Introduction:
This portfolio will critically evaluate a proposed marketing campaign created for the emerging indie-rock band ‘The French Exit’. The original campaign plan was developed between September and December as part of a collaborative marketing project focused on building this band’s audience, strengthening their branding, and supporting their planned upcoming release that was meant to have come out in April 2026. The campaign aimed to reposition the band within the growing UK indie-rock revival scene and target Gen Z indie audiences, while also appealing to older alternative-rock listeners who value grassroots culture and live music.
The campaign strategy centred around different marketing techniques to combine social media promotion, branding development, Spotify optimisation and audience engagement in general. Using marketing frameworks like STP analysis, SWOT analysis and the SOSTAC model, this campaign was attempting to increase the band’s visibility in the Merseyside and Leeds indie music scenes. We planned to increase their social media to 1,500 followers and improve the professionalism and consistency of the band’s online presence by building momentum around the planned single release and expanding their audience through gigs and live performances (particularly in Leeds).
My role in this project was Campaign Planner and Project Manager, which involved coordinating meetings, maintaining project timelines, organising communication between the group and band, and monitoring the overall campaign progression. Throughout the campaign, I became responsible for maintaining communication with the band, which became increasingly difficult due to conflicts we weren’t fully aware of.
Although the campaign demonstrated a strong understanding of modern indie music marketing strategies, its implementation was very disrupted by the conflicts, making communication inconsistent. The planned single release was cancelled after our second meeting when a file was lost due to the producer making a mistake. As a result of this, this portfolio reflects on the realities of working in the music industry, where unreliability, communication failures and organisational issues can directly impact marketing outcomes, as well as evaluating the effectiveness of the marketing plan itself.
While the campaign achieved limited measurable success due to what we had access to, through the improvements made to the band’s social media cohesion and minor TikTok audience growth, the project highlighted the importance of professionalism and adaptability in music marketing.
Campaign Overview:
The planned campaign for The French Exit was designed around the band’s rebrand from their previous identity, ‘Urban Hours’. The rebrand allowed us to reposition the group in the modern UK indie-rock scene and establish a clearer visual and musical identity. Influenced by bands and artists like The Coral, The Verve and Elliott Smith, the band wanted to combine their emotional songwriting with a grassroots indie aesthetic. This aligned closely with the resurgence of indie music currently in the UK alternative scene.
The campaign focused on digital marketing and audience development. Research that we conducted during the planning stage showed us two main audience segments. The primary target audience consisted of Gen Z indie listeners aged around 15-21 who engage with platforms like Spotify, TikTok and Instagram. This audience values authenticity and independent music culture. The secondary audience consisted of older indie-rock listeners aged around 35-55 who are more likely to support local, live music acts and purchase merchandise rather than interact through trends and social media.
The campaign strategy was developed using the SOSTAC framework (Chaffey, 2023). The situation analysis identified several weaknesses within the band’s existing marketing approach. Although the band had already gained a small local following in Merseyside/North Wales and had a history of streaming under their former name, their social media lacked consistency and professional branding. Their Instagram primarily featured isolated performance clips and individual pictures of the lead singer rather than cohesive band-focused content. None of their images included the 4 people in the band, as they removed their guitarist when changing their name and have since not included the new guitarist in any of their posts. Their Spotify branding was also inconsistent, including outdated imagery as mentioned, and a biography that no longer aligned with the band’s intended indie-rock positioning.
Campaign objectives included:
- Increasing the band’s social media following to 1,500 followers by May 2026
- Improving Spotify for Artists branding and organisation
- Creating more consistent and visually coherent social media content
- Supporting the promotion of future live performances
- Building anticipation for an April release
- Positioning the band more effectively in the indie market
To achieve these objectives, the campaign proposed a blended marketing approach which included digital promotion, audience interaction and live performance marketing. We suggested that they create content including behind-the-scenes footage, rehearsal clips, live performance videos, updated professional photography and teaser content for the planned single release.
Venue research formed another aspect of the campaign. Leeds-based venues like Santiago’s Bar, Northern Guitars, Oporto and Brudenell Social Club were identified as suitable spaces for audience expansion due to their strong connections to grassroots indie audiences and student music culture. The campaign intended to use live performances to complement the digital marketing activity and expand their reach to Leeds from Merseyside/North Wales.
