February 23rd, 2011
Dear American Idol Producers,
I hate to say it, but most of us have stopped drinking the Kool-Aid. Wait, Okay, I take that back.
But the point remains the same. No one who wins American Idol is actually the winner. Remember Taylor Hicks? No. Remember Chris Daughtry? Yes. They were both contestants on season five of American Idol. Taylor Hicks took home the gold while Chris Daughtry took home whatever precious metal they give to fifth. Since getting the early boot, Chris and his band Daughtry have sold more albums than Taylor Hicks or any other American Idol contestants except Kelly Clarkson and Carrie Underwood. Just to re-cap, in 10 seasons of the show, only those 2 winners have actually been winners, at least on the basis of album sales.
A common understanding in marketing is that things people say in a market survey or focus group are not always the best indicators of their actual behaviors. For example, a consumer can tell you that they like a product at first glance and would be inclined to purchase it. Then the product hits the shelf and people are not buying it like they said they would. Sometimes these failures are epic- think New Coke or Heinz’s Purple Ketchup. This is the primary goal of the marketer- to determine which stated consumer preferences they will actually act on when economic tension hits the equation.
This is the condition from which American Idol suffers. The show is one giant survey of consumers about which product (in this case, the show’s contestants) they like the most. Of course, it would ruin the spirit of the show if the question was explicitly phrased as, “Which contestant’s music would you most likely purchase? And how likely are you to purchase the music?” Therefore, when the album release date comes, the millions of people who vote for contestants weekly are nowhere to be seen. Unfortunately, the show’s premise is built around the fallacy that consumers will buy what they (at least implicitly) say they will buy.
So what went wrong, American Idol? My first thought is that AI is open to the public viewing and voting. Generally, a marketing survey or focus group is geared toward the consumer group of a particular product. With AI, they aren’t polling album buyers. They’re polling TV show watchers. Second, the show’s format doesn’t allow people to showcase their best music each week. Being a great singer across all genres like 60’s night, love songs, or country music doesn’t equal great success. Most musicians excel within a specific genre and, with the exception of the few cross-over country and pop artists rarely do musicians try to appeal to multiple genre audiences.
As we all know, American Idol recently tried to re-invigorate the show, which has seen a decline in both ratings and album sales, with new judges. (I secretly wonder if they did focus groups or surveys to see who viewers would like the most, although I suspect they did.) Because the format of the show hasn’t changed, I don’t expect next year’s winner to do any better in album sales than Taylor Hicks or Ruben Studdard. If they truly want to sell albums, they need to find other ways to figure out which artists consumers want to hear more from. For example, they could use digital sales of recordings from the performances à la Glee. If AI could actually offer the previous night’s songs the next day on iTunes, they could let sales numbers factor into the voting and get a much better indicator of actual consumer opinions. Also, they could simply let each artist record a short EP prior to the show’s launch, although that doesn’t allow for the “growth” that America loves to see and rewards in artists.
In light of all that has happened in the past 10 seasons – From Justin to Kelly, McPheever, and Ellen DeGeneres – I plead with you, American Idol producers, change it up, ok?
Your former fan,
Hannah
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