Thoughts about Ayumi's Marketing Strategy

[bluegie]

I think she does care more about her albums... but avex cares more about her no. 1 single streak .

Originally Posted by Bashumaru

I think the reason shes still sticking to the formula is because it works, it got her to like her 3X numbers ones so why not keep doing it. If Ayu broke her number 1 single streak do you think she would be more experimental since she doesn't have the burden of it again?

OK.. well as long as her statue is here, she will not face major rivals. We've always discussed about it, that artists with a certain statue will have a safe week for them to continue getting no. 1. B'z, KinKi Kids, Mr. Children, ayu, etc. They have a long number 1 streaks. I guess music companies have silent agreements on that..

And since that's a fact, it's hard to ask ayu to knock off that formula then..

[Bashumaru]

Originally Posted by bluegie

I think she does care more about her albums... but avex cares more about her no. 1 single streak .



OK.. well as long as her statue is here, she will not face major rivals. We've always discussed about it, that artists with a certain statue will have a safe week for them to continue getting no. 1. B'z, KinKi Kids, Mr. Children, ayu, etc. They have a long number 1 streaks. I guess music companies have silent agreements on that..

And since that's a fact, it's hard to ask ayu to knock off that formula then..

I don't think there is such a thing because if that was true how come Utada doesn't have straight number ones, I'm pretty sure she has a statue too .

[Coelacanth]

Originally Posted by Bashumaru

If Ayu broke her number 1 single streak do you think she would be more experimental since she doesn't have the burden of it again?

I think Mirrorcle World is somewhat of an unsafe/experimental song to release as a single. However, since it's being marketed as a 10th anniversary single, it might not matter so much. I don't think avex would let Ayu pull another Bold&Delicious/Pride, especially since her streak is still going, and after the somewhat lower single sales of last year.

Personally, I don't find the #1 single streak that big of an achievement in the first place. Especially in the Japanese market, some weeks have little to no competition, and you know avex will be more inclined to pick that week. It's all ********.

[ayumisrael]

I actually miss to CREA's/ayu's compositions, her self composed songs were really excellent composed.

Originally Posted by Bashumaru

I think the reason shes still sticking to the formula is because it works, it got her to like her 3X numbers ones so why not keep doing it. If Ayu broke her number 1 single streak do you think she would be more experimental since she doesn't have the burden of it again?

I actually think that she cares more for her albums rather than the singles, and I didn't see her dying when she got #2 for GUILTY and broke her #1 studio albums streak, so I don't think it's the issue. Those streaks are more important to avex I suppose.

[cttncandy]

I honestly believe one of the reasons is because throughout the years Ayu has become more and more "diva-ish". I don't necessarily mean in her attitude, but in the way she presents herself. I feel like she has somehow become "unrelatable". People might miss that Ayu that wore simpler clothes. Her whole image has become very fake. It just feels like now she is just relying on pretty and glamorous, everything has become a big production, and I miss the Ayu that wasn't so involved in things like that. I mean there is barely a performance where she is not wearing some huge dress or an outfit. It would just be so nice and genuine to see her wearing a simple pair of jeans and some sneakers.

I know things like these might not seem like a big deal to some of you, but me for example, I don't really listen to the big flashy diva stars of my country- because I feel like I can't really relate to them. Their facade takes away from their music.

I've been with Ayu for a while and I know there is more to her than this, but for a casual listener, someone that's not a fan like we are here, this might simply be a huge huge turn off.

[ayumisrael]

Originally Posted by cttncandy

I honestly believe one of the reasons is because throughout the years Ayu has become more and more "diva-ish". I don't necessarily mean in her attitude, but in the way she presents herself. I feel like she has somehow become "unrelatable". People might miss that Ayu that wore simpler clothes. Her whole image has become very fake. It just feels like now she is just relying on pretty and glamorous, everything has become a big production, and I miss the Ayu that wasn't so involved in things like that. I mean there is barely a performance where she is not wearing some huge dress or an outfit. It would just be so nice and genuine to see her wearing a simple pair of jeans and some sneakers.

