Why Fifth Harmony is brand engagement goals.

Disclaimer: It’s obvious that I love my girls from Fifth Harmony and that I support them in every way possible (you probably know I’m part of 5HonTour along with other amazing people) but I will try to write this from my professional perspective, from my “marketer” point of view.

A few days ago I came across an old Billboard article stating how many girl groups have tried to break out the music industry in the past years and have failed. There could be many reasons on why this is, but I think something that definitely influenced this was the evolution of the industry. 

 Most people don’t buy music anymore. And here’s where another evolution happened: 

 Artists became brands too.

 The technical intro
I’ve always believed Marketing and Social Media Marketing are both two different types of art and I’m totally passionate about them. 

 We’re currently living in a Marketing 2.0 world. It’s called this because nowadays the customers or audience is entitled to communicate in real time and directly to organizations or brands using specific channels such as social media, something that didn’t exist during Marketing 1.0 where communication was unidirectional (brand to customer only). 

 The audience is now free to communicate and express opinions and make them public. An important new element to marketing was born and that baby was called “engagement”, and here’s where the excitement begins. 

  • Engagement is how the audience interacts or connects with brands on a specific channel. It’s mostly used on digital platforms and its goal in life is to measure the relationship between the parties. Every brand strives to have a close bond/symbiotic relationship with the targeted audience.

Fifth Harmony's organic engagement

So why am I writing all this technical lingo? 

Because after following their journey since the X Factor I can say that Fifth Harmony is the perfect example of an artist that besides being insanely-freakin-incredibly talented, they are also a brand with such a ridiculous organic engagement that any brand  or organization would kill to have. And the keyword to keep in mind  is "ORGANIC".


 You may agree with me that so far there hasn’t been any huge investment or effort from their label to generate that engagement, the responsability of this is solely under 5 names: Normani Kordei, Lauren Jauregui, Camila Cabello, Ally Brooke Hernandez and Dinah Jane Hansen just by being themselves.

That's supposed to be Cupid. Yeah, same.


 The authenticity behind the 5 girls and their fearless way of showing their values and what they stand for, have not only hooked their fans, but also have people from all ages around the world falling in love with them since the very beginning.  

 And here my friends is where the organic engagement lies and the reason why all their fans are so passionate and loyal to their 5 girls: authenticity at its finest. And the girls are not afraid to show it during interviews, on their personal social networks, appearances, etc. For example:






The level of engagement the Fifth Harmony brand has reached is such that their fans have even taken action to help by creating accounts specifically to plan and organize ways to reach a certain goal, update on radio information, create trends to promote and more to help Fifth Harmony become even more successful.



 Harmonizers are also the responsibles behind them winning an MTV Video Music Award for “Artist To Watch” last year even before having an album out. And the most amazing thing of all?everything they do is out of “LOVE” because a relationship with their girls exists regardless the distance, language, age difference, etc. 

 Even Simon Cowell has acknowledged the Harmonizers' impact by stating that “It's fans who've made this happen...”.


Some Receipts:

 1. Strategic Alliances with Important brands 

Companies such as Barbie, WetSeal, Clean&Clear, Affliction and more have seen Fifth Harmony's potential to sell their products thanks to their brand engagement and influence. 

 Also mentioning the girl group on any of their social media networks helped them get better response from the target.


Fifth Harmony for Barbie
2. Quantity isn’t everything. Engagement is EVERYTHING

The number of followers doesn't matter if your audience doesn’t connect with you and your content. Yes, the golden rule of QUALITY over QUANTITY prevails here. Fifth Harmony's overall performance on their social media channels are on fleek compared to to others.

 For example, let’s compare some numbers of followers and level of engagement from different Twitter accounts that have a similar target with posts on the same day (we will use number of RTs and Favorites to measure):



 Ciara: 6.37M followers
Fifth Harmony: 2.09M followers



Ciara has more time in the industry but she just came back from a long break. Ciara is also signed to Epic Records. Even though she has a lead of 4M followers more than 5H, the 5 girls engagement game is better.


Little Mix : 6.78M followers
Fifth Harmony: 2.09M followers


There's a similarity to both posts. Both include a multimedia element (which is supposed to generate more engagement.) But the difference in followers is massive. Fifth Harmony's social engagement is still greater.


The Vamps: 2.65M followers
Fifth Harmony: 2.09M followers



Not even the pic of shirtless guys can beat Fifth Harmony's engagement and positive message. 


 There’s no doubt Fifth Harmony has the strongest brand engagement game and so far they have one of the most important marketing keys to success: their fans’ loyalty and Fifth Harmony’s organic relationship with the audience. 

 Plus the army of Harmonizers around the world working along side their girls to reach their sales, marketing and radio goals.  They are probably one of the best allies the group’s management and label could have to make Fifth Harmony the next big girl group of the decade.



A brand that has their customers(fans) working, spreading the word and promoting in honor to their relationship is GOALS to any brand.


- Kiki (@kikregui)

Special thanks to Oier & Amira for proof reading and for their suggestions!



  • Get Fifth Harmony's latest single "Worth It" HERE



Read More about Fifth Harmony:
Fifth Harmony's Google Popularity Report (May 15th, 2015)

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