Why has advertising song marketing become so popular?

Speaking of the two most popular songs on the Internet in the past month, they must be:

"You love me, I love you, Mixue Ice City is sweet."

"Super idol's smile is not as sweet as yours, and the sunshine at noon in August is not as dazzling as you."

These two songs, one is the theme song of Mixue Bingcheng, and the other is the advertising song of Watsons distilled water. Honestly speaking, due to their different styles, although they are both very popular, as an outsider of the music circle, I find it difficult to tell which one is better.

So this article is not about discussing its creation, but about the brand's song marketing. The reason why these two songs are mentioned is because they are highly comparable - first, they have swept Tik Tok and Bilibili, and have been cited as bgm or secondary creation in countless videos; second, both songs have been on the bench for more than a year.

Let me first state my conclusion. From a brand marketing perspective, Mixue Bingcheng clearly wins over Watsons.

Disclaimer: The entire article is subjective and based on personal feelings. Different opinions are welcome.

Reminder: The following content is all related to the brand, not simply about the song.

1. Reasons for choosing Mixue Ice City

It is not me who wins, but the result that decides who wins. It can be divided into three aspects:

1. Brand Voice

1) Online

• Douyin: The number of related videos on Mixue Bingcheng’s official account is over 300,000. As for Watsons’ official Weibo account, I searched for a while but couldn’t find any videos of related songs. However, the number of views of the official Weibo videos is basically within 10,000.
• Bilibili: The number of views of Mixue Bingcheng’s official Weibo account is over one million, and the highest of Watsons’ is 400,000.

2) Offline

• From my personal experience, I only found out by chance that "Love You at 105°C" is the advertising song for Watsons distilled water. I asked everyone around me and no one knew (including heavy TikTok users).
• Due to the epidemic, I cannot personally experience the offline supermarket dissemination, but as far as I know, some offline parts of Mixue Bingcheng are carrying out brainwashing cycles.

2. Brand awareness

Judging from the audience, "Love You 105°C" is most often cited by celebrity fans due to the characteristics of its lyrics, and then expanded to animation, film and television, and even funny secondary creations.

Mixue uses the advantages of its offline stores to brainwash people with its sweet message. The crowd differentiation is not particularly obvious, and the "earthy" and "magical" bgm can attract a wider range of people than 105°C.

From the perspective of associative cognition, as I said before, Watsons is quite lacking in this regard. (Before I knew the truth, I was still wondering why the lyrics "drops of pure distilled water" were used as a metaphor).

The associated advantage of "Sweet Honey" is that he incorporated the brand name into the lyrics, and it is an important part of the climax, which is also the most popular part.

3. Brand benefits

Since I am not an insider and do not understand RO indicators such as initial investment, I simply look at sales volume. Because the two offline stores have stronger attributes, it is impossible to count sales volume. Just looking at the online sharing, the number of people visiting Mixue Bingcheng store has increased significantly (the content in my circle of friends exceeds the limit), while Watsons Distilled Water has basically no such increase, and its stores have not seen much store visiting sharing due to the song.

2. Current Status of Advertising Song Marketing

1. Mainstream approach

There are currently two types of song marketing.

The first is to promote singers: invite popular stars, the songs they collaborate on are average, and they mainly focus on the influence of the stars.

The second is to promote songs: focusing on hip-hop and rap. Usually the budget is limited, and they hope to "get lucky" by making the songs catchy and interesting.

2. Music Market Background

As far as I know, there are still many problems and loopholes in the music market. The rights of many musicians, especially those who create music, are difficult to protect, and it may be difficult for them to survive. If brands can give reasonable freedom to creators, and creators maintain an open and positive attitude towards collaborating on advertising songs, to a certain extent, customized music can not only provide musicians with a way to generate income and even break out of the circle, but brands can also obtain good works and returns from it. This will be a positive cycle and will allow more "brand musician co-created songs" to enter the market.

3. Reference Practices

Based on the above current situation and the example of Mixue Bingcheng, I would like to summarize and share my views.

1. Objectives

It’s not about “how many people do I want to comment and forward?” This is the expectation at the detail level. Here you can understand it as part of the strategy. Generally, it is necessary to formulate a comprehensive plan based on your brand, your user group, market environment, and competitors, and this goal must be rewarding.

No matter what you do, the goal is the starting point. What role do you want this song to play in marketing? You must first think clearly about what this advertising song serves and what level it focuses on? There are some “virtual” things in marketing, but if this “virtual” thing cannot be put into practice and no effect can be seen, then it is a failure.

2. Content

Advertising songs still fall into the category of content marketing. From a branding perspective, if you want to expand public awareness, then don’t look for the tone from public tastes. Of course, this tone cannot be too far away from the brand image.

On the other hand, due to the distortion and distortion of communication in the information age, brands should consider the presence of brand information in song communication. For example, Watsons’ distilled water, although officially recognized, is not very effective. Therefore, the appropriateness and effectiveness of brand placement is a point to pay attention to - it should not make people feel that it is too marketing-oriented, but the brand should not be buried in the song.

3. Acceptance/implementation

This undertaking is mainly aimed at users and products.

Once an advertising song is released, what do you hope people who see it will do? People usually hope to have interactions on social media and have more "tap water". When it comes to user interaction, do you think of common operations such as “like, comment, forward, and share”?

But this is only the first layer. When I say it is the first layer, it doesn’t mean it is unimportant. These are the basis on social media, but it is highly correlated with the content (who sings, what to sing, and how it is). What I want to discuss more is the quotation and secondary creation of the advertising song later on.

I think Mixue Bingcheng has set an example in this regard.

• Upload different language versions of songs to give everyone more creative space
• Some offline stores have launched a "singing for milk tea" campaign, which has caused social discontent among some consumers, but the beneficiaries of the topic are the brands and other potential consumers.

The second point actually involves what is said in the goal, especially for product advertising songs, the issue of conversion must be taken into consideration. Although marketing results are difficult to control and predict, and there is a lot of waste, everyone should have heard about the dismal sales of Pechoin's legendary blockbuster.

My opinion is that it is better to use advertising songs for products with low barriers to entry, attractive points, strong shareability, public recognition and high brand association than simply talking about brand concepts. For example, distilled water. Although I know the song, I still have no interest in buying it at Watsons, because there is nothing good to share after buying it, and it doesn’t match the main product of Watsons as far as I know.

4. Communication strategy

Mixue Bingcheng mainly used the strategy of "surrounding the city from the countryside", opening up a new path that was different from the previous explosive product strategies.

• Rural areas: A large number of offline stores brainwash and repeat broadcasts
• City: The competitive online music market

In addition, although both songs have been on the bench for a long time, Mixue Bingcheng has actually done long-term preparations, including warm-up before the MV release, cooperation with KOL+KOC, and can effectively connect with the popular forms to promote more topics and UGC content.

On the other hand, Watsons is most likely being rehashed. Bilibili is still trying to take advantage of the popularity, but Douyin has hardly noticed it. In this regard, the internal Douyin team should learn from Bilibili.

Finally, share some thoughts:

First, we must understand the rules and reduce waste.

Second, manage expectations and don’t blindly pursue hot products. There is a template for the success of a hit product, but there are also unknown metaphysical factors.

Third, pay attention to wind direction and be flexible. In case your hidden treasure is dug out one day, be sure to take advantage of it and expand the topic.

The above is the content. After reading this article, you can go and listen to Sweetie and think about it.

Author: Attack of Ah Xin

Source: Attack of Ah-Xin