I know things like these might not seem like a big deal to some of you, but me for example, I don't really listen to the big flashy diva stars of my country- because I feel like I can't really relate to them. Their facade takes away from their music.

I've been with Ayu for a while and I know there is more to her than this, but for a casual listener, someone that's not a fan like we are here, this might simply be a huge huge turn off.

Though simple jeans and a t-shirt won't present the story she wants to tell in her lives. And she did always use pretty and glamorous clothes and dresses (an example is STADIUM TOUR's 2001 Endless sorrow performance, concert tour 2000 vogue dress, etc.)
I really think that the simple wearing should stay for the encore or else her concerts won't be as meaningful and big as they are, she would just be simply there with the same outfit and sing the whole show, which doesn't fit her.

I think that most of the problem is that she doesn't get any strong tie-ins anymore, period. She get panasonic consistently, and some not so helping tie-ins such as the kiwi cms, and that's all. Nothing like she had.

[cttncandy]

Originally Posted by ayumisrael

Though simple jeans and a t-shirt won't present the story she wants to tell in her lives. And she did always use pretty and glamorous clothes and dresses (an example is STADIUM TOUR's 2001 Endless sorrow performance, concert tour 2000 vogue dress, etc.)
I really think that the simple wearing should stay for the encore or else her concerts won't be as meaningful and big as they are, she would just be simply there with the same outfit and sing the whole show, which doesn't fit her.

I think that most of the problem is that she doesn't get any strong tie-ins anymore, period. She get panasonic consistently, and some not so helping tie-ins such as the kiwi cms, and that's all. Nothing like she had.

Concerts are a different story. I am talking about regular performances. Concerts are supposed to be big events its pretty much where an artist "pulls out all the stops".

[ayumisrael]

Originally Posted by cttncandy

Concerts are a different story. I am talking about regular performances. Concerts are supposed to be big events its pretty much where an artist "pulls out all the stops".

Well I was refering to the sentence "I mean there is barely a performance where she is not wearing some huge dress or an outfit. It would just be so nice and genuine to see her wearing a simple pair of jeans and some sneakers." =P

On other occasions like PV shoots or magazine shots she wears those dresses and a lot of glamorous diva-ish stuff as well. As long as she doesn't wear them for her casual normal life, I think it's fine.

[Melrose]

^

I agree. I despise Britney Spears, Madonna, etc. for their image. I prefer smaller artists -- ones that aren't popular in my surroundings. If I lived in Japan I probably wouldn't be a fan of Ayu, because I like original artists.. But I live in Europe and love her x 500 from here. She's one of my only 3 artists that I buy stuff from.

[ayumisrael]

I generally think that streaks (albums/singles) aren't something special anymore because of two reasons.

1. Most of the weeks the popular artists face no competitions (unless if it's each other or an unexpected smashing success from a release) both for albums and singles. A good example is last week's hikki's HEART STATION that outsold the 2nd place in like 380,000 copies or something the difference is ridiculous between the 1st and 2nd spots, it's so high!).
2. Most of the releases sales aren't high enough so the top 10>5 even the 4th and 3rd place aren't hard to get to anymore.

[GSC89]

Interesting replies =S.

You came to the conclusion that it is because of her PVs? Seriously?

She has alot of crappy PVs. The PVs actually have very little to do with why she became so sucessful.

3 simple things:

1.- Lyrics

2.- Fashion

3.- Tie-Ins

I really don't think it has anything to do with PVs. I can't say why she became popular necessarily, besides people just liking her music; but I can give some reasons that I've heard 1st hand from people in Japan as to why her popularity went down.

Well, the reason why I think that PVs are one of the most important factors in getting people to buy singles is because to be honest, other than tie-ins, it is the most common/effective way of getting people to buy the song.

In my perspective, no one is going to download (illegally) music from any random artist for no reason and claim that "Oh, that song sounds good, I'm going to buy the single".

I don't think that happens. I can't speak for others but I got to know of her songs through the PVs -.-. Vocals alone do not attract people to buy singles, I re-iterate, its the marketing =S.