My responsibilities as the project manager involved coordinating communication between the team and the band, which meant organising meetings and calls to maintain the campaign structure. Multiple in-person meetings and Zoom calls were arranged through the project to discuss timelines, branding decisions and campaign progression. The group delegated tasks clearly, with roles including marketing strategist, creative lead and communications lead. While the planning stage of the campaign remained detailed and organised, the actual implementation of it became increasingly difficult due to the band’s lack of cooperation.
Evaluation of Campaign Effectiveness:
The campaign showed strong strategic planning and an understanding of contemporary indie music marketing. However, the effectiveness of the campaign was significantly limited by external issues in the band. While certain aspects of the campaign achieved minor success, most objectives were either partially completed or not even attempted.
One of the few successes from the campaign was the improvement of the band’s social media cohesion. Before the campaign, the band’s Instagram lacked consistency and focused heavily on the lead singer rather than presenting the group as a band. Through discussions with the band regarding branding and aesthetics, the feed became slightly more visually coherent and better aligned with their indie-rock identity. This reflected an improved understanding of branding consistency, which is essential in music marketing, as visual identity contributes heavily to audience perception.
However, despite these small visual improvements, they lost some audience engagement on Instagram during the campaign period. The band lost approximately five Instagram followers, and post engagement decreased. A possible explanation for this decline could be the lack of platform-specific content strategies. The band often reposted identical videos across TikTok and Instagram, rather than adapting the content to suit audience behaviours and algorithms. TikTok seemed to respond better to the casual, short-form, trend-driven content, whereas Instagram audiences often engage more with polished visuals and curated posts.
The campaign had proposed platform-specific strategies involving behind-the-scenes footage, studio clips and teaser content. However, because the band had failed to arrange the planned photoshoot due to them being in Leeds at different times, and did not create new content, the band were unable to implement these ideas. This reduced the campaign’s ability to maintain audience momentum and reinforce the band’s identity.
While Instagram engagement declined, TikTok growth remained relatively stable. The band gained approximately twenty-nine followers during the campaign period and maintained consistent view counts across uploads. Although the growth is small, it suggests that their content on TikTok was more suitable and a more effective platform for the band’s target audience. This aligns with broader trends across the music industry, where TikTok has become one of the most influential discovery platforms (Silva, 2025). However, the campaign struggled to convert TikTok views into deeper audience engagement or streaming growth.
Social media before campaign:
Social media after campaign:
Streaming performance remained weak throughout the project. One of the campaign’s key objectives involved optimising their Spotify for Artists and building momentum towards the April single release. However, the planned release campaign became impossible to execute due to the band losing the project file for the single. Without new music, the campaign lost its central focus. Monthly Spotify listeners remained at fourteen to twenty throughout, demonstrating minimal growth.
The cancellation of the release reduced the effectiveness of our overall strategy significantly. Much of the planned content calendar had been designed around generating anticipation for the single through teaser videos and lip syncing 15-second clips. Once the single was lost, the group had nothing major to market, making it difficult to sustain audience engagement.
This highlighted a major weakness in the campaign, which was the over-reliance on a single release without sufficient planning. Although the campaign demonstrated strong organisation, its success depended heavily on the band’s reliability, which clearly lacked. When the band failed to provide content, maintain communication and complete recordings, the campaign lacked alternative strategies that could be implemented.
Communication issues became one of the biggest barriers to implementing our campaign ideas. Throughout the project, I arranged multiple meetings and calls, but the band started to ignore messages and refused to engage with campaign discussions and stopped communicating with both the marketing team and each other. Internal disagreements and arguments in the band eventually led to members focusing on separate projects, which meant they abandoned this band and its campaign entirely.
Messages throughout the project in non-chronological order:
These issues showed the importance of professionalism and communication when dealing with managing artists and marketing them. Emerging artists tend to rely on informal structures, which can make organisation difficult. In this case, conflict in the band directly impacted marketing outcomes. Without the band’s participation, the group were unable to create content, secure live gigs or maintain campaign continuity.
