Wavo is Helping Artists Reach Millions of New Fans on YouTube
/Wavo is a digital marketing platform and agency that specifically caters to music & culture. Wavo hosts the world’s largest remix and DJ competition platform; current clients include Warner Music Group, Universal Music Group, SFX, Armada, Ultra and more. Wavo also runs wavo.me/boost — the native advertising network for arts & culture.
Despite the growing presence of streaming platforms like Spotify and SoundCloud, YouTube still represents the largest on-demand music service, boasting over 172 billion streams last year. Because of it’s huge size, reach, and ability to encourage video virality, YouTube is arguably still the best promotional platform for musicians.
TrueView is Google’s advertising tool for Youtube, and it’s built on the unique promise that you only pay when someone chooses to watch your video ad.
One of the most popular formats utilized by users in TrueView advertising — and the one we’ll focus on in this case study — are in-stream ads. In-stream advertisements play before or during the primary video. Users can skip the ad after five seconds, but you're only charged when they watch 30 seconds or more, or perform an action (like clicking through to your full video). As a result, TrueView ensures that you pay exclusively for engaged users. Mix this with the ability to set your own maximum bid per view (CPV) and you've got an incredibly cost-efficient model.
“With the right targeting and testing you can get plays from an audience that cares about your music, for cents on the dollar.” -- Conor Clarke, Wavo.me CEO
In this case study, we’ll discuss how we worked with electronic duo DVBBS, to get over a million plays for one of their latest singles, “Ur On My Mind.” By utilizing TrueView targeting that appealed to dedicated dance music fans, Wavo was able to help kickstart the natural virality of the track’s new music video.
Client: DVBBS
DVBBS is a Canadian electronic duo consisting of brothers Chris Chronicles and Alex Andre. The group first gained recognition for their 2013 hit “Tsumani, ” which they created in collaboration with DJ and producer Borgeous. They have since released a number of popular singles over 2015 and 2016, and have played sets at some of the world's biggest festivals, including Tomorrowland, Ultra Miami, and Creamfields.
Campaign
DVBBS and their management team at Strvctvre, approached Wavo in August of 2016 to develop a promotional campaign for the duo’s new single, “Ur On My Mind.” Wavo tailored a YouTube campaign for DVBBS that aimed at targeting the group’s existing fans, as well as other engaged EDM listeners who were likely to exhibit interest in the track.
By the end of the campaign, Wavo had helped to drive over a million views from engaged fans to DVBB’s new video.
Utilizing TrueView Targeting
“The ability to track the exact number of times a micro-targeted audience watches a commercial all the way through is nothing short of the holy grail for brands.” — John McIntyre for MediaPost
Wavo works closely with our clients, pairing YouTube placements with the artist’s target demographic, in order to ensure that we reach only the most receptive and engaged audiences. Wavo currently has a 40–50% view rate on our campaigns, meaning that almost half of our audience chooses not to skip our pre-rolled, in-stream advertisements.
At Wavo we employ a multifaceted approach to targeting that includes a combination of some of the following strategies:
Interest and topic targeting: Picking from available audience categories to reach consumers who have interests relevant to the promoted material.
Placement targeting: Targeting relevant artists and playlists on Youtube, as well websites and apps that show Youtube videos. At Wavo, we’re constantly curating our list of partner artist, label, and playlist channels, in order to target the most receptive Youtube users, on channels with similar content. Placement targeting is key because ultimately, the most successful advertisements are those which target the most interested users as they’re looking for related material.
An sample of a typical list of channels we might target a song… In this case we’re targeting Indie Electronic fans (Note: this is not the actual DVBBS dashboard)
Video Re-Marketing: Re-marketing to fans who have done the following YouTube-related actions:
- Have watched any of our videos
- Have taken action (like, dislike, comment, or share) on any of our videos
- Have viewed our video as a TrueView advertisement
- Have visited or subscribed to your YouTube channel
Re-Marketing helps to ensure your fan base keeps up-to-date with new material. These are the people you already know due to their prior actions, and as they’re most likely to engage, it’s important to target them first. Having users like, comment, and share your track is key to generating virality. Baring this in mind, you may also want to set a higher cost-per-view bid to ensure you reach this crucial demographic.
Similar Watched Videos: Targeting users with profiles similar to those who watch your videos. The list size can be 10x your original re-marketing list, and yet still be very effective and inexpensive, enabling you to grow your re-marketing list and views quickly.
Email Re-targeting: Serving ads to individuals included on an email database. This is great for targeting specific sets of people you want to reach — like say a radio DJ or writer at a magazine — that you want to cover you. For DVBBS campaign, we targeted relevant and specific media and industry lists.
Pixel re-marketing: Includes the integration of code that tracks consumer behaviour on the web, allowing companies to place relevant advertisements on the sites a user visits. Wavo generates millions of pixels a day through our advertising services. We then use these pixels to re-target high-value, segmented music fans.
Over the course of the campaign, our in-stream advertisement for “Ur On My Mind,” was served 1.5 million times, and generated over a million views. Each interaction served to connect individuals to either a promotional video, or the track’s new music video, where they were invited to like, share, and comment.
Google’s TrueView has arguably become the cheapest and most effective means of promoting new music, as it allows artists to connect with their core fan-base, as well as engage potential new listeners. Even large-scale acts, who are used to racking up millions of hits on their videos, can benefit from utilizing Youtube’s advanced targeting capabilities.
The official music video for "Ur On My Mind"
Wavo's team combines experiences in music, arts, fashion, and the traditional creative industries, with an expertise in data analysis, advanced analytics, and marketing. We've developed a great understanding of digital marketing as it pertains to the music industry, and are thus able ensure we to deliver the right views from the right audiences. Ultimately, whether it’s getting a million views on Youtube, reaching #1 on the charts, or promoting a world-tour, our dedicated team of music specialists will work to ensure your advertising campaign is set for success.
Wavo has since run several more campaigns with DVBBS, helping them to rack up a total of 4 million YouTube views, across a number of promotional videos.
Since their debut with "Tsumani"-- which has racked up almost 100,000,000 Spotify streams-- DVBBS has worked with a number of industry stars, including Tiesto, NERVO, Steve Aoki, and DJ Snake. The duo released their latest single, “Not Going Home,” ft. Gia Koka, on November 18th. Their highly anticipated Beautiful Disaster EP is set to arrive on December 2nd.