Over the past few years, Christian rapper NF has repeatedly snuck up on the mainstream, delivering a string of top three albums on the Billboard 200 with increasingly impressive numbers. And this week, he did it again — NF’s new album Hope (NF Real Music/Virgin) debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 with 123,000 equivalent album units, and No. 1 on the Top Album Sales chart with 80,500 sales in its first week while setting a personal record for most streams in a week.
It’s the result of six months of work by his label and distribution partner, Virgin Music, which included multiple variant releases, signed CDs, a nationwide in-person indie retail campaign and dedicated work with the DSP partners ahead of the album’s release. And that work helps Virgin Music senior vp of commercial marketing Cindy James earn the title of Billboard’s Executive of the Week.
Here, James breaks down all the elements of the rollout campaign that landed NF his fourth straight top three album, including the sales and streaming strategies that helped push the project over the top. “People traditionally think of ‘distribution’ or ‘label services’ as one step removed from the process, but at Virgin Music Group, we look at ourselves as partners in this space and are entirely in the game of breaking artists, driving hits and label development,” James says. “We are globally connected and coordinated with the thoughtful strategy behind every move we make while always asking ourselves what’s right for the artist, the project and the label.”
This week, NF’s new album Hope debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200, moving 123,000 equivalent album units in its first week. What key decisions did you make to help make this happen?
NF is an artist unto his own, commanding an audience across all formats, creating a deeper level of fan connection through high-touch moments while letting his art lead the conversation. Our job is to find ways to connect, collect and convert the fans at every possible touchpoint of the rollout. The Virgin Music team went deep into planning mode six months before the release, strategizing every element of the commercial landscape, including activations across streaming, physical retail, direct to consumer and music video. The album was delivered with enough time to have all configurations available day and date while giving the editorial marketplace time to live with the album and develop meaningful rollout strategies. We approach every release campaign with a sound understanding of the artist’s vision and goals for their project.
A strong understanding of the weighted elements that make up the Billboard chart calculations is critical in delivering impactful results. This is a testament to our first single and title track off the album “HOPE,” debuting top 50 on the Hot 100 chart and driving the album to No. 2 on the Billboard 200 album charts upon release. We implemented early tactics across multiple formats and configurations to achieve many No. 1s for this project, including topping the Top Album Sales, Vinyl Album Sales, Independent Albums and Top Rap, R&B/Hip-Hop Albums charts, all of which were achieved in our debut week.
Chris Woltman and Ashley Pimenta [element1 Management] and the CCMG team were invested, committed and incredible to work with across every aspect of this rollout, enabling the proper access to the artist and moments of opportunity that make a meaningful impact. This was a globally coordinated campaign with Virgin Music’s head of marketing, Adam Starr, spearheading creative marketing activations, and Capitol Music Group’s Kieran Thurgood, Jessica Staats and Mollie Chen leading the international charge, and never-ending support of our president Jacqueline Saturn.
Hope topped the album sales chart, moving 80,500 units last week. What was the sales strategy you guys employed for this release?
We have a very committed artist who spent weeks signing many albums made available for fans to purchase at independent retail stores across the country and his online D2C store. In addition to the signed CDs, we had multiple configurations available for this release, including four box sets and exclusive vinyl variants. We utilized many of the DSPs’ merchandise integrations to move units and meet the fans where they were. This was a successful tactic for us. These physical copies are just as much of a collectible item for a fan as they are a method of consumption.
In addition to the signed albums for the indie retailers, we bolstered their offerings with a gift with purchase and several in-store signing appearances nationwide. This was Nate’s first time doing in-store signings, and we had fans lining up as early as 2 a.m. at some locations. The level of planning, attention to detail and tenacity in ensuring these signing appearances went smoothly were expertly executed by Steven Dizon from our commercial team, who flew around the country to handhold every aspect of the signing with the stores, leaving both the artist and our retail partners feeling confident and supported through each event. These signings broke each record store’s previous artist appearance attendance and sell-through in recent memory. For a retailer like Reckless Records in Chicago, which has been around for 30 years, that’s an incredible feat to achieve.
The album’s first week also represented NF’s biggest streaming week yet for any album. What did you do, in terms of strategies employed, to help bolster the release at DSPs?
We delivered the album to DSPs almost three months ahead of release, which not only allowed the editorial marketplace to live with the record but enabled a pre-add at Apple Music which achieved the coveted No. 1 most pre-added album rolling into release week and was included in Spotify’s launch of their on-platform pre-save and Countdown pages, which has yielded this release as one of their most successful on-platform pre-saves of all time.
On release, we had a two-single approach across the Pop, Hits and Hip-Hop genres, with “HAPPY” our Top 40 radio single, crossing into the Pop and Hits placements and “CAREFUL” featuring Cordae for the Hip-Hop lists with a primary focus at Apple Music, which delivers a higher weighting of streams in the charts and a core song for their subscribers — another tactic to bolster our first-week number. For most of the release week, we had every song from the album in Apple Music’s Top 200 Hip-Hop singles chart, the No. 1 album on the Hip-Hop genre chart, and the No. 2 album overall on the platform. These chart placements in themselves drive additional on-platform visibility.
The album is NF’s fourth straight top three release on the Billboard 200, yet he hasn’t had a top 40 Hot 100 hit since 2017. In a singles-driven streaming world, how do you maximize attention on his albums?
“HAPPY” is an absolute smash that will leave you with goosebumps. This record is impacting Top 40 radio now and was strategically released in line with the album to ensure the discovery of this single to mainstream audiences drive back to the album. When our team and partners together heard the single presented by the artist, we all locked eyes knowingly of having an enormous hit on our hands that will take this entire campaign into 2024. It’s the kind of song where you feel it — no data needed. It was a shared moment that we will remember as a defining moment entering this campaign.
The past few years have seen dozens of new entrants in the distribution and label services space. How has the role of a distributor changed and how does Virgin continue to evolve to meet the needs of artists these days?
People traditionally think of “distribution” or “label services” as one step removed from the process, but at Virgin Music Group, we look at ourselves as partners in this space and are entirely in the game of breaking artists, driving hits and label development. We are globally connected and coordinated with the thoughtful strategy behind every move we make while always asking ourselves what’s right for the artist, the project and the label.
