Data-driven Attribution In Your Area: Strategies for your Industry | PART 1 of 4
White Paper | Authors: Catherine Candano Google, June Cheung Oracle Advertising and CX, Rupesh Kumar Carat Media, Tara Crosby Twitch, Vidyarth Eluppai Srivatsan The Coca-Cola Company
What Do K-Pop and Data-driven Attribution have in common?
Let’s indulge ourselves shall we and fast forward into the future. We take ourselves to a time when travel, live music and maskless dancing is a thing. Introducing our key characters, Jessica and Josh. Jessica has surprised her dear friend Josh with the most coveted tickets in the land, BLACKPINK LIVE - IRL.
After some delicious pre-drinks and dinner, Jess and Josh pile into the stadium, happily melding into the large crowd, to find their not-so-great but nevertheless expensive seats. Eagerly waiting for their K-Pop idols to kick-off the show.
And as the lights go down, and the fireworks start to the beat of ‘DDU-DU-DDU-DU’. I hear you all ask, but what has this got to do with attribution?
Well, for those who may not know the ins-and-outs of K-pop, the fabulous ladies of BLACKPINK did not just happen upon their fame and fortune. They have been cleverly crafted and trained to deliver the best possible performance for their company, YG Entertainment. This preparation included close to 6 years in training and a permanent move from New Zealand to Korea, for the main rapper in BLACKPINK, Jeenie. BLACKPINK was certainly no happy accident of success.
As marketers, we must now think about ourselves as band managers, crafting and curating our corporate performers for success. In this series we’ll share how to use data to guide our performance capabilities through the competitive environments, especially for keeping music lovers’ attention despite the many distracting choices online, and emerging patterns of music consumption on digital!
Ever wonder why the same strategies don’t yield the same business performance? Why some bands make it and others are destined for greatness only known in their garage band practices?
We know that one of the biggest adjustments companies have had to make in the past 12 months is figuring out how to match their business operations with the shift of consumer journeys from offline to online, caused by decreased physical mobility during the pandemic. As a result, digital customers are more demanding, expecting personal experiences with brands, anticipating new ways of being engaged. In this age where users’ expectations are high and attention is limited, there is increasing opportunity for marketers to be strategic about orchestrating a concerted marketing strategy – imagine you are manager of the band looking to win the audience’s attention.
As manager you target high performance (and consistent improvement) of all the band members. A great manager will serve many roles: technical supporter, motivator, leader, psychologist, make-up artist, choreographer and maybe most importantly, as a role model inside and outside the arena. Experienced managers will understand their various members’ roles in the program to ‘capture the hearts and minds of the audience’.
As the manager you must understand how digital channels in your brand play to win! A chart topping record is the conversion we are aiming for in our marketing activities!
What conversion are you optimizing for?
A good manager also knows that setting the right goals keeps everyone motivated and on track to deliver the performance of their life!
But one good performance will not make you the global phenomenon that is BLACKPINK. And it’s not just about a star performer either. Years of training has led up to this performance, numerous teams and stakeholders are involved, it’s a highly choreographed moment both on and off the stage. Backed by data-led insights that drive the best possible output for the record label.
Let’s put this into perspective with an example. If you are Jess and Josh, sitting in the audience watching BLACKPINK, your assumption is that Rose - who is arguably the lead singer - will be the star of the show. Expecting the lead singer to be the source of all of the hits on the night and to hog the spotlight. This is last click digital attribution - when you overly assume credit goes to the last touchpoint among your bandmates.
However, YG Entertainment has done a good job of investing in all of the stars of BLACKPINK and support teams to ensure every gig goes off without a hitch. And even BLACKPINK know that their success rides on all their support teams being carefully organised and highly efficient for each and every performance.
Understanding that the last touchpoint isn’t solely to be credited for the standing ovation, but rather the total of the various interactions of the entire band and support staff in the build-up to make this happen. This is multi-touch attribution!
A standing ovation isn’t just about who sings the lead vocals in the track, it’s about a team performance and the strategies that got you there! The sound and lighting, the costumes, the hair, the makeup, the props, the dancers, the pyrotechnics, the list goes on.
And lastly the most popular band in the world can never rest on their laurels. There is always another new band on the horizon and there is nothing worse than being yesterday’s news. BLACKPINK needs to keep their eyes on the prize, more hits, more world class performances, more social media stardom with enhancements and improvements every single day. We must get stronger over the course of time.
As marketers it’s our responsibility to strive for continuous improvement. Optimisation, review, testing and learning are vital to staying on top of the charts.
You can’t keep using the same old playbook, you must optimise and continually invent, to keep things moving.
Finally a good manager must also look at what’s going on outside of their band, what are the variables that can shift and changes that might be outside of their control? What tools do we have to cope with this change?
Music tastes change, new artists and bands around the world attract attention, the world goes into a global pandemic and all live music stops. Identifying these changes early, adapting and re-inventing is essential for stability and even benefit the long term outcomes for the brand.
In the case of BLACKPINK; YG entertainment had to pivot quickly, adjusting their channels for revenue and focusing on the breadth of the global audience through new virtual experiences with their stars. On NYE 2021 BLACKPINK performed a LIVESTREAM concert, where audiences purchased digital passes to join the concert, regardless of their location or the restrictions or any other factors that might otherwise limit the audience.
Whilst the band managers of BLACKPINK cannot control what’s going on globally they can incorporate these changes into their plans and adapt and improve their results for the future. This is marketing mix modeling - forecasting into their business model (or MMM) at it’s best!
So, what do BLACKPINK and Digital Data Attribution have in common? A dynamic band manager who looks at data to understand how the band members individual and interdependent performance on stage can help them shine collectively (multi-touch attribution). Then zooming out and factoring in external forces like pandemic forecast data to incorporate and optimize for the best show IRL or livestream (marketing media modelling)!
Now let’s get back to the show, as Jess and Josh enjoy every second of the new normal and the greatest ever band, BLACKPINK.
