JrockRevolution.com (JRR.com) began as the promotional website for the sold-out groundbreaking, multi-artist Japanese rock festival, Jrock Revolution, held in May of 2007 in Los Angeles. The popularity and success of the festival attracted so much site traffic that the client decided to expand it into a destination site for the international Japanese rock (Jrock) fan community.

With various news and media sites already present covering the Jrock scene, JRR.com would need extensive brand repositioning in order to be recognized and embraced by the fan community beyond the initial focus on the Jrock Revolution festival.

When I first came on board as Director of Marketing and Administration, the site staff was limited to a single web developer and a single content developer. The client lacked the resources to realize the goal of transforming JRR.com into a full-scale webzine with continually renewed content and social networking elements.

The repositioning of JRR.com from a single-event website to an all-inclusive Jrock destination site required not only original content, but also extensive rebranding to retain and grow the site audience. In order to do this, I needed to bring on an entire team by hiring new talent, and also enlisted the help of EINSOF Marketing Group, who came on board as a brand management company to completely manage, develop, and oversee brand operations.

Our team provided JRR with all marketing, development, and content production services which resulted in the creation of content, community, and social media features that rivaled competing sites. We also promoted the brand through media partnerships, special events, street teams, and cross-branded opportunities and events.

Two initial campaigns which took place in 2007 at Anime Expo in Los Angeles, CA and Otakon in Baltimore, MD generated a mailing list of 8,000 names. We used this mailing list to send out e-blasts and reminders for promotions, contests, and any new features on the site, pushing unique traffic to the website.

Because our client desired fresh content updates for the site 3 to 4 times weekly that would engage the Jrock fan community, we flew our team to Japan to acquire media partnerships and establish relationships with Japanese management and record labels. We also recruited writers and created contests exclusive to the site to keep the material interesting and unique to our visitors. In order to set us apart from all of our competitors, we chose not to replicate readily available information, but instead, populated the site with exclusive features, creating a uniqueness few competitors had.

A Handy List of Things We Did

– Acquired and managed relationships with Japanese management and record labels
– Acquired and managed relationships with media partners for cross-promotional efforts
– Created content network with Japan
– Established social media infrastructure across all channels
– Conducted ongoing social media marketing campaigns
– Hired and trained content developers, writers, graphic designers, and marketing coordinators
– Hired and trained social media management team to generate new content
– Created and ran exclusive site contests
– Designed and managed all email marketing campaigns and the mailing list
– Distributed over 15,000 promotional flyers at nationwide events and Los Angeles local stores and events
– Created community forum, populated with content-rich information and conversation starters
– Hired and trained customer engagement team to interact with fans on community forum and build brand loyalty
– Integrated e-commerce site
– Conducted niche market research with polls, questionnaires, and one-on-one fan interaction
– Promoted the JRR.com brand through street team marketing campaigns nationwide
– Sent brand ambassadors to represent the brand at events and industry panels at major Japanese pop culture conventions nationwide
– Provided unique content updates 3 times a week
– Provided ongoing creative services which included all graphic design, banner design, interactive media design, and marketing material designs

In the 6 months that we worked to reposition JRR.com as a trusted site for news and information, we experienced averages of 150,000 to 300,000 unique hits, with peaks upwards of 600,000 during huge promotions or exclusive features.

Our efforts in establishing JRR.com as a community site for Jrock fans were very successful; our forum had over 10,000 regular members, 6,000 of whom posted on a consistent basis.

Our team was so successful in our content and network development strategy that our content outpaced the website’s ability to support it.

In effect, we successfully outgrew the website.

GALLERY