One Sunday morning, a couple of years ago, I woke up with a mild hangover. The sort of hangover that tells you drinking a bit more is the cure (the lie we tell ourselves when we want to start drinking early).
Before jumping out of bed, in my head I was already creating a playlist of the music that would go down well with my babalaas session. For me during those days, deep house music was just perfect for the occasion. That was before I got caught up with this amapiano craze.
After gathering enough strength to get up, I went to the lounge, powered up my laptop and connected it to the speaker system.
I play my music on YouTube, and the good thing is that the platform already knows what I want so it was just a matter of clicking on one of the suggested playlists and I would be good to go.
The first song on the list I selected was Monique Bingham and Black Coffee’s Deep In The Bottom. With the next track being another Monique Bingham number, this time with Ralf GUM Take Me To My Love, this was just what the doctor ordered.
I deleted a few songs on the list so as to avoid coming back to skip since I also wanted to do the dishes while I drank my first Zambezi of the day.
When the first song finished, I had already downed a few sips and was psyching up for the next tune which I knew would certainly turn up the morning vibe.
With YouTube you also have to be prepared for Ads, but these are usually less than 30 seconds long so no harm done.
Then there are those moments when that Ad is an actual song and these can be as long as three minutes. We are talking about a song you had no intention of listening to here.
In this particular instance, instead of hearing Bingham’s soulful voice coming on, I heard a voice I did not recognise. The guy was singing about mazondo or something along those lines.
This was the day I got introduced to Ceeblazer, an artiste who would eventually become a pest on my YouTube experience for days on end.
Someone might ask why I didn’t just skip the Ad then if I didn’t like the music. Remember I was doing the dishes in the kitchen, so the hustle of drying up my hands and having to go to the lounge to skip the Ad seemed like a task, so I had to endure.
I was pissed, to say the least and while I got my vibe back when my jam finally came on, those three minutes had been filled with anger.
I am not sure what sort of advertising package he had paid for or the criteria which was being used to narrow down the target audience, what I can say is this Ad was relentless for days if not weeks before it finally vanished.
To the artiste, this might have been a brilliant move to score some new fans and maybe he actually did, but personally I was just put off.
Last I checked the song, which is titled “Zondo”, had more than 400 000 views, but I am positive that a substantial number of those views were not organic. Some of us watched because we had no choice.
If he was just looking for views, then I guess he won, but if he was putting out that Ad in order to cultivate a genuine fan base, I don’t think that was the right way to go about it.
The same artiste then later on released another song, “Zhebelebe”, which he also pushed through YouTube Ads.
This song was a bit better than the last one and had I heard it under different circumstances, I might have given it a chance. I just don’t take kindly to music being force-fed to me (plus the guy’s voice is a pain to the ear).
Some might be wondering why I would pick an incident that happened years ago to use as an example. Let’s just say it stuck.
There are several other local artistes who have also tried taking this route to stardom and failed. Or maybe I thought they failed because after the Ads stop, I don’t get to hear their music being played anywhere.
While major stars might have no reason to use this strategy, there are some who do. Ty Dolla $ign did to push his new song, Ego Death. (It had passed the five million view mark last I checked)
The reason why I brought up the subject is because just recently, I had to listen to another local song which was a YouTube Ad, this time a sungura track. Maybe this guy had paid for it to be played just once because I never heard it again. Too bad for him because I didn’t even get his name.
I wouldn’t know if it’s just me, but I believe a substantial number of people hate YouTube Ads. They are more of an intrusion which is why many individuals are always on the ready to skip them after that five second window which the platform doesn’t allow you to skip.
The reason why someone would think that I am going to put whatever it is I was going to watch on hold so that I can check out their music baffles me. YouTube Ads are more like spam and can sometimes be irritating.
YouTube is without a doubt one of the biggest advertising platforms out there and for good reason too (over 2 billion monthly active users), but I just think as a musician what you need are organic listeners.
Every musician needs to put their music on this platform, it is one of the biggest steaming site in the world after all, but I don’t think trying to force it on us as an Ad is a wise move.
This is my personal opinion which is based on personal experiences and preferences so my sentiments should be taken with a grain of salt.
Maybe the marketing strategy actually works and I am just yet to see or hear these success stories.
Please do let me know what you also think about the subject in the comment section.
I am yet to hear the success stories too. It could work if the person is genuinely talented but lacks a mainstream platform to get the appreciation his craft deserves. However, we are all sometimes deluded about how good we are hence the Zondo earsores!