Why Pink Floyd "Viral" Campaign

[bigV]

As much as I like those vids, I think that they are too obscure to be interesting to a general audience. I mean, clocks in the sky? A bunch of hospital beds in front of Golden Gate? An average viewer would have to ask an inevitable WTF?! They should have probably stuck with the pig, flying by landmarks in countries they see as primary market for their product, but even that would be too obscure for people who haven't been in touch with Pink Floyd before, and creating a marketing campaign only for people who already know what's it all about could be a little bit counterproductive.

Which leads on to the question: who's going to be buying those new CDs? Newbies or the more hardcore Pink Floyd fans?

Hopefully both.

I don't think the vids are obscure. These are memorable Pink Floyd images AND sounds. Besides, this is (hopefully!) only one of the stages of the marketing campaign. And as marketing campaigns go, this is a good one.

V.

[nosaj]

All talk of "viral" aside...I am in marketing and communications, and I think some of the comments above cover my thoughts...

As far as charts and re-issues, I believe a re-issue can sell enough and be measured by the main "charts", but also, if a re-issue does not make the "charts", there are some re-issue "charts" out there...but, who cares about charts?

[bigV]

All talk of "viral" aside...I am in marketing and communications, and I think some of the comments above cover my thoughts...

As far as charts and re-issues, I believe a re-issue can sell enough and be measured by the main "charts", but also, if a re-issue does not make the "charts", there are some re-issue "charts" out there...but, who cares about charts?

Which comments? Mine?

V.

[Idisaffect]

who cares about charts?

People in marketing.

[Hudini]

Which leads on to the question: who's going to be buying those new CDs? Newbies or the more hardcore Pink Floyd fans?

I think that each type of new sets has its own target group. But I don't think this campaign shows it well enough.

[Jack Wolf]

I don't think new or casual fans are gonna throw that much money away in purchasing the immersion sets.
They'll probably go for the experience sets or just get the albums themselves. Someone has to already love the music enough to put down $120+ for an immersion set.

But if this marketing campaign is a huge success, then I think other bands like Led Zeppelin, Rolling Stones, etc, may follow suit.

[nosaj]

who cares about charts?

People in marketing.

Ha, ha, you crack me up. I studied art, not marcom...I need to make a buck. Besides, I call it propaganda.

As far as these "videos" go, I am probably not much of a target audience...

[Keith Jordan]

Germany

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5uHGPHCXwo

[Hudini]

I don't think new or casual fans are gonna throw that much money away in purchasing the immersion sets.

That's just what I'm talking about. Newbies will go for the Discovery sets, casual fans will go for Experience sets (since they feature the most popular albums with a handful of outtakes and similar stuff), die hard fans will go for Immersion sets. Each set has its own target audience. But, the marketing campaign doesn't make that clear well enough, and thus is quite ineffective.

But if this marketing campaign is a huge success, then I think other bands like Led Zeppelin, Rolling Stones, etc, may follow suit.

I don't think so. Not because those other bands wouldn't do that, it's just because they probably wouldn't have that much to offer. Pink Floyd, at least throughout the 60s and the first half of 70s, have been quite a proliferous band, with much of their studio efforts never seeing the light of day on an official release, while they spent the second half of 70s practically hiding in plain sight, with such strict recording policies that to this day there are no officially released live recordings from that era. Pink Floyd still have too much things left somewhere in their vaults yet to see the light of day, unlike Led Zep, whose dead cow has been milked to ashes long ago, or the Stones, whose original albums include all kinds of songs, most of it the like of which Pink Floyd would never even consider recording professionally, and it's highly speculative if there's anything left that the world would really like to hear from them today.

[Keith Jordan]

Santiago...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4G_I9mN5CsI

[Keith Jordan]

Brussels....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEqPUG8uRAc

[Hudini]

Going a bit senile, boss? You've already posted these two.

[Keith Jordan]

Going a bit senile, boss? You've already posted these two.

It would seem that way! I blame Pink Floyd for first posting them under a different user account and then using their official one! Perhaps it is all a part of the viral conspiracy which is not on the same level as Publius Enigma!

[snifferdog]

All I want to know is will there be some Dogs of War in these videos

[Idisaffect]

Ha, ha, you crack me up. I studied art, not marcom...I need to make a buck.

If only we could eat art.

Well, sometimes we can.......