Marketing & Branding Portfolio
Raye’s new single “WHERE IS MY HUSBAND” was always going to be a hit even before she released it. Her use of teaser videos, emotional branding and suspense has created a space where it is impossible for her new single to go wrong.
Raye is a 28 year old female British R&B, Pop, Jazz and Soul singer with a huge fan base; 49.5 million Spotify monthly listeners winning a whopping 6 BRIT awards for her album “My 21st Century Blues”. It is safe to say she is no small name. Yet unlike lots of popular artists, her fame, fortune, and marketing abilities did not come from a record label. In fact, her success and the reason she is who she is today is due to her leaving Polydor records after 7 years, which in turn allowed her to have more creative freedom. Just over 4 years ago, Raye claimed that she had “been on a 4 album record deal since 2014” and she subsequently had not been allowed “to put out one album” and her music was “collecting dust”. When Raye left Polydor Records, and the “fast pop” style of music she was required to make, she spoke out about the mistreatment within the music industry, specifically towards her as an artist and woman. This led to her vast growth in popularity. Musicians, like myself and many of my friends, started to notice Raye and connect with her as we too similar issues despite being a minuscule fraction of the her size and she particularly gained huge traction from her female audience. The audience she was gaining loved her rebellious side speaking out against “the man” fighting her own injustice. Many agreed and respected her for it and there is no better way to create unity than creating a common enemy and this case the enemy was “the man”. By doing this she creates a brand position and a differentiation which she later will build into one of the biggest artists alive.
Raye has created a sense of honesty and loyalty amongst her fans with some simple steps. Firstly, in her hit album “My 21st Century Blues” she spoke up about her own personal private issues such as: mental health, body-image, addiction, trauma. These hard-hitting topics don’t tend to feature in mainstream music thus creating a fresh vulnerability to her music and image. We as a society are in a rebellious era a time where no one is right and everyone is wrong. People are hugely polarised in their thoughts and feelings. An artists putting 2 fingers up to “the man” and bringing up deep topics not usually spoken out about is exactly what creates deep brand loyalty like this. Additionally, her music is a representation of these thoughts and feelings, Raye writes and co-produces most of her songs and it creates a sense of authenticity and further pushes this idea of being independent, which is exactly what her fans relate to. Her authenticity and independence is not just the record label: it’s the band that she’s kept core members in since 2016, it’s the music she writes and produces its her ability to get on stage and say what happened to me is wrong! The time and society we are in now has as much to do with her success as herself. She probably wouldn’t be half the artist she is now if she did the same things even just 15 years ago because times were different rebellion was not on peoples minds. Importantly however, Raye I don’t believe did any of these things with marketing in mind which is another interesting point. She didn’t leave the record label because she saw a marketing opportunity or speak out about her personal experiences because she thought people will relate thus meaning brand loyalty thus meaning streams leading to fame, money popularity and whatever else comes with that she did it because she wanted to speak out about the awful things that had happened to her and get out of a toxic relationship with a record company. This is important because it adds a whole other layer of brand authenticity, genuine authenticity. Annoyingly while many will try most will fail to recreate this because studying it can only help so much in the case of Raye her genuine authenticity is what led the ‘marketing theories’ and not the other way around.
Raye creates genuine connections with fans on a more personal level too; she frequently engages with fans online and will even do surprise performances and events for her fans creating value in being her loyal fan. This creates a 2 way system and a far more personal bond between her and her fans. She creates communities in more subtle ways, her Instagram name is RAYE with a British, Swiss and Ghanaian flag proudly next to her name creating a sense of national pride and community amongst the groups of people. This is important not only to creating more fans and traffic but also to show further authenticity and relatability. While this seems very usual and not at all out of the ordinary artists such as Drake who is proudly Canadian does not have it in his Instagram bio nor Kanye West nor Charlie XCX in fact most top artists don’t do this simple thing which works in Raye’s favour as she is yet again the outlier and more subtly being independent from those other huge artists.
Raye comes across as a genuine nice person and I say “comes across” but I do believe she is and I’m almost diminishing that by wording as I am. A prime example of Raye’s authenticity is when she was asked about another huge popstar Olivia Dean who attended the same school and grew up in the same area she was overwhelmed with genuine excitement and stated “how beautiful” for her peer and was so supportive. If she were disingenuous perhaps would start a rivalry or a ‘beef’ between them to stir up more engagement and excitement for both of the huge artists. Contrastingly, she did not do this her immediate excitement about Olivia Dean and perhaps working with her in turn worked really well for her as now many more fans of Olivia Dean are now also Raye fans. Whether this helped a lot or a little I don’t know but they both have a very similar audience to their brand. While it perhaps has a high chance of converting fans of Olivia Dean to Raye as they already like that style of music it does also mean it is a smaller number of people that listen to Olivia Dean and not Raye. This is an example of social positioning Raye is actively putting herself in the same conversation as Olivia Dean and thus hopefully pulling an audience from her fans.
