Marketing: Fansite

Marketing needs to be produced from both above and below the line, ranging from mainstream television advertisements, billboard posters and national television appearances, to much smaller marketing techniques of audience word-of-mouth and discussion forums on websites such as myspace. With the boom of the internet, the audience are much more inclined to voice their opinions of an artist through websites, and the internet has recently been bombarded with 'fansites' spreading new information about the artists; in many ways, a free advertisement campaign for the record label.



An example of this is the ‘Mcfly maniacs’ website, is an unofficial site for the awesome foursome pop band (with guitars) Mcfly. The site has been created by fans for fans, to discuss their passion (Mcfly) and find out more about the band. The site states:



“Welcome to McFly Maniacs, the number 1 resource for everything McFly! We opened on 6th December 2003 and have suported McFly from the very begining! We have had alot of suport from everyone who visits and its been great running it over the past years, we will keep going as long as you keep visiting!We would just like to thank you all for the suport on the site over the years. Its been great running the site and we enjoy your company! If you wish to contact us, then click on 'Site' then 'Contact'. Hope you enjoy your stay! :) Amy and Emma”

The site is targeting all fans of McFly, and is using the website to:

• Promote the band
• Give the fans more information
• Make the fans feel involved with the band, ‘in the know’
• Create an online community
• Give this niche audience a form of media which is solely targeting them
• Personalised, narrowcasting.
  

The website contains:
Menu bar: Home, band, gallery, music, fans, fun, tours, site, web
‘Video of the moment’ where Mcfly’s current video is posted via a YouTube link.
A chat board
News bulletin board, almost like a blog, where the site runners leave messages and updated information on the boys.
Gallery: loads of photos of the band, from TV and Video stills, to scanned in magazine images, official tour photos or photos taken from live events. These are fan photos, not those you’d see on the official band website.
Music: Find out all the details and statistics concerning their singles and albums (chart positions, sales, release dates etc), the lyrics and chords to all their songs.
Fans: send in your pictures or autographs if you’ve met Mcfly, see photos of other fans bedrooms covered in Mcfly posters, send in artwork you’ve done of the band. Register with the site to leave comments on the forum or join in the chats.
Fun: get Mcfly ringtones or wallpapers, play games, caption photos, read Mcfly cartoons, read funny Mcfly quotes, send photos of Mcfly look-alikes.
Band: band members biographies.

Media texts involved are the internet, photography and video. The site is kept quite like a blog as it is an amateur site.

Video of the moment: Mcfly, Transylvania

For the industry: free market research; they can see the audience's interests, and what they like/dislike about Mcfly from this site. Free promotion - they are getting the promotion of the band and of their songs through a medium they have nothing to do with. In some ways this is scary - what's published is democratic, and therefore out of their control - but in other ways it is beneficial, they don't have to be reach audiences, the audiences find out more off their own backs.

Press Release

1st Draft of the Press Release:

"Born and raised in the Venezuelan city of Maracaribo, new star to hit the spotlight, ‘someone’ plays Golnessa, a girl who rises from a life of unattainable ambitions and distant dreams, to the world of stardom, glamour and fame. As dancers, Golnessa and her friends form the Gina Girls, and perform nightly at their local bar Mercado. After being spotted by British Producer Marcus (Williams) the girls are dramatically whirled into planet ‘celeb’ and find themselves dancing in full view of the world, performing at huge venues and attending a-list soirees. But does the rollercoaster of fame prove too much for Golnessa, and do the melodious sounds of South America seem far sweeter than the loud, harsh and claustrophobic bubble of London?

‘Mercado, the soundtrack from the original motion picture’ is an eclectic collection of sound. Intertwining Latin-infused tracks with new, gritty, London-based bands, the music makes ‘Mercado’ the spectacular film it has become. Dance is a major motif in the film, and the soundtrack totally reflects this...headlined by Papi Cazo’s ‘Takin’ it Over’, the album uses manic beats, riotous trumpets, and flamboyant melodies, to inspire listeners to get up on their feet and salsa like Golnessa.

