How effective is the combination of your main product and ancillary texts?Shafaah Jaber

What is a brand?

A brand is something that an audience will automatically link to a product/project. A brand can something a long the lines of a slogan or a logo. A brand not gives the item familiarity, it also gives it a personality of its own allowing it to be recognised for its own unique qualities.

Examples of famous brands are Twinnings and Apple. Though each brand is very different from the other audiences and consumers instantly link Twinnings to their delicious teas and Apple to their brilliant computers, mp3 players, mobile phones etc.

Phillip Kotler once said that a brand is “a sellers promise to deliver a specific set of features, benefits and service” the idea that he is trying to get across is that a brand is familiar and sticks to what it knows best, so to speak. For example Kenco the coffee manufacturers wouldn’t suddenly start making teas or hot chocolates. In other words a brand won’t change due to the loyalty of It’s customers/ fan base.

Branding within the music industry is very similar to the branding of products in the sense that the artist’s image is what associates the fan to them. The artists brand image can be anything from the way they dress, the morals they convey or even their hair style/ colour. For example Lady Gaga’s brand image would be Quirky, Ostentatious and Unique. Whilst Dame Shirley Bassey’s would be Elegant, Classy and Understated.

Chosen brand image

Whilst deciding what brand image we wanted to convey, Jenna and I decided to research artists of the genres which we were hoping to imitate.

Katy B- Lights On

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJNXXuAxkfk

We looked at Katy b’s music video because her brand image and music genre tied in with the fresh British artist approach we were going for. We specifically chose Katy B because she still managed to maintain her femininity whilst performing within a male dominated music genre.

Mylie Cyrus- 7 Things

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hr0Wv5DJhuk

Mylie Cyrus was our second choice since she is a typical toned down pop princess. We liked this music video simply for the fact that it is a performance based music video which focused solely on the artist and band.

We chose to mix the two genres of pop and grime creating a whole new hybrid genre that takes aspects of both the British grime and American pop scenes.

What is your brand image?In the end we decided that our artists brand image would be Urban, Down to Earth, Pop. We chose this image because most female pop artists are over the top and girly whilst female grime artist are very masculine and ‘gangster’. With our artist Aleeza we had to find the perfect balance so that she would easily fit into both genres whilst retaining her femininity and strong willed independence that makes her the artist that she is.

In this image our artist is seen wearing a floaty blue dress which accentuates her femininity whilst her ruffled hair and sunglasses give her a urban edge

This first image is very different to the first. The artist is seen here holding a vodka bottled whilst slumped against the wall in her drunken stupor. Although this image is very urban and slightly down to earth the fact that she possesses the qualities of a typical teenager, the odd socks and clear skin have helped our artist retain her naivety so that she is still firmly within the pop genre.

How have you constructed a sense of brand identity using media language?The first word to describe our artist is Urban, we have portrayed this through the simple black brick wall in which our artist is leaning against during the chorus. Also he vodka bottle she is holding throughout the video shows her to be a realistic person who doesn’t care what people think of her.

This element of the brand image worked since the audience feedback shows that many people liked the simplicity of the backdrop.

Our second brand image word is down to earth. We portrayed that through the way the artist acted throughout the music video and through her costume. The opening of the music video shows her rising up after sleeping on the floor, this shows that she is up for partying and doesn’t really care where she ends up as long as she had a good time. The costume we chose for our artist was mainly tshirts, denim shorts and most importantly odd socks. This choice of costume gives a her a childish air yet it shows that she is very relaxed in how she dresses.

The third word in our brand image is pop. Although it is very different to the other words we have chosen to describe our artist, pop is probably the simplest to convey. We did this through the use of a sleeker hair style, short dress and high heels and bubble gum pink backdrop. These elements allowed us to remind our audience that although our artist is simple and edgy she is still girly in an understated way.

Ancillary Tasks

The ancillary task definitely follows the same brand image of our music video. We made sure it matched by using the same mise-en-scene, the outfits, bubble gum pink, blacks and sunglasses. The main thing that we watched to match was the simplicity that we were conveying through out the music video. Simplicity showed that our artist is very down to earth, and by constantly conveying this brand image we were able to imprint it within the audiences’ memories of Aleeza.

The different shades of pink allowed Aleeza to still be feminine whilst standing out as a strong person. The third album insert is what I believe screams out Aleeza’s brand image. She’s laughing into the camera whilst wearing a pretty deep blue dress with her hand placed on her hip in a very strong yet relaxed pose.