EMPIRE Partners with Snapchat to Achieve Success

Founded in 2010 by Ghazi, EMPIRE is a trailblazing, wholly independent record label, distribution, and publishing company headquartered in San Francisco, California. Along with their North American base, their presence now extends around the globe, with major footprints in Africa, Europe and Latin America — with an artist roster that includes Asake, Tyga, T-Pain, Jay Wheeler, and Tink.

Like any label, EMPIRE’s success is directly tied to their ability to not only to get their artists heard, but to nurture loyal fan bases to support consistent success. In today’s world, that means maximizing streaming listens and providing fans the kind of social access and exposure to artists that keeps them coming back for more.

Fortunately, as an independent label, EMPIRE enjoys the freedom and flexibility to experiment with new, novel marketing campaigns as they see fit. And because they advertise and distribute content globally, they’re able to derive a diverse array of digital-advertising learnings and then apply them across the markets.

The Challenge of Connecting with a Younger Audience

To sustain and grow their market shares around the world, EMPIRE focuses on connecting with Gen Z and Millennials — specifically young audiences 13 to 25 years old. That effort’s fueled by driving awareness around their artist releases with the goal of converting people into streamers, as well as followers of their artists and label on social media.

Reaching Gen Z and Millenials with Snapchat Ads

So EMPIRE started testing the social media waters to find the most suitable advertising platform for reaching their objectives. They realized that Snapchatters share music and sound clips more often in DMs and, within the large group-chat communities they belong to — a behavior they discovered was unique to Snapchat.

“Gen Z and Millennials are important to our business because they're tastemakers in music,” explains Ethan Sacré, Director of Digital Strategy at EMPIRE, “and we know Snapchat is the place that we can reach them. Our goal is to reach young audiences 13 to 25 years of age with our digital ads, and these users are adding music and sounds to their stories and spotlights every day. And as a music label, it makes sense for us to try connecting with them.”

Sacré reports an impressive outcome: EMPIRE’s click rate on Snapchat ads is typically high “if the asset is right.” And they’ve seen their EMPIRE account followers grow over 200% this past year.

“Personally, I've been seeing a lot of people in my daily life use Snapchat these days,” Sacré continues, “which pushes me to find creative ways to keep advertising on the platform.”

EMPIRE’s Advice for Advertising Success

With a history of success on Snapchat, Sacré has some sage wisdom to impart to businesses looking for the right platform to support their business goals.

Tap into Snapchat’s innovation and flexibility

“The product team at Snapchat is always developing new features that make you stand out from other platforms,” he reveals. “And if I've learned anything in the marketplace, it’s that you never fight against new tech and trends from younger people. Snapchat has adapted to new tech, and allows partners to access new features that make for a consistently rich experience for our digital ad campaigns.”

Lean hard on UGC (user-generated content)

“We're constantly rethinking how to tailor our assets to a young fan who's got no time or patience for ads formatted with a classic advertising lens. Gen Z fans on Snapchat have a keen eye for what is and isn't an ad — we found that UGC content and organic raw videos perform best.”

Expand your horizons to tighten your focus

“Another piece of advice that I would give is to not just look at your peers and imitate their successes,” Sacré concludes. “Look across different industries advertising on the platform and learn what creative ideas they apply to using Snapchat's innovative features. We feel that you can learn most by pushing yourself past your comfort zone.”