Wicho Lopez is the managing partner of all Wizard of Ads offices in Central America. He also maintains the Spanish language translation site of the Monday Morning Memo,
El Mago de la Publicidad.
Hi Roy,
This is my Case Study:
Malacates Trebol Shop
The Guatemalan band, was chosen by My Space Latino to be the featured video of the week, on the second week of June.
The band just released their fourth album produced and engineered by two grammy award winners, KC Porter and Thom Russo.
In order to call it a success, My Space Latino said the video needed at least 20,000 clicks from Monday 7:00 a.m. thru Friday, 8:00 p.m. This would put the band on their “featured new artist list” next to big names like Juanes, Shakira, Alejandro Sanz, Cafe Tacuba and Calle 13, among thousands.
The band needed this to help out with exposure as we're seeking international concerts, and to make the album available in other countries. On objective: Exposing the band outside of Guatemala thru the album itself, and the video, and as a promotional tool for concert sales.
The votes that counted, were the ones were the person watched the video till the end. (No only-clickers to the page, we needed the people to click on the video, and watch it completely in order to count.)
Points of Strategy:
1. The didn´t give the band´s My Space. (www.myspace.com/malacates) <http://www.myspace.com/malacates)>
This would required search, click, search, click.. video page.
2. We posted the link directly as a hyperlink.
http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=58473175
3. The message was:
“Play the New Malacates video (Don´t miss the ending.)”
There´s nothing especial in the video at the end, we just wanted to let people know to watch it completely in order for the vote to count.
The Fan Club has around 450 people registered, plus the band is always ranked among the three top bands in the country. This noticeability made the delivery of the message very easy.
4. The liner on all messages was:
“We encourage you to thump it up, or thumb it down. Leave us a comment.”
Since My Space Latino commented us, that this was also important for us to be ranked.
5. Vehicles:
Direct hyperlinks from:
– Twitter (www.twitter.com/malacates) <http://www.twitter.com/malacates)>
– Facebook (Fan Page)
– Facebook (Advertising)
– Blogger (and sent via mailing list)
– Band´s webpage
What no to include:
– No “You Tube” (Obviously any click on the video on You Tube, will cause a “no-vote” from the My Space page)
– On printed articles and radio interviews, the only page mention was: www.Malacates.com <http://www.Malacates.com> from where, the hyperlink was available the front page banner). If you log in right now, you´ll see a “following banner of notice”
Results:
1. On Monday June 8th,
We ended up in second place with, 3,379 plays.
(Followed by Lady Gaga in third)
http://malacatestrebolshop.blogspot.com/2009/06/2-en-my-space-hoy.html
2. At the end of the week, we got about 17,200 “plays”, 2,800 short. But the 94% likeness helped the band qualify to the “new artists” page and My Space Latino opening interest in expanding their business to Central America.
3. Due to this, the international response of the band increased.
– In July we did a two week tour to Maryland, New Jersey, Houston, Los Angeles and Mexico City.
– Thru November, we will play one shoe at “The House of Blues” in Hollywood.
– The bands albums got more sales more over the internet(iTunes, amazon, napster)
– The legendary Amoeba Store, accepted the band´s album into their inventory.
http://www.amoeba.com/store-locations/index.html#hollywood
(Remember the band is no a U.S. artist, and this is quite hard to obtain, if the store wasn´t aware of the potential sales it would have to the hispanic community residing in California.)
4. This also helped the current business, since the concert sales are stable (in our country, in this economy.)
5. Merchandise sales went up. We are selling more t-shirts, keychains, stickers and iPod cases now.
Was this obtain, only thru this strategy?
– No, this is part of many other activities we do each week. But this surely helped more quickly than other strategies we implement as a innovation in our music business. We understand all music (and formats like albums and videos) are tools to help us sell more concerts.
Hope to see you soon Don Roy, I send you a un big abrazo!
Wicho
Luis López
Managing Partner
– El Mago de la Publicidad