Also the reason I concluded that Ayumi relies on PVs for marketing is that no other female artist matches her in terms of total costs of all her PV productions. If it wasn't a contributing factor, would Avex spend so much money on it?

On the Utada thing, Lyrics are also one of her stronges assets. Hikki doesn't has horrendous PVs like you say, some are even better than Ayu's. Also Hikki is very popular due to her fluent english/japanese, her mother was a popular singer aswell. Had good promotion fromt the start. And perhaps most importantly, she is like nothing else out there, making her a completly fresh and new artist since day 1.
The fact that FoL got insane sales could be because of many things: 1.- was her first real single after quite a while, making it a very anticipated song. 2.- was a good song 3.- had one of the best tie-ins in her entire career

You put your finger on the most important factor for the success of Hikki's songs. The tie-ins. As someone pointed out, Ayumi doesn't seem to get the tie-ins anymore, is Avex saving them for Kumi or other rising stars or are tie-ins not for the record company to decide? Does anyone know about this?

Yeah some. They aren't horrendous, they just have low budget and you can see that in most PVs hikki just totally isn't into the PV promoting stuff....

People hear of Hikki's songs primarily from the tie-ins, not the PVs, I'm sure her record company knows this, and will continue to play on the same marketing strategy.

The advantage with this marketing strategy(tie-ins) is that it doesn't weaken with age significantly compared to PVs where appearance/age will affect promotion alot.

But there is another theory I have...maybe it's Ayu's new recent style of music? Lately, her music has been more rock-involved and has taken on darker sounds to it, which if you look at her past sales on A BEST 2 -BLACK- (which is said to feature more dark songs than A BEST 2 -WHITE- that features the lighter and happy songs) there is a slight difference in the sales

Oh yeah. Failed to notice that -_-, I guess that could be one of the reasons.I suppose that with her lyrics getting more and more darker , young people probably find it harder to appreciate that sort of lyric style and adults are likely to have too much problems in their lives I don't think they would depress themselves further.

[Kikaru]

I think another factor that should be added is avex. Most artist at the latter point of the careers (unless they're like older and married or something or really really past their peaks) tend to release on a patterned schedule. Yes, songs like Glitter/July 1st/Fairyland/Blue Bird are poppy and repetitive, but the sales tend to be higher than the darker singles.

Personally I think while the numbers are declining, I think it's not a BAD number. Sure, she's not selling extremes, but it's a comfortable number.

I admit, I'm not a big fan of trance/pop stuff on Loveppears, and I really like the musical arrangement and rock-atmosphere in Guilty and Secret, so in some ways I can't relate to you guys.

And yes, there's the down-to-earth, perform in jeans and big fancy dress. But Ayu was never like that in the first place. Since Loveppears, she's always been a fashion icon. I really don't remember a tv performance with jeans and a t-shirt normally, unless you count the CDTV stuff at new years...

Edit: I just realized, when it comes down to it, everyone will decline -- every pop star will have their peak and every pop star will eventually fade away, or maybe selling less than they used to sale. I think really, there's no perfect marketing strategy because a single song is not going to be loved by everyone no matter what. I'm pretty sure even the Hikki people have complaints about her promotions and etc.

Which is why Avex needs to hire better marketing people. (JK JK) But it's the perks of being in business, because no business is ever going to be perfect.

[bluegie]

"hikki people..." such a weird phrase LOL.. you can simply say hikki fans .

Originally Posted by Bashumaru

I don't think there is such a thing because if that was true how come Utada doesn't have straight number ones, I'm pretty sure she has a statue too .

That is because hikki didn't have several consecutive no. 1s to make a streak. Automatic wasn't no. 1, Movin' on was, First Love wasn't, then 4 singles no. 1, broken by FINAL DISTANCE, then another five no. 1 singles, broken when Passion was released. Since then Toshiba never places hikki in a safe week for single release.

