Case Story: Crashes $tuff Versus Love Music Video & Single Release Campaign
The Brief
Crashes commissioned me to produce a video to promote their new single: $tuff Versus Love.
The brief was to produce something that emulated a classic 90s band VHS and ‘’found footage’’ vibe, to create something that reflected the poppy, fun feeling of the song’s music while remaining in contrast to the existential crisis of the lyrics.
Due to unforeseen circumstances, the video brief was only delivered 72 hours before the single launch leaving a tight schedule to shoot and edit the video.
The Execution
Having worked closely with Crashes since their inception, I had an archive of live and candid footage of the band which formed the basis for the video. This was then combined with some self-shot footage the band supplied from their Christmas night out and a brief additional hour long shoot with two of the band members for additional b-reel.
To create the VHS vibe, the video was edited in a 4:5 aspect ratio, RGB split and treated with VHS effect overlays and sound effects to create the illusion of the video being a VHS full of clips being watched back.
The Results
The video was launched on both social media and YouTube simultaneously. This let the band drive traffic to YouTube as well as take advantage of native video functions on Facebook and Instagram to reduce friction between listeners seeing the video on social and being able to watch it without needing to click off the platform.
A small ad budget was allocated to promote the video to Crashes audience, and specifically anyone who had watched over 25%+ of the band’s previous videos.
This ensured that all paid advertising was targeted at warm leads, who in turn generated authentic word of mouth by sharing, liking or commenting on the video helping it spread into new user’s feeds. Allowing the band to strategically allocate their budget to enhance genuine buzz, instead of wasting funds trying to generate new listeners among an audience unaware of the band.
Across the weekend of the single’s release the video reached over 10,000 people, generated a combined over 551 reactions, comments and shares and for every £0.01 the band spent a user either watched the video or performed a valuable action such as a like, comment or share.
The campaign also achieved a Cost Per 1,000 impressions (CPM) of under £3, and a unqiue Click Through Rate (CTR) of over 12%, well above the 2-3% average.
To date the video has 164 likes, 64 shares, 21 comments and has close to 5k views on Facebook alone and saw the band’s audience increase by 68 likes during the first weekend of release.
