LAUNCH SHOWS SOME MRAZ-MATAZZ

The folks at LAUNCH say they not only monopolize the online music sphere, grabbing over half the time spent on music sites, but that they’re taking the lead in breaking artists. Dave Goldberg, LAUNCH founder and VP/GM of Music at parent company Yahoo, submits for your consideration Elektra’s Jason Mraz.

"This is the first time we said up front, ‘We are going to be the primary driver in taking this artist to the next level—we’re going to guarantee this,’" Goldberg says. "And we did it."

The potential appeal of Mraz’s single, "The Remedy," for adult audiences was clear from the outset. But Goldberg and VP Marketing & Promotion Jay Frank, who have been on the record since December but focused their efforts in a month-long promotion in May, say they helped expand the record’s listenership radically.

Between its radio and audio players, Yahoo’s information pages and instant feedback from its users, they assert, LAUNCH served both as a vehicle to push and brand Mraz as an artist and as an engine to measure audience response with speed and precision.

The effort reached an audience of some 1.8 million users per week "His sales are up 40% since the campaign started," Goldberg notes. Mraz has sold about 180k OTC.

Going through sales figures, Frank notes, "we found numbers double where there was little airplay," thanks to LAUNCH’s multi-tiered efforts. Furthermore, while Mraz already appealed to an older female demo, "within a week interest among teen females doubled; by the end of the campaign, he was a Top 30 artist for them."

"As we found people who liked the single being pushed," Frank adds, "we took a couple of extra tracks and pushed them to people—hopefully convincing them they should purchase."

Elektra GM Greg Thompson credits "a combination of the enthusiasm of the LAUNCH staff and their unique relationship with a very specific consumer. LAUNCH made the audience feel they needed to know Jason Mraz—who he is and what he represents. The staff at Elektra had already laid a great underlying foundation and strategically built the album.

"This was an artist that sonically seemed to appeal to the adult audience, and we needed an extra element to awaken the youth culture to his immense talent," adds Thompson. "LAUNCH, with its impeccable timing and ability to connect to that younger demographic, provided us with that element. They were able to pinpoint a demo that was being teased, accelerate the process and ensure success."

"A lot of times, we’ve not been good about taking credit for what we’ve done," Goldberg avers. "This is the start of something we’re going to be doing on a regular basis—we’re going to show the impact. The industry has been focused on the Net as either a source of piracy or a way to sell CDs," he ventures. "But a huge base has emerged here in the last year that’s proving a huge force in breaking new music. This is our coming-out party—this is a whole new avenue for the industry to break music."