Let's see ayu... ok, from Free & Easy --> talkin' 2 myself, there are 17 consecutive no. 1s (correct me if i'm wrong). That is a long no. 1 streak among female artists. If she didn't release Daybreak then probly had 6 more no.1 consecutive singles (from M to Dearest... A song is born doesn't count cuz it's a duet). This is why avex (and probly to ayu herself) wanna save this streak as long as possible.

If you dun believe that, then look at KinKi Kids, and more specially, B'z. I'm sure placing KAT-TUN battling with them will definitely kill their streaks (average debut week for KAT-TUN was ~350K), as both KK and B'z selling less than 200K on the first week.

I have a feeling tho that ayu's no. 1 streak will be broken in about 2 yrs or so.. 100K on the first week is pretty much normal now. If ayu can still manage to sell over 100K on the first week, avex can manage to get a safe week for her... If her singles starting selling like crap (e.g., talkin' 2 myself), her streak will be broken at anytime..

[Bashumaru]

Originally Posted by bluegie

"hikki people..." such a weird phrase LOL.. you can simply say hikki fans .



That is because hikki didn't have several consecutive no. 1s to make a streak. Automatic wasn't no. 1, Movin' on was, First Love wasn't, then 4 singles no. 1, broken by FINAL DISTANCE, then another five no. 1 singles, broken when Passion was released. Since then Toshiba never places hikki in a safe week for single release.

Let's see ayu... ok, from Free & Easy --> talkin' 2 myself, there are 17 consecutive no. 1s (correct me if i'm wrong). That is a long no. 1 streak among female artists. If she didn't release Daybreak then probly had 6 more no.1 consecutive singles (from M to Dearest... A song is born doesn't count cuz it's a duet). This is why avex (and probly to ayu herself) wanna save this streak as long as possible.

If you dun believe that, then look at KinKi Kids, and more specially, B'z. I'm sure placing KAT-TUN battling with them will definitely kill their streaks (average debut week for KAT-TUN was ~350K), as both KK and B'z selling less than 200K on the first week.

I have a feeling tho that ayu's no. 1 streak will be broken in about 2 yrs or so.. 100K on the first week is pretty much normal now. If ayu can still manage to sell over 100K on the first week, avex can manage to get a safe week for her... If her singles starting selling like crap (e.g., talkin' 2 myself), her streak will be broken at anytime..

Lol I misread your original post XD, by statues your talking about streaks right? XD, when you said statue I thought you meant like something they're extremely well known for like Ayus #1 streak, Utadas 10 million selling album, B'z most records sold etc. and that would earn them a safe week , my bad.

[LacusClyne]

since we're on the topic of marketing, how many Ayu's songs are actually tie-in with dramas? i only know love~destiny is.

tie-in with dramas is actually a very strong way of promotion if the drama gets popular, i wonder why there isn't any for ayu?

[Ayumiko]

As a old fan of ayu...I was first attracted to her music. I started listening to her music without even knowing what she looked like back then. Each song was very different and I enjoyed and loved them all, despite the fact that sometimes I couldn't stand her high pitch voice. After I got hooked on to her music, I began to search more info on her and that's when I found out what she looked like from pics. To my surprise, she was very beautiful and I really liked her fashion styles...and then after that I began watching her pvs, reading her lyrics translations and so on...till now.

so for me it was:
1. her music/ lyrics
2. her fashion sense
3. pvs and concerts

Ayu changed alot over the past years...there are things I'm glad she changed and there are things I wished she didn't. Music wise, I love both her old and new songs but as much as I love her rock songs, I really miss her pop songs that she used to have a lot. The arrangements of the older songs are much better than the new ones. She really need new arrangers. She lacks unique bridges in her new songs...which songs like surreal has. I will have to agree that she's been playing it safe with her releases and even though I'm a big fan of hers, I'm getting a bit tired of releases like fairyland, bluebird, and glitter. Where are songs like unite! and inspire that she used to release in the summer time? In terms of ballads, ayu still have it in her. Together when... and untitled for her are one of my fav ayu ballads. Her vocals improved alot over the past years and I'm really glad she improved.

