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American Express mobilizes Unstaged program via Taylor Swift interactive app

Author

Chantal Tode
American Express is teaming up with Taylor Swift on a mobile application giving fans a deep dive on the pop star?s latest single via a 360-degree, interactive experience.
 
While Ms. Swift recently withdrew from mobile-driven music streaming service Spotify, this effort with American Express shows that she clearly recognizes the potential of mobile to engage her fans. Using the app, fans can follow along with the video for the Blank Space single, which is number one on the HOT 100 chart, and explore its setting in a lavish mansion by moving their phone or tablet and tapping certain elements in the video interface.
 
?Our American Express Unstaged platform has always been about connecting some of the biggest names in music with their fans through digital innovation, but we were interested in bringing it to a whole new level,? said Walter Frye, director of entertainment marketing at American Express.
 
?The opportunity to bring Taylor?s fans into her stories through in a never-been-done before 360-degree, immersive experience was an ideal way for us to launch our mobile app presence while giving something very special to Taylor and her fans,? he said.
 
Concert promotion
The app, which also includes an Easter egg hunt, shows how American Express is mobilizing a concert promotion strategy built around a series of films under the Unstaged umbrella.
 
The American Express Unstaged program was created in 2010 in partnership with Vevo and YouTube. It pairs a musical artist with a director to deliver digital musical experiences for fans. Previous Unstaged collaborations have included Pharrell Williams and Spike Lee as well as Kings of Leon and Fred Armisen.
 
The American Express Unstaged Taylor Swift Blank Space Experience App is available to download for free from the Apple App Store and Google Play.

 
Within the app, fans can explore the video?s six different rooms and encounter ancillary characters connected to the storyline