How Lil Nas X is Changing the Face of Music through Digital Marketing

Lil Nas X is no stranger to being in the spotlight. His viral hit Old Town Road started out as a satirical song made for his Twitter following, where he was known more so for being an account that posted memes and other joke content for his audience. Just as everyone would expect for a song that was originally intended to serve a smaller audience, Old Town Road became the longest-running number one hit in US chart history. His first studio project lease, entitled ‘7 EP’, performed very well with his subsequent single Panini amassing over 500 million streams on Spotify to date.

While there are countless examples of artists seemingly blowing up overnight before fading back into obscurity, Lil Nas X seems to be here to stay in large part due to his virtual presence. He is incredibly active on Twitter and posts clever, self-deprecating tweets that increase his follower base even for those who don’t particularly like his music.

However, the focus of this article is going to be related to his promotional tactics for his latest single ‘HOLIDAY’. The music video for the song was recently released, and features Lil Nas X as Santa in a futuristic holiday season. Like the rest of his music and content overall, the creativity and obscurity of the concept shows how he doesn’t take himself too seriously and understands that his strength lies within his persona.

This past weekend, Lil Nas X partnered with online multiplayer game Roblox to host a virtual concert across four different time-slots. This format emulated Travis Scott’s concert on Fortnite back in April. I find it fascinating that game developers and musicians alike are just thinking of this concept as Lil Nas X drew north of 33 million viewers across the four shows and made him trend worldwide on Twitter. He has jokingly referred to how he has switched from being “Old Town Road guy” to “Roblox guy”, which led to a barrage of jokes from fans and cynics alike which boosted the fanfare surrounding his new single to an astronomical level. He retweeted several of these jokes, which further shows how his humour and self-confidence allow him to market like no other artist can.

While this was the main event he partook in, Lil Nas X also appeared in a James Charles video where he got his make-up done to match his character in the Holiday music video. This was another savvy move by the young artist, as James Charles’ reach on social media is near the top of the list among modern internet personalities.

On top of this, he shot some scenes for the music video outside a Starbucks in Hollywood. While he was there, he purchased all patrons Peppermint Frappuccino’s to further embrace the holiday spirit he is trying to invoke within his new single.

Holiday is already within the top 20 in the United States less than 2 weeks after release, and Lil Nas X is continuing to roll out unique digital marketing efforts on nearly a daily basis. There is no reason to believe he won’t soon have another Top 10 hit under his belt in the coming weeks, and other artists and aspiring influencers should take note of how much personality and portraying your genuine self can attract the perfect target audience for yourself.

LINKS

Twitter: https://twitter.com/LilNasX

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lilnasx/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_uMv3bNXwapHl8Dzf2p01Q/featured