Challenge
Augmented reality has been an increasingly popular feature of advertising campaigns recently but it has never before been used in conjunction with the release of a new single. Island Records decided the release of rapper Devlin’s latest single featuring Ed Sheeran was the perfect opportunity to use augmented reality. The track, Watchtower, has been produced by rapper Labrinth and includes the chorus of Bob Dylan’s track All Along The Watchtower. The aim for Island Records by teaming up with Aurasma was to gives fans extra content and drive sales for the single from the downloaded content.
Insight
In recent years digital downloads have outsold physical music sales and augmented reality is the next step according to Aurasma. It is a new way for music artists to offer their fans new releases and showcase their music.
Solution
The release of Devlin’s new song was the first music single release to use an augmented reality app, which gives fans access to video content and downloads. The campaign used 2,000 outdoor ads which could be scanned using a smartphone to reveal the video for the new single.
The campaign was powered by the Aurasma smartphone app and gave fans access to exclusive scenes from the music video and the ability to click to download the track directly from the outdoor ad. To try out the AR feature, fans can download the free Aurasma app from the Apple App Store or Google Play Store and then find one of the posters.
The outdoor ads became a virtual gig space for fans, music fans with IOS or Android Smartphones were able to scan the poster and have Devlin ‘perform’ for them at one of the outdoor ads across the country.
The song was available to download via 2,000 augmented reality posters ahead of the single release in shops and online from the 19th August. Fans were also able to pre-order the single through the posters and app.
Results
A teaser of the music video has already been watched 1 million times on YouTube. Full results to follow.