Become A Music Monster Overnight! [EN]: Chapter 172

“And then there’s LITTLE LADY.”

They weren’t quite on par with ‘NineteenNines’ just yet, but their title track, ‘puppy love,’ had been slowly gaining traction in Europe and the United States for the past month.

-Click-

I clicked on a short video of YC Revolution.

In the short clip, two adult men, seemingly a family, and a young girl were bobbing and dancing to the song.

-puppy~ love! puppy love!-

And during the highlight of ‘puppy love,’ they all shouted and sang together, and only after that highlight did the young girl smile sheepishly before the video ended.

It was a video that was impossible not to smile at.

Short videos of people dancing to ‘puppy love’ were popping up like mushrooms after the rain.

The fact that this phenomenon was spreading not only on YC Revolution but also on SNS [Social Networking Service] platforms like YouTube meant one thing.

It meant that a ‘puppy love’ challenge boom was happening.

Of course, unlike in the past, so many challenge videos were being uploaded that it could be called a challenge transition period, so you might wonder what’s so special about it, but the ‘puppy love’ challenge was different.

That’s because the ‘puppy love’ promotion strategy itself was artificially initiated from this side.

It was using an influencer marketing method.

Influencer marketing refers to leveraging the power of individuals with a large social media following to recommend products or services and influence their followers’ opinions.

It’s like word-of-mouth marketing that reduces the aversion to blatant corporate advertising, and it has become a very effective marketing tool for business owners and entrepreneurs at all stages of development.

It sounds complicated, but it wasn’t that difficult.

In fact, the challenge videos where K-pop stars dance together to the highlight parts of each other’s songs are also a form of influencer marketing.

“The response is faster than I thought.”

There are two potential pitfalls with this influencer marketing.

One is that it’s not easy to promote unless the product you’re trying to promote is really good, and the other is that influencers are amateurs.

Influencers are simply famous, so it was difficult to do systematic promotion, and the results varied greatly.

“It wasn’t easy, but……”

However, I was confident in this influencer marketing.

That’s because it was the right marketing for the target I was aiming for in this project from the beginning.

The target I was aiming for in this LITTLE LADY project was not Korea but the global market.

What does this mean? It meant targeting general listeners overseas who don’t typically listen to K-pop.

In fact, in the current K-pop idol market, it was almost impossible for an idol created by a small to medium-sized entertainment company to break into the K-pop inner circle.

This is because the expectations regarding talent, capital, and the company’s brand value are not comparable to those of larger companies.

In terms of a general company, it was like saying that a product made by a small to medium-sized company would beat a product from a large company of the same type.

In that respect, I needed a groundbreaking method to succeed in this project without relying on the power of YC Entertainment.

After much deliberation, I came to the conclusion that we should make a triumphant return to Korea after achieving success abroad.

In terms of movies, it’s like presenting an award received at a famous overseas awards ceremony as a promotional strategy, but what I was thinking of was a bit more advanced.

“I need to achieve meaningful results on Billboard or in the UK.”

If I’m lucky, I might even be able to aim for number one on Billboard.

That’s because this LITTLE LADY project is thoroughly targeting general listeners overseas.

K-pop fans have increased a lot as K-pop singers, starting with me, have become active, but that ratio is less than 20% of the total market.

That means that the number of general listeners who are not K-pop fans is at least four times that number.

If we can achieve results in this huge market, then reaching number one on Billboard, as well as number one in the UK, is not impossible.

“If it succeeds, it will be a new direction for small to medium-sized entertainment companies, as well as the K-pop market in the future.”

K-pop, especially idols, requires a huge amount of money.

Decorating members, shooting music videos, etc… If you do what you consider basic, the company can go bankrupt before you know it.

In particular, most small to medium-sized entertainment companies have limited time and finances.

They don’t have the time or money to invest and wait for two or three years.

