A NEW marketing strategy, that combines busking with social media, was tested in Glasgow on Saturday in a campaign being branded as FanBusking.
Instead of busking for money, recently-formed Gaelic band, Macanta, performed accompanied by posters displaying a QR code – not dissimilar to a barcode – that could be scanned with a smart phone to allow fans to ‘like’ them on Facebook, which can then deliver news about, for instance, upcoming gigs.
The concept was created by Berlin-based advertisers, Andy and Kat Wyeth – the brains behind a digital campaign last year that went viral, involving a Google Street View image of a woman apparently giving birth on a pavement.
Macanta lead singer, Dòl Eoin, told allmediascotland.com: “We’re just tiny wee guys from a tiny wee island, and we’re just trying to play music that we love. If it works for us, it’ll work for anyone.”
He added: “[FanBusking] is so simple, and so many people are just kicking themselves that they didn’t think of it before because it’s just busking and advertising in the same place.”
The event was filmed by Shootback Productions for a film to be released later this year.
Said director, Stuart Breadner: “A lot of people like things on Facebook without actually checking it out. You’ll probably find out that most fans who have a thousand likes on Facebook probably would only be able to get about a hundred of them to their show. So this is a better way of bringing the music to the people; It’s a more authentic way of gauging new fan reactions.”
