Drake Gifts Fans 100GB Of Archived Content, A Tactic For All IP To Consider

Entertainment marketing inspiration comes from all corners of the landscape. And as of recently, Drake’s approach to reestablishing leadership in music and pop culture is a compelling approach that is applicable for streaming and movie IP with an upcoming release. The Drake and Kendrick Lamar feud garnered many headlines in the spring, in the process moving the needle for each of their brands in different ways. Kendrick continued to promote and perform related Drake diss tracks into the summer, and by some critics was declared the winner as measured by streaming numbers. Perhaps confined by the ongoing Kendrick Lamar narrative, Drake’s recent marketing tactic, the roll out of @plottttwistttttt on Instagram, feels like it entirely answered what would have been written into a creative brief goal along the lines of: Elevate Drake as a storyworld brand from which future narratives can occur beyond the limitations of a specific release or moment.

Earlier this month, outlets reported that Drake began following a “mysterious” and private IG account, assuming it was linked to the Kendrick Lamar beef. At that moment, Drake was one of only two followers, while it listed 262 posts, a bio line of "100 GIGS FOR YOUR HEADTOP," and a profile picture of an audio file logo. As intrigue built around the account, within a few days Drake made the page public to reveal a content purge of various hard drives of unreleased material over the course of his entire career. A collection of never before seen BTS videos, photographs, and music, equivalent to 100GB of archived content spanning different eras of Drake’s career, was pre-populated dating back to June on @plottttwistttttt. The account was then made public and promoted by Drake’s official handle in August.

The reveal of all this unreleased content wasn’t just a pivot, or plot twist, from the Kendrick Lamar press, it reestablished Drake in pop culture even among lapsed fans and critics by reminding global audiences how rich and wide spanning the Drake storyworld is…and the depth of entertainment value it has delivered over the years. The creativity of @plottttwistttttt is a compelling marketing tactic in the context of franchise marketing. Whether you’re mapping out a campaign for an anticipated second season in streaming, or pondering how an upcoming theatrical release wins back fans of the original while reaching new audiences, or even exploring how to intrigue a new generation with a beloved video game franchise from another era -- it’s worth considering what might be sitting on old production hard drives, and what would happen if you surprised the world by revealing some of that archived content in anticipation of an upcoming release...