How Drake’s “Hotline Bling” music video is an example of how all businesses should market products to a target audience.

Monday October 26, 2015 hip-hop artist Drake released his “Hotline Bling” music video through Universal Music’s VEVO youtube distribution channel. The video features Drake performing a series of freestyle warm-up break dance moves and silhouettes of women. Lighting throughout the music video features a series of pastel and vibrant colors. The lighting, shadows, colors, women, and dances all received viral attention. In days the video was viewed 40 million times. To date ‘Saturday Night Live’ has parodied the music video featuring US Presidential candidate Donald Trump. Thousands of memes have also populated the internet as well. “Hot Line Bling” is a great example of how all businesses should market products to their target audience.

"Hot Line Bling" by Drake 

Capture the Look & Feel Your Audience Desires:

Drake as a hip-hop artist has established himself like no other commercially successful hip-hop artist has before. Drake’s audience and fan base is 2/3^rd’s female. This has been established from a catalog of music exploring relationships, and women with a level of intimacy most rappers will not do. Drake’s advantage for taking these risk has provided him an opportunity to capitalize on an audience under served in hip-hop.

“Hot Line Bling” sonically is mellow and stands out from his vocal talents delivering melodic variations in a subdued tone. This feels and captures an emotion towards intimacy. Drake’s subject matter and sound match which delivers the message to the audience best.

Colors Matter:

The ‘Hot Line Bling’ music video showcases a mix of pastel and vibrant colors. This aesthetic naturally lends itself to capture the attention of women. The basic design of using lighting to color the video, while limited props are used draws the attention of the viewer in. Also colors are matched with changes in the music and lyrics as well. In business aesthetics are essential in branding and capturing the attention of customers. As different colors touch on different emotions, using colors as a technique to deliver messages should always be considered.

What’s not seen Matters:

The women in the video are shown in the forms of silhouettes. This is a genius feature. As Drake is generally performing lyrics in songs from the first person perspective the listener can assume the ‘you’ he’s speaking of is the listener. Connecting with a potential buyer where he/she feels a relationship is developed is powerful. If a business can market it’s products where buyers think they are taken into consideration it only will develop customer and brand loyalty.