Pvs and concert wise...I think in the past 10 years she had good and bad pvs equally throughout her career. Concerts...her concerts are getting better in terms of production but she is slowly getting not as creative as before for her tracklist and performances (hopefully AT08 will be great!)

fashion...her fashion are becoming more and more harder to copy for normal ppl. Back in the days when she used to wear more casual clothes with accessories that you find cheap or expensive...there were alot of girls that could imitate her. Now her image is more divaish and her clothes are more name branded, more mature higher end fashion. Ayu had always been using the sexy image in her whole career...from the loveappears cover till now...but lately its kinda a little bit too much. Yes she is turning 30 and everything but I just feel like for someone like her, she doesn't need to do any of that. In AT07 until that day... performance, I didn't like the way she lets the male dancers touch her like that and mirrorcle world pv...the lingerie scenes was not necessary in my opinion. Sexy photoshoots for covers, magazines are ok for me but seeing it in motion kinda makes me think sometimes when she would stop.

I wish ayu will go back to when she used to control everything rather than letting the 'professionals' she trusts so much to handle her stuff. I can see why she is declining in sales...not only is the music industry is declining, her popularity is also declining...because ayu really changed alot over the past years...she is just not appealing to the general public like she used to...I guess that could be a good thing too.

[bluegie]

Originally Posted by Ayumiko

... I really miss her pop songs that she used to have a lot. The arrangements of the older songs are much better than the new ones. She really need new arrangers. She lacks unique bridges in her new songs...which songs like surreal has.

SURREAL is a really unique song (again) in ayu's discography. I dunno if there's a chorus part in this song.. The pattern is like melody A, melody A, bridge, melody B, melody B. This is one of the best pop-rock fusion from ayu .

Originally Posted by Ayumiko

Pvs and concert wise...I think in the past 10 years she had good and bad pvs equally throughout her career. Concerts...her concerts are getting better in terms of production but she is slowly getting not as creative as before for her tracklist and performances (hopefully AT08 will be great!)

The thing is, the recent attitude/concept of her pvs are mainly 1) "I'm pretty" and 2) "the pv should be pretty... plot is not important." I really enjoy her old pvs because I could see a storyboard from the pvs.

Concert... well again she has been recycling her old performances... Cage, cross, similar songs, etc. The last concert that I really enjoyed was MY STORY tour. Since then her concerts are kinda mediocre.

Originally Posted by Ayumiko

Yes she is turning 30 and everything but I just feel like for someone like her, she doesn't need to do any of that. ... Sexy photoshoots for covers, magazines are ok for me but seeing it in motion kinda makes me think sometimes when she would stop.

Again, I think she comes to an age (or a mind) that she wanna try to be more feminine. I'm not saying being more feminine means you gotta be sexy. What I mean is that she's tryin to act like sexy, she just feels like it.

[bluegie]

lemme think..
SEASONS, forgiveness (well... this shows a tie-in doesn't mean good. it debuted with only 100K in 2003, really bad sales), Endless sorrow, etc.. Can't remember all. And you're right, it's good to have tie in ONLY if the drama itself is strong. So far most ayu-drama tie-ins are kinda sucky..

Originally Posted by Bashumaru

Lol I misread your original post XD, by statues your talking about streaks right? XD, when you said statue I thought you meant like something they're extremely well known for like Ayus #1 streak, Utadas 10 million selling album, B'z most records sold etc. and that would earn them a safe week , my bad.

LOL yeah I was talking about the the #1 streak statue . Now I think about this statue... when did it get started? I just know B'z last single was the 40th consecutive no. 1... I wonder if originally B'z company did that in the first place, then other companies started to follow this glory thing?

[TITANIC]

hikki very popular in japan because she is consistance with her music..
it's different with ayu..
ayu not only make a good music..but she is trendsetter and should give something WAH.....

hikki's sales bery well because she realese album every 2 year or more..and ayu realese album every year..

for single sales, ayu's sales quite steady..
she always sell at least 100K...

different witk hikki.her single's sales not steady...
there are singles sell well and bad...
and the position didnt well as ayu

[ayu_ayu301]

to me ... ayu marketing strategy started to follow along the same template for quite a while now ....