Project Concept
Q: What do you get when you cross Photoshop and fandom?
A: An inordinate amount of creative freedom, and potentially some pretty cool posters.
This project promoted the latest mini-album release from musical group Adventure Calling Emotions (A.C.E) in early fall of 2020. The goal was to produce digital and print-ready advertisements, and was conducted in partnership with A.C.E’s fandom, Choice.
Research
Data from an August 2020 survey of Choice was reviewed, and the following observations were made:
- Choice are primarily female, and are extremely diverse living all over the world. They are often multilingual.
- More than 30% of the fanbase has been involved in supporting A.C.E since 2017, and have strong brand loyalty. The vast majority of Choice are single, and aged 16–35. They typically have access to more liquid assets, but are extremely unwilling to pay high shipping costs.
This data was primarily sampled from native English speakers, and thus was not representative of the entire market; however, it served to better identify the kinds of users who would positively engage with the ads.
Ideate
As such, the development of promotional materials began. The plan evolved into compositing the following promotional photos into a movie-style poster.
This was important because:
- Image-first strategies widely appeal to younger audiences; and
- Having less text minimizes barriers to independent translation efforts.
Create
Ultimately, the final versions of the posters featured the album title The Butterfly Phantasy in its original Hanja (Chinese) form, and focused primarily on the photographic imagery elements from official promotions.
Although there was some variation by platform, this was the final, general-use digital poster:
Final Product
Twitter promotions for this project received over 42,000 impressions, and more than 12,000 engagements. The Bangkok promotions via Instagram had nearly 16,000 impressions, and meaningfully reached over 13,000 of those users.
Both existing and new users responded positively to the promotions. Although this project was only a small piece of the puzzle, it is with great enthusiasm that I can report the title track music video, Favorite Boys, reached 3 million views in 13 days — a new record for growth.
Next Steps
This project is also currently being used to develop mobile AR interactive promotional prototypes as a proof-of-concept for future promotions and analytics.
AR integration is an emerging solution in A.C.E’s industry, and will help them to stand apart from their peers. By adding extra interactivity, user engagement is expected to increase.