In collaboration with the film, ‘someone’ will be making special guest appearances on MTV’s ‘TRL’, BBC’s ‘Friday Night with Jonathon Ross’, and Channel 4’s Saturday morning show ‘T4’, performing the film’s most spectacular dance routine, to the headlining single ‘Takin’ it Over’. Golnessa and the Gina Girls are also scheduled to tour next March with a multitude of artists from the soundtrack to truly show the world their stuff, and a dance along DVD to the film will be available to buy from December 10th, so those at home can learn the real dance moves from the experts.

'Mercado' is to be premiered on the 1st of December, and will be let loose to the public on the 5th. This is to be followed closely by the sublime soundtrack on the 10th of December. Find out more about the film online at www.mercado.com, and the soundtrack will be downloadable there from the 15th of December onwards."

Album Cover Ideas

Here are a collection of album covers which could be used as inspiration for our own cover. Our music video is meant to be a track from the film (which will probably be called Mercado). The star of the film is Golnessa, a fun and sexy character who enjoys spending time with her friends, performing and dancing. The film will probably have a love interest and is very inspired by the latin and south american genres - hence the music and much of our iconography. Our album, as the film's soundtrack needs to portray all the different themes of both the film and the music video and should star Golnessa, the main character, as a promotion tool for the film. The first album covers are real movie soundtracks which are very useful in terms of institutional information such as credits, film companies, various artists and so on.


This Chicago soundtrack successfully conveys the 1950s period as well as the musical film genre with the dance costumes and the title being in the same font as broadway shows. We liked the use of the extreme long shot as it makes the characters seem much more dominating and attractive, and the 3 characters shown are the film's headliners, actors we quickly recognise. We also liked the background of the big glowing letter, however this is very broadway, and may not fit with our latino theme.
This soundtrack is from a spanish/south american film and the warm colours and dark skin tones are very similar to our music video. We particularly liked the central female character surrounded by the two males as it clearly suggests a story or a plot central the film. The title faded over the top of the image is very effective as it is big and bold but doesn't take away from the main image. We also liked the linear block down the side of the cover with the name of the artists.

Once again all of the soundtracks have the star as the dominating image. Jessica Alba in 'Honey' is dancing to convey the main theme of the film, and the direct address to the camera which Rachel Weisz and Susan Lynch draws our attention to the cover and anchors the title 'beautiful creatures'. The black white and red effect used in 'el cantante' makes the film look very sophisticated, arty and beautiful which is quite a contrast to most of Jennifer Lopez' films.

These covers are from real albums and I chose them as inspiration as they are all very feminine, very much like our video. These covers are particularly aspirational for girls for example the bright pibk feathers in the Garbage album and the very pretty and innocent close up of Christina Aguilera. Thse covers also offer great appeal to the boy audience, especially Christina who is directly addressing the audience whilst lying in a bed. I thought the middle cover was great because it uses a group of girls - like our vid - standing in a kind of dancy pose (one of our main themes) and are wearing 40s/50s costumes, a period which we have drawn from with our moulin rouge inspired costumes and our 50s boudoir. The garbage cover is great with the feathers as we also used lots of silks and feathery materials in our video. I think this cover and the 'It girls' cover would be really useful for our back covers which we could fade and put the track names over the top.

And very quickly, i thought the special effect on the iggy pop album cover with the bright clashing colours could look really good on our album, thought a font similar to 'heavy soul' could look very spanish/latino if spelling 'Mercado', and liked the central image as it reminded me of Gee's chair!

Dance Routine

It has been my responsibility to choreograph the dance routine for the middle section of the music video, and I constructed it with the help of two inspirational music videos (Christina Aguilera 'Ain't No Other Man' and West Side Story 'America').

It'll make no sense to you now, starts at about 1min 20sec)

• Up and down up and down
• Step forward right, twist back on left , shake bum 3&4
• Twist with bum round to right diagonalShake shoulders, push left down first
• Forward and back forward and back with left foot and punchy arms
• Salsa step forward and back, dropping onto right foot
• Walk (right) walk (left), place legs out one at a time (right leg first)Do the swishy hair thing, clockwise directionPositions 6, 7, Goli 8
• Push down with right hand knees facing left, pull up with the left hand, knees facing right (slow)
• Gesturing hands as walking backwards (slow)
• Arms with beat, Goli spins (we clap)Arms with beat, Goli wiggles (we clap)
• Arms with beat, Goli does Shakira belly (we clap)
• Arms with beat Goli shimmies (we clap)
• Goli runs forward to jump on bar, while we all shimmy.

