If you haven’t heard of Olivia Rodrigo you’re probably living on a desert island away from all social media or hiding under a rock. The 18-year-old actress and singer went viral on TikTok with her song Drivers License and now she just released her debut album – Sour. Her singles broke several Spotify records and created countless TikTok viral trends, setting her as the breakout artist of 2021.
It might be true: she didn’t come out of nowhere. But it is also true that she came out brutally and turned us all into heartbroken teenagers again, breaking records that no other new artist had broken before.
The fact that Olivia became an overnight online sensation was a mix of relatable music and lyrics, the emotion behind them and very effective marketing and PR strategies… from the typical love triangle drama to all the gossip fed by it and to the media promotion. But today we’re leaving the gossip to the magazines and analysing the marketing strategy behind the release of her first album – Sour – that happened on May 21st.
In times of a pandemic where there can’t be crowded concerts or worldwide tours, Olivia did something innovative at least… a #SourCarWash hosted by Spotify in LA. Wilkins Experiential worked with Geffen Records, Spotify and Taco Bell to promote a Covid-safe, engaging and fun car wash for fans to celebrate Sour’s release. An extremely creative Out-Of-Home experiential campaign that translated into a heavy amount of user-generated content and online engagement.
This event was also integrated with a partnership with Sour Patch Kids, which actually started out as a random real-time Twitter meme! Talking about good use of social media, here’s an example of one of them. When Olivia revealed the name of her debut album, the brand reacted immediately which translated into one of the biggest marketing partnerships the brand has ever had. The Olivia Rodrigo Sour Patch Kids custom mix was brought to life in a matter of weeks by 360i, Mondelēz International and Interscope Records. And safe to say that the partnership was a success – besides generating engagement with an organic social media giveaway of 12 signed boxes, 2.5k boxes were distributed at Olivia’s car wash launch event and in celebrity packages. The fans also went crazy with it, creating a 4-hour wait at the NYC store and selling out the product within the first hour of opening! Moreover, the partnership got the conversation going and created even more buzz… as there are now rumours that the artist is going to release a new album called Sweet based on the brand’s slogan "First they're sour, then they're sweet". A good lesson to all Marketers and Social Media Managers out there!
Talking about the PR Packages, this was another really smart move from her team. These packages were sent to different celebrities and artists who have a different audience than her on different platforms, which translated into a reach of more people from new demographics that probably wouldn’t know about Olivia and Sour otherwise. And you probably saw one of the unboxings: Kim Kardashian’s video got viral after her daughter North saying, while she was recording, that she never listened to the song which generated shares of the video and created awareness towards the package and, consequently, the album.
The good thing is that this isn’t over – to promote the single Déjà vu, Olivia’s team also gave away free strawberry ice cream in a promotion campaign for the single where she literally mentions how she ate it with a spoon for two in Malibu, and she gave personalized purple letters to everyone that was a guest at the BRIT Awards, where she performed.
Moreover, all of this campaign focused on another thing I find really important when promoting something in the music industry: fan engagement. Olivia and her team made the effort of interacting and integrating her audience in the promotion of Sour, whether it was online or in-person in a Covid-safe way. She even sent necklaces to her top listeners to thank them for their support.
Everyone behind Olivia’s marketing team is actually shaping music releases and the music industry itself while focusing on fan engagement – that can also be customer loyalty – and in the adaptation to new social media platforms.
And we can see the results – Olivia is the youngest artist ever to achieve the Official Chart Double and it’s the first time a debut artist album has claimed it since Sam Smith in 2015. She is also the first female artist to do the double with a debut album since Lady Gaga in 2009 and Sour was the fastest-selling album of 2021, overtaking Foo Fighters, and the fastest-selling debut album since Lewis Capaldi’s Divinely Uninspired to a Hellish Extent.
I leave you with a tweet that I found recently that sums up this article: “olivia rodrigo’s marketing team must have masters degrees in gen z targeting bc they always understand the assignment”. And they really did.
This article was also posted on Fan To Band, ViewPoints and Caótico (Portuguese version).
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