Crowd Control

British media coverage concerning what song will sit at the top of the UK Singles Chart on December 25th – a.k.a., the “Christmas #1” – has risen to such fervor that you might think they were discussing possible outcomes of the World Series, the Super Bowl or… whatever those English types do for their so-called “football” (just kidding).

But for the last 4 years the victor has seemed almost pre-ordained, as each Noel found the winner of that year’s  “X-Factor” show sitting atop the heap. And up until a few weeks ago, this year’s winner, Joe McElderry, must have been feeling pretty good about his chances to repeat the cycle.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the quorum…

Jon Morter is a part-time DJ and rock fan from Essex. In 2008, on a whim, he tried to gather online support to make Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up” that year’s Christmas #1. He failed, but was intrigued enough by the response he got to try again this year – opting this time, to promote Rage Against the Machine’s expletive-filled 1992 track “Killing in the Name.”

His plan? A coordinated social media effort to generate an extreme uptick in sales during the one week it would matter.

Jon started a Facebook group dedicated to his cause and quickly started to see the power of a motivated ”brand community.” The group grew exponentially – in both awareness and support – simply by nature of the message (and the media). Then on December 15^th, successful comedian Peter Serafinowicz rallied his more than 268,000 Twitter followers to act. With Peter’s goose, Morter’s no-budget awareness effort snowballed into a popular campaign that eventually gathered the support of thousands of fans, former X-Factor winners and even Sir Paul McCartney.

When the smoke cleared, more than 500,000 copies of a 17-year-old song were sold over the course of a single week – and “Killing in the Name” was the new Christmas #1. Rage Against the Machine, the unknowing benefactors of the achievement, even pledged to give all profits from their single to charity.

Does this mean that Social Media is always going to be more effective than the traditional marketing machine that drives “X-factor?”

Of course not. Morter’s campaign played off a brand built via traditional media, and no doubt was juiced by many mentions in the traditional media.

Yet this story does highlight the communication power of the exponential networks of friends and followers to which almost all of us are now attached.

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