Target Audience

Our Target Audience:

• Our core target audience would be young (under 30), both boys and girls, who enjoy music styles from different cultures, dancing, partying and watching independent films (our track is taken from the Motion Picture…) A secondary audience could be younger consumers between the ages of 8 and 18, particularly girls who would aspire to be like the star of the video.
• The tastes and attitudes of our core audience in a media context would particularly be the enjoyment and consumption of films and music from varying cultures; particularly Spanish and South American inspired mediums. On a social level, the core audience would enjoy go out to clubs, dancing and being with friends. In many ways the video would appeal to girls who enjoy going out, as it includes scenes of getting ready, and girls running around having fun.
• The main function of this style of music is to raise spirits and as a track to dance to – it’s upbeat, catchy, fast-paced and repetitive.
• The audience could interpret this video to help them construct various identities. The most obvious would be the South American, sexy, carnival-going, Spanish dancing, hunk or mama. However, there are also identities such as being a party-goer socialite, wearing glamorous and theatrical clothing, and being someone that other people admire.
• Typically this music would be consumed at a club, bar or party to get people dancing, however consumers may also listen to it when getting ready to go out or when trying to raise their mood when working at home!

Fitting Ideas to the Track

This was my first attempt to structure the group's ideas around the music, fitting the different sections of narrative with suitable sections of music in order to be effectively illustrative or juxtapositional.

• Starts with the fast make-up shots, CUs etc
• When the big beat kicks in i thought we could have a lift opening (an idea we mentioned ages ago) and as the doors open all the girls are posing in full costume.
• Now we have the running round the streets and the bus and stuff all going on, interspersed at this point with very short glimpses of trumpets playing, silhouettes of dancers, and maybe flashes of costume and bright colours.
• Then when the tune dies down and it just the drums (the music goes quite slow) i thought we could have Goli's big entrance (like the filthy gorgeous vid) where we show everyone watching her, CUs of their expressions, the movements are quite slow. But here we could use some voyeuristic shots of Goli, cutting up her body - eyes, tummy, shoes - as if from the POV of the people watching and scrutinising/admiring her. She then begins to dance a bit...
• And when the tune kicks in again everyone else joins in. Here we have the full on mercado party; loads of alcohol, dancing, people sitting looking cool, cocktails, people having fun.
• Then the guy starts singing and the trumpets are gone (1m 25secs) i think we should have the choreographed dancing but all cut up. So we can have the girls dancing with goli, cut up with boys and girls doing ricky martin dancing, cut up with goli on her own dancing in her ZONE with projections, cut up with all the girls in their boudoir laughing (rehearsing maybe?). Use slow mo a bit here maybe?
• When it goes fast again she should run up onto the bar.

Music Video Genres - Spanish/Latino

Inspirational videos for a spanish/latin theme (if we decided to focus on 'Takin' it over')I looked at two Ricky Martin videos:

'She Bangs'


Although this video is too sexual, i loved the fast paced editing and the great use of close-ups when everyone is dancing particularly in the first verse and chorus - for example the blonde girl shaking her hair, or the low angle shots of girls' bums and legs. Also, at the end when everyone is dancing behind him - i think we could definitely recreate an atmosphere like this at mercado if we got people dancing and shaking their hips! There is a very lively latino feel throughout, and the dancing style would be a great inspiration.

'Livin la vida loca'


This video - again - is too sexual, but the group dancing is fantastic and some of the moves would really fit with the spanish theme we were looking for. I particularly liked the low angles when the girls are dancing, where we can see their sexy heels and fast-moving dancing feet. The colours are all very orangey and gold which creates a great atmosphere. I was in Mocado last night and it's absolutely beautiful and the lighting is very orange and has pink fairy lights everywhere so we could create a similar atmosphere. I also loved the trumpets in this video, it'd be great if we incorporated some instruments as it would make the 'night out' look much more live and exciting. I also thought the extremely fast-paced, flashing, editing at the end would be a great effect for our video as it would allow us to repeat shots to almost 'sum-up' the party, and would make the video look much more professional and againg just more lively and fun.