Brand Asset Management-Jay Z and 50 CENT

Jay Z and 50 Cent Reebok Commercial(2006)

Hip-hop has always been in the driver seat when it comes to the latest trends through lyrics, music and fashion. Combining talented artists with known brands equals more sells from targeted markets. Back then Jay Z and 50 CENT business associate Steve Stoute managed to secure shoe deals with Reebok that was normally reserved for athletes. In a sense, Steve Stoute acts as a brand asset management professional in managing the brands direction.  In a recent interview with Power 105's the Breakfast Club, Stoute discussed a few strategies that he used in advertising.

According to Steve, building on shared value between artists and brands will present a genuine picture with the consumer. Jay and 50-helped assist in shared value because they too like to rock sneakers with their gear. Bridging that gap helped Reebok understand that not everybody wanted to purchase shoes that made them run faster, but rather a shoe that could rock easily with outfits.  

What's interesting about Steve was that he placed Shawn Carter and G-unit shoe lines in music stores, that way fans could pre order them before they hit Foot Locker and other shoe chains. This brought the demand to an all time high for Reeboks in which 10,000 pairs were sold within a few hours being release.

The power of hip-hop has brought a whole new revenue stream to the forefront. Before, major record companies weren’t seeing any revenue from branding opportunities, now with 360 deals, labels are pushing hard for brand building, because they get a share of the proceeds and it gives them an incentive to work on the artist behalf. 

Independent artist can join in on these opportunities as well in your local communities. For example, let’s say that an artist is a skateboarder and has a local community following. What they can do is seek out sponsorships from skate shops, negotiate a deal that says they will wear sponsored clothing or shoot a video inside or round the store for funding.

Steve Stoute mention it should be a shared value, don’t seek sponsorships from a skate shop if you aren’t a skater, it won’t be authentic. Over all if you are an artist in this new and exciting digital music world there’s opportunity, you have to connect with products you genuinely love and enjoy. To see the full interview with Steve Stoute click here