Research & Planning: Cover Drive branding & marketing

Cover Drive started making youtube videos to help promote themselves on the internet and for people to recognise their music and their style. This was successful as this is how they got noticed and signed by their record label.

This is the first video they put up

After being signed up they automatically started working on music for a single and an album and in the process putting up more videos on them doing cover songs on YouTube to help promote themselves. They created a Twitter to help build their fan base and a Facebook page. Their biggest way of promoting their music when they first started was their first ever gig, opening for Rihanna at her Loud tour in Barbados. As well as Twitter, YouTube and Facebook, they also have a Tumblr page uploading photos, by using these social networks this is good for their fan base as the fans can connect with them through any of the social networks as the band do reply personally back to some fans.

The band are a Caribbean band, therefore they try to reflect this through the image as well as their music for example wearing bright clothing. Amanda is the lead singer and the only girl in the band, therefore all eyes are on her when she is performing, so she wears fashionable clothes that you may not normally see people wearing in the streets and she creates a persona when she is singing and performing to make her look more professional.

As well as promoting themselves online, they have also done many shows to help promote their new singles for example performing for a wide, large audience like T4 on the beach, Summertime Ball, Dappy Rockstar Tour (that they went on only after releasing 1 single), JLS tour and Kelly Clarkson UK tour as well as small, intimate audiences such as at clubs and Universities. In addition, being guest stars on many TV shows such as Blue Peter, Freshly Squeezed, This Morning etc... performing live and being interviewed helps people hear them live and get to know them through the interviews.

T4 on the beach 2012

Summertime Ball 2012

JLS Tour 2012

As they are from Barbados, this makes them stand out from other bands as it is rare to find a popular Bajan band and also because Rihanna is from Barbados, the press tend to have compared them to Rihanna in the past because they are both from Barbados, even though Rihanna is a solo and Cover Drive are a band, this catches people's attention.