Despite these challenges, some aspects of the campaign planning remained strong. The target audience research reflected the current indie-rock market correctly, especially in Leeds and Merseyside grassroots scenes. Venue choices like Oporto and Brudenell Social Club aligned well with the band’s intended audience. The campaign also demonstrated a strong understanding of authenticity as a marketing tool in the indie music culture.
Because the band only performed one live show during the campaign period at The Rockin’ Chair in Wrexham, the live-performance aspect of our strategy was never fully developed. Planned venue outreach in Leeds became difficult as the band admitted that they were not ready for additional performances. This limited the campaign’s ability to expand the band’s audience geographically.
If the campaign had been implemented fully, the April single release would have acted as the central driving force behind our marketing strategy. The campaign aimed to build anticipation through teaser content and platform-specific videos. With better cooperation and communication from the band, the strategy may have achieved stronger audience engagement and streaming growth.
While this campaign had little success, the project still showed a valuable understanding of branding, audience targeting and strategy. The campaign’s failures were caused largely by the band’s disengagement, disorganisation and inconsistent communication, making them extremely difficult to work with, and made my role as project planner almost impossible.
Application of Marketing Theory and Models:
A variety of marketing theories were used to inform the development of this campaign, especially the STP model, SWOT analysis and the SOSTAC planning framework. These frameworks are used widely in the marketing industry to analyse audience behaviour, positioning and strategic planning. These models helped structure the campaign and ensured that the marketing decisions we were making were connected to audience behaviour and industry context.
STP Model:
The STP model (Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning) played a major role in shaping the campaign strategy. (Kotler and Keller, 2016).
The segmentation stage revealed two distinct audience groups. The main group is Gen Z indie listeners aged fifteen to twenty-one, and the secondary group is older indie-rock listeners aged 35 to 55. The targeting strategy focused mainly on the younger audiences as they were much more accessible through platforms like TikTok and Instagram. This aligned with the band’s age demographic and existing audience behaviour. However, the campaign also recognised the value of older audiences, especially regarding live music and long-term loyalty.
The positioning centred around authenticity and vulnerability. Unlike a lot of modern indie bands that rely on trends, The French Exit wanted to position themselves as grassroots-focused. This strategy aligned well with bands like Geese, who are not focusing on the trends, but rather on authenticity to become popular (and it seems to be working well for them).
Despite the strength of the STP analysis, the campaign struggled to fully implement this positioning due to inconsistent band engagement. The band failed to maintain content output and branding consistency, weakening the campaign’s ability to reinforce the image they want.
Strengths:
The band possessed an identifiable indie-rock aesthetic, and already had a small existing audience from their previous project, ‘Urban Hours’. The campaign itself demonstrated strong organisation, detailed research and realistic venue targeting.
Weaknesses:
The band lacked professionalism and organisational skills. Communication became unreliable, and content production was inconsistent. The planned single also randomly got lost in the middle of the campaign. These weaknesses prevented the campaign from gaining any momentum.
Opportunities:
The campaign identified several opportunities in the modern indie music industry for the band to use to its advantage. TikTok is a powerful discovery platform for emerging artists, while venues in Leeds provide valuable networking opportunities. The popularity of indie music at the moment also creates a favourable cultural environment for the band’s sound.
Threats:
The biggest threat to this campaign was the instability of the band itself. With the internal conflict, inconsistent communication and the fact that the whole project became completely abandoned, the campaign’s effectiveness was compromised. Competition in the indie music market is also very high, making consistency extremely important.
Marketing Funnel:
This campaign can be evaluated through the use of a marketing funnel model, which shows how audiences move from awareness to engagement and then eventually conversion. Within music marketing, this process often involves moving listeners from social media toward deeper engagement, such as streaming, attending gigs or purchasing merchandise.
The campaign aimed to increase visibility through TikTok and Instagram content. TikTok performed better in this area, with the band gaining twenty-nine followers and maintaining stable view counts. This told us that the band’s content was still reaching audiences despite the other campaign difficulties.
The interest stage focused on strengthening audience connection through clear branding and personable content to help alongside the planned single release. While a few improvements were made to the visuals of the band’s Instagram, the lack of new content and cancelled photoshoot limited the campaign’s ability to maintain audience interest.