So why was “WHERE IS MY HUSBAND” always going to be a hit? Well multiple reasons including her teaser opening with the unreleased track and debuting it at her Glastonbury set, her release of a music video with a dance when she released it, her announcement of a 2026 world tour alongside the release and her independent artist status. Starting with her 2025 Glastonbury set where she opened with the unreleased song, firstly with the nature of the tune being upbeat and energetic people were super excited about it and videos of her performing the song went viral. I myself saw her perform it online at Glastonbury before it was released and I saw first hand the hype created around it. This was also due to Raye performing the song and not just singing it, she had a whole choregraphed dance which would later go viral on TikTok and Instagram thus extending her audience. After the initial excitement of the song on the 19th of September 2025 she released the song onto all platforms but crucially she released it with a striking music video which included dramatic lighting, with her chasing a shadowy figure. The music video fits the song perfectly and more importantly fits her brand perfectly, the music video of course went viral after its release and her brand has been totally transformed and revived from her early days at Polydor records. Additionally, the music video has scenes of the full band playing live in a retro soul way: everyone dressed up, vivid red dress, live horn section. The music video perfectly portrays what it is that Raye’s brand is, this is doubled by the fact that her live performances uses similar effects: bold red dresses, live funky big band brass, gospel vocals. These all transport you when you watch her to a whole different time and era that suits Raye’s brand perfectly. Of course with all of this she also announced a 2026 world tour alongside the release of the song. She in turn is showing her faith in the song and this further shows fans her authenticity as she had planned all of this before the song had even been released thus showing her self-belief in her image which is precisely what her image creates for her listeners. Of course with all things considered at the heart of all of it she is still employing that independent-artist idea and that is still the crucial underlying feature of all of this success in her marketing.
These factors combine perfectly demonstrates Kapferer’s Brand Identity Prism her Physique – bright and bold depicted through the stark shade of red she uses throughout the song which contrasts with the opening to the music video which opened in black and white. Her personality evokes freedom and independence, its empowering. The brand communicates with the outside world by expressing her authenticity and empowering rebellion. This ties in closely with the culture she’s tapped into – breaking down social norms, standing up for ones self speaking out against inequality. The relationship this makes between Raye and her fans is one of freedom and individuality, one where you can speak out against injustice. Her fans feel personally connected with her as the music she creates is so personal to her and involve very serious subject matters such as addiction in her song “Mary Jane”. As far as her reflection on her typical listeners/fans, they tend to be a younger audience however with her style of performance she does open herself up to the older generation epically as a lot of her music and image reflects that. Most importantly perhaps because Raye does manage to connect with her fans on such a personal, intimate level she allows her fans to feel however they want to and not worry about anyone else’s opinion due to her independent career.
Therefore, Raye’s hit single “WHERE IS MY HUSBAND” was always going to be a raging success because of Raye’s ability to create brand and community of unwavering loyal fans. The process before release was as crucial if not more important than post release. The teaser at Glastonbury with the dance to accompany created huge virality thus meaning even before the song was released the hype was so big behind her especially considering her branding and individuality. That same branding and individuality came from years and years or her unwavering commitment through her own injustices. This genuine authenticity and ‘grind’ is why it has been possible for Raye and also why it is near impossible to replicate deliberately.
Reference list
Cragg, M. (2021). ‘I’m angry, I’m raging’: how Raye took on her record label – and won. [online] the Guardian. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2021/sep/25/im-angry-im-raging-how-raye-took-on-her-record-label-and-won [Accessed 1 Dec. 2025].
Instagram (n.d.). Instagram. [online] www.instagram.com. Available at: https://www.instagram.com/raye/?hl=en [Accessed 3 Dec. 2025].
KISS FM (2025). RAYE Talks Viral Hit, Olivia Dean Collab & Her Ambitious New Album! | Rock Hall Red Carpet. [online] YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4mWM1VOBsVY [Accessed 2 Dec. 2025].
Qblogging (2025). Welcome To Zscaler Directory Authentication. [online] Qblogging.com. Available at: https://qblogging.com/raye-singer-biography-career-awards-2025/?utm_source=chatgpt.com [Accessed 2 Dec. 2025].
RAYE (2025). RAYE – WHERE IS MY HUSBAND! (Official Music Video). [online] YouTube. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rK5TyISxZ_M [Accessed 2 Dec. 2025].
Wikipedia. (2023). Raye. [online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raye [Accessed 2 Dec. 2025].
