Billboard is projecting that Lady Gaga's Born This Way will sell above 1.15 million copies by the end of business today. This means she will have the biggest first week sales of a pop artist since NSYNC's 2001 album Celebrity. Note that I added "pop" to the superlative, because there is something to be said about how pop music sells these days.
Unlike in the early 2000s, current music sales, especially of pop, are abysmal. Even with #1 singles and radio play, many pop stars are lucky to cross 250,000 in their first week. Case in point, Katy Perry had two of the biggest hits of last year, and sold 192,000 copies in her first week. Taio Cruz had two of the biggest hits of last year with "Break Your Heart" and "Dynamite", sold a paltry 24,000 copies in its first week.
And yet, Lady Gaga is about to cross a threshold that only a few artists have, even with the relative flop of "Judas" under her belt.
Some detractors of Gaga will try to asterisk her accomplishment because of the 99-cent Amazon deal. Yes, it is a highly unorthodox move on Amazon's part (since they are the ones who cut the price, not Gaga or Interscope), but it's a no-lose situation for all parties involved.
Considering the dire straits the industry is in at the moment, labels and artists should be looking towards Lady Gaga for inspiration to revitalize album sales.
What's quite funny is that, just like her music and fashion, Gaga isn't doing anything particular new or special. She is using the technologies and trends of now to reinvent the promotional practices of the past.
Let's explore what I call the "Gaga Model".
Gaga Model Step One: Promotion, promotion, promotion
Lady Gaga is a master class at promotion.
From the beginning, the promotion for Born This Way has been mind-blowing. She has used virtually every avenue possible to assure the maximum impact.
Her most publicized deal was with Zynga, the internet game company behind Farmville. Her fans and the millions who use Farmville every day were able to unlock special Gaga-related items and tracks from the album. What was important was the reach that Zynga could offer Gaga. There were millions of people who tended to their virtual farms while listening to songs like "Marry The Night", "Electric Chapel", and "Fashion of His Love" (which was on the deluxe edition).
Gaga also used the traditional promotion methods, to the extreme. For instance, the S train in New York City was completely painted in the image of Gaga and Born This Way. Why that train in particular? Because it's the shuttle between Grand Central Terminal and Port Authority Bus Terminal, two of three biggest transportation hubs in the city. When she wasn't on subway trains, she was on TV, being featured on shows like Oprah, Ellen, Saturday Night Live, American Idol, and more. She gave an incredibly candid interview to MTV about her childhood, and performed on Good Morning America's Summer Concert Series. She filmed a very popular Google Chrome commercial, set to her latest single "The Edge of Glory". That commercial has pushed that song to #2 on iTunes.
Then there is Gaga's bread and butter; the Internet. She has over 10 million followers on Twitter and over 30 million fans on Faebook. She engages with them regularly, not just to promote her album but to share her thoughts, feelings, and appreciation for their support. It's a powerful, and underestimated, tool and she's mastered it perfectly. Look no further than "Born This Way", which became the fastest selling single in iTunes history because of its heavy online promotion.
It has been a long time since we've seen a promotional tour this huge. These days, artists would do a morning show concert, a few talk shows, and be done with it. Not Gaga. Whether it's to bolster her sales or to appear in front of her fans as much as humanly possible, Gaga has taken promoting to a whole new peak. She may be risking overexposure, but it's clear the risk was worth it.
Gaga Model Step Two: Selling everywhere at once
It was highly unlikely that you didn't run into Born This Way somewhere this week.
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| Lady Gaga at Best Buy in NYC Monday |
Just like in step one, the purpose of putting her album in so many places was exposure. It sounds ridiculous, but it is possible for some people to not know that an album is being released, even if it's out in the usual stores. It gets even worse when there isn't enough promotion to sustain the album, radio airplay or not. It's doubtful that some of these retailers are equipped with Soundscan, which reports the sales to Billboard. That doesn't matter, though. As long as people know the album exists and they potentially purchase it and have it in their homes, the published numbers don't really matter much in the long run.
Gaga Model Step Three: Deals and Steals
Amazon wasn't the only retailer to offer up deals. Best Buy bundled the CD with a brand new smartphone purchase, although those sales will not count towards Soundscan. iTunes offered a free remix to those who bought the album before June 9th. They also offered the album at a discounted price if they downloaded the four singles released earlier, "Born This Way", "Judas", "The Edge of Glory", and "Hair".
For some, the Amazon deal wasn't fair because, for 99 cents, the album was basically being given away for free. Because of that, some argued that Billboard should not have counted those sales.
What some may not grasp is the idea of consumer intent. Even if an album is 99 cents, that does not guarantee someone will buy it. What the deals does is open the album to those who may have been interested through Gaga's other promotional efforts. Once again, the purpose of the deal was to expose the album to as many people as possible. That said, Billboard revealed this week that even without the deal, six of the big retailers reported first day sales of 500,000 copies.
These special sales promotions, especially Amazon's, were really no-lose situations for everyone. Companies were able to promote their products, Gaga and Interscope were able to sell albums and expand their presence in the public's consciousness, and fans of all economic standpoints were able to buy Born This Way.
How The Gaga Model Can Reinvigorate the Industry
For all that we've seen in the past five years, Gaga's Born This Way should've topped off at 400,000 copies in its debut week, at best. Even with the smash of "Bad Romance", The Fame Monster with its deluxe and standard editions only sold 325,000 copies in the United States. That album, while critically successful, didn't have the same level of promotion behind it that Born This Way does. In fact, a lot of artists don't have the level of promotion Born This Way does.
And that is the problem.
Back when Britney Spears and the Backstreet Boys were busting sales records, they were also heavily promoting themselves. In fact, the methods they used back then almost put Gaga to shame. I still have the special McDonalds CD that Jive released, featuring songs by Britney and 'NSYNC. They were literally everywhere, and the fact paired with the standard practice of holding singles back from retail release pushed first week sales into the million-plus club.
Labels need to understand that if they are insistent on keeping the current album model working, they need to promote. Seriously promote. It's not called pop music for nothing. Lady Gaga, and Adele for that matter, have proven that huge album sales are possible, when the right amount of effort is put in.
The Gaga Model may not be for every artist, and there are risks that some may not be immune to like she is, but it is definitely a start in pumping blood into a dry industry.
What are your thoughts on this? Are labels adequately promotion their artists, or should they follow Gaga's example? Is Gaga overexposed because of this? Leave comments!
2 comments:
This is just what I've been saying. Gaga knows how to promote and she's reminding people of the astounding benefits it has. Artists have forgotten about the art of promotion. BTW's smashing first week sales are testament to this.
Great article. Well written, insightful and articulate.
Thank you, I'm really hoping that this will inspire artists to go harder in their promo. Beyoncé is next with 4, so we'll see if she took some notes (even though she does a great job with promo anyway)
:)
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