In this case, I thought it was right to seek a way to quickly conquer overseas markets, including the United States, rather than the domestic market, which is dominated by large entertainment companies.

And for this to be possible, it was right to target general listeners overseas through universal music.

In that respect, LITTLE LADY was suitable in many ways.

Since there was almost no established fandom, it was possible to set target segments from the planning stage and target specific areas.

Therefore, I focused on creating easy-listening pop (music that’s comfortable to listen to) that would work in any country or place.

“For this reason, I minimized everything except the melody line so that people wouldn’t feel tired of the song.”

In fact, I boldly didn’t include the rap part that would definitely be included in a typical K-pop idol song.

The reason why ‘puppy love’ focused on universal themes like a girl’s unrequited love, rather than a ‘girl crush’ concept, was also for this reason.

The problem was the vocal skills to bring ‘puppy love’ to life, and LITTLE LADY, especially Jaehee, showed more than expected.

“She had an elegant vocal like a top-level jazz singer.”

With Jaehee as the center, ‘puppy love’ showed tremendous high quality as easy-listening pop.

“Looking back, it was an advantage that there was no fandom. Thanks to that, I was able to make all the lyrics in English.”

If it was a group with a fandom, there would have been a fuss from the beginning. There are many people who consider the identity of K-pop to be inherently Korean.

Since we were targeting overseas from the beginning, we provided subtitles in 30 languages from the music video.

No, not just the music video, but all the videos that LITTLE LADY uploads.

Thanks to this, the video production cost increased, but it was worth it.

The lukewarm response at first exploded at some point, and the number of YC Revolution subscribers exceeded 1 million.

What gave great strength to this very meticulous plan was none other than my younger brother.

At first, my younger brother looked at me, wondering why this guy was doing this, but soon listened to my plan and actively stepped forward.

Thanks to this, I had to create a separate planning room under the name of a business trip for him for a while.

And the LITTLE LADY project was on the verge of great success, so I felt rewarded.

As we approached the culmination of that success, my younger brother muttered with a look of joy.

“This can be called a new kind of K-pop. It doesn’t cling to stereotypes, but it can take all the benefits of the K-pop label.”

Think about the sustainability of music. Focus on music that you can listen to for a long time.

Recent K-pop idol songs have focused on stimulating parts. That’s not bad, but the problem is that their lifespan is too short.

You get tired easily and naturally distance yourself.

The same was true for YC Entertainment’s idols.

The reason why a song that reached number one on Billboard didn’t last long and was quickly eliminated from the Billboard Hot 100 was also for this reason.

However, if a song is made in this easy-listening pop form, it will definitely be on the Billboard Hot 100 for a long time, even if it doesn’t reach number one.

“It might really happen.”

“Ahem.”

Seeing my younger brother’s eyes filled with renewed respect for his older brother, I cleared my throat with an unnecessarily proud feeling.

* * *

-The miracle of a small to medium-sized idol? LITTLE LADY enters the Billboard Hot 100!-

-Who is LITTLE LADY, who was considered a foreign pop singer team, contrary to everyone’s expectations?-

-P Entertainment CEO Kim Seung-jae, who created a new myth! Reveals that LITTLE LADY was a team that targeted overseas from the beginning!-

As the reaction to the success story of NineteenNines subsided, LITTLE LADY, which was finally known even in Korea, became the center of attention.

That’s because ‘puppy love,’ which they sang, showcased the ultimate form of easy-listening pop to the point that it was hard to believe that they were a Korean team.

The same was true for overseas fans who were in the midst of a challenge craze, and after the challenge, they belatedly came across the music video and learned that LITTLE LADY was a K-pop idol.

But what’s really more surprising is that they are idols created by a new small to medium-sized entertainment company.

Considering that it’s really difficult to enter the Billboard Hot 100 even for a large entertainment company, let alone YC Entertainment, this is really amazing.

Of course, it would be stranger if it didn’t become a hot topic.