The desire stage was intended to build anticipation around the planned April single release through pre-save links, teasers and behind-the-scenes content, but once the single was lost, the campaign could no longer move audiences further down the ‘funnel’.
Finally, the action stage aimed to convert audience engagement into measurable outcomes like increased Spotify streams, follower growth and gig attendance. This stage remained unsuccessful, demonstrated by the band staying at around sixteen monthly followers and failing to secure more live performances.
The marketing funnel shows that while the campaign achieved some audience awareness, it struggled to convert visibility into sustained engagement or consumer action. This was, as mentioned many times, caused by the inconsistent band participation and absence of a central release product.
SOSTAC Framework:
The situation analysis identified weaknesses in the band’s social media and branding. Objectives like follower growth and audience expansion were realistic and aligned with the band’s goals.
The strategy stage showed a strong understanding of blended marketing and audience behaviour. The tactics section also created a detailed timeline for the single promotion.
However, the campaign struggled heavily in the action stage. Although tasks were delegated clearly between team members, we had to depend on the band to put these plans into action. When communication broke down, the actions were not completed.
The control stage proposed monitoring engagement like streaming numbers and live audience growth through analytics from Instagram and Spotify. However, limited campaign activity reduced the amount of meaningful data that was available for analysis.
Overall, the marketing models used throughout the campaign provided a strong strategic structure and demonstrated an understanding of music marketing theory. However, the project also highlighted the limitations of theoretical planning when an artist’s reliability and organisational skills are lacking.
Personal Reflection and Evaluation of Contribution:
My role in the campaign was the Campaign Planner and Project Manager, which meant maintaining communication between the group and the band by organising meetings, scheduling calls and delegating tasks. Throughout the project, I became responsible for maintaining progression and attempting to keep the campaign organised despite the communication difficulties.
One of my main responsibilities involved organising and documenting meetings with the group and the band.
Meeting notes:
I monitored deadlines and attempted to ensure that all members stayed informed regarding the campaign’s progression. I also coordinated communication between the different roles in the team to ensure tasks such as audience research, brand analysis and venue research were completed effectively.
When the communication became inconsistent, I continued to attempt to chase for information, organise Zoom calls which the band sometimes forgot about, and encourage the band to provide updates regarding their music, content and future plans. This became particularly difficult as much of the campaign depended on artist participation. The planned single release formed the centre of our marketing strategy, and when the band eventually lost the file for it, the campaign lost its primary focus. I only discovered this through personal communication outside the project from my little brother (a member of the band), which shows the extent to which the communication in the campaign had broken down.
Despite these challenges, I believe that I demonstrated strong organisational and leadership skills through the project. I continued arranging meetings and attempted to maintain campaign progression even when communication became difficult. I also ensured that delegated tasks remained organised and that the group itself continued professionally despite the external setbacks.
Conclusion:
Overall, the marketing campaign for The French Exit demonstrated strong planning and a detailed understanding of indie music marketing theories. Through the use of audience segmentation, branding strategies and blended marketing techniques, the campaign identified realistic opportunities for audience growth and artist development in the grassroots indie-rock scene.
However, the effectiveness of the campaign was limited by the organisational issues in the band. Inconsistent communication, arguments, and the cancellation of the planned single release prevented most of the strategy from being implemented. As a result, the campaign’s success was limited, with only minor TikTok growth and small improvements to the band’s visual branding to show for it.
Personally, the project developed my communication, organisational and leadership skills. Managing the campaign during periods of instability showed the importance of contingency planning in the creative industry.
To conclude, this project highlighted the role of music marketing in the independent music industry, where successful campaigns depend on artist engagement and reliability just as much as strong branding and strategy.
Bibliography:
Chaffey, D. (2023). SOSTAC Marketing Planning Model Guide. [online] Smart Insights. Available at: https://www.smartinsights.com/digital-marketing-strategy/sostac-model/. [Accessed 11 May 2026]
Kotler, P. and Keller, K.L. (2016) Marketing Management. 15th edn. Harlow: Pearson.
Silva, C. (2025). How TikTok is rewriting the soundtrack of music discovery. [online] Mashable. Available at: https://mashable.com/article/tiktok-music-discovery. [Accessed 11 May 2026]
