95 on the Overall Digital Albums chart.
- Facebook likes grew by 14%, Twitter followers increased by 11% and Spotify followers grew by 38%.
- Usual engagement on Instagram spiked during #thegoodfight contest, resulting in a 225% jump in likes and 132% increase in comments. Overall, ‘Gram followers went up by 35%.
FOR YOUR VIEWING PLEASURE
But he didn’t make no money. Vanity stats mean nada.
I like the campaign .I would need you guys for The Orange Piano Tour, but don`t know whether
you`re affordable for me.