However, after P Entertainment, which created LITTLE LADY, started promoting them in Korea as well, the story entered a new phase.

-Is the identity of LITTLE LADY Happiness, which was once called the epitome of a failed idol?-

-Who is producer DK, who produced LITTLE LADY’s first album?-

Surprisingly, LITTLE LADY was Happiness, which was once called the epitome of a failed idol.

Of course, there were many opinions from domestic K-pop fans about this.

-Wow~ Producers are so important. If this is a Cinderella story, I’d call it a scam.-

└Is DK a fairy godmother then?

└LOL If you look at who found DK in real life, it’s hard to call him a fairy godmother.

-Oh my god! Why is a black guy here?-

└The physical is amazing? A muscular black guy who is over 190 cm tall [approximately 6’3″]? I’d believe you if you said he was an athlete.

└Fairy godmother TS [transgender]? It’s fresh if you think of it that way.

└You crazy bastards! Stop it!

-I heard that the main vocalist of the song ‘puppy love’ is Jaehee?-

└Ah! It was Jaehee. Well, it’s not surprising since she was the runner-up on Super Musician when she was in middle school.

└Wow. That’s an achievement she made in middle school?

└Yeah, I remember she narrowly missed winning even then.

└Wow~ A team with such a talented person was ridiculed as the epitome of a failed idol… I really can’t understand this market.

-There was a reason why P Entertainment CEO Kim Seung-jae brought Happiness. He must have thought it was worth a try since it was a team with such a genius.-

└Rose to 64th place on this week’s Billboard Hot 100! The producer is a producer, but the song is too good in the first place.

└I admit this. Who is PY, who wrote, composed, and arranged the song?

-What’s absurd is that even though it’s ranked 64th on the Billboard Hot 100, it still hasn’t even entered the top 100 on Lemon in Korea-

└The domestic music site market is even harder to climb than the Billboard chart… My heart is pounding.

Two weeks after entering the Billboard Hot 100, it rose to 64th place, showing an even hotter response in Korea. And with that, there were many questions raised about the problems with domestic music site charts.

From the story of the streaming illegal companies that were still lurking and being hushed up, to the question of whether the ranking calculation method should be newly established.

“If that were as easy as saying it, we would have taken care of it a long time ago.”

Youngchan was pleased that his hobby was showing meaningful results faster than he thought, but he had to smile bitterly at the chronic problems of the Korean market that were revealed in the process.

‘But this is definitely something that needs to be resolved, so I should think about it.’

If all else fails, it wouldn’t be bad to invest a lot of money and create a new music site.

If we create a ranking chart that takes into account various aspects such as Billboard’s tally, rather than simply streaming, and set a standard, the side effects will be reduced.

To do that, there must be a drastic proposal, and Youngchan was thinking of setting the site distribution share itself to less than 10%.

“There will be quite a loss. But this is worth investing in.”

He judged that the domestic market must be cleaned up in order for talent to continue to emerge in the K-pop market in the future.

-LITTLE LADY’s ‘puppy love’ finally reaches number one on the Billboard Hot 100!-

-The unbelievable myth of a small to medium-sized idol has been completed!-

-Many entertainment companies in Korea are paying attention to the new form of K-pop!-

-Critic Hwang Hee-cheon gave his opinion, saying, ‘K-pop should not become the center of the world on its own, but should continue to spread its existence endlessly toward the center and be recognized through the indicators it has achieved locally.’-

And when LITTLE LADY’s ‘puppy love’ finally reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100, the domestic media went wild.

It was a natural thing to happen since something that was only thought of as a possibility had come true like this.

But the really amazing thing hadn’t even started yet.

Surprisingly, ‘puppy love,’ which reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100, not only maintained its position for six weeks, but also did not leave the Billboard Hot 100 for more than a year.

It was no different than seeing it as a miracle created by the unique characteristics of easy-listening pop, which minimized fatigue to the extreme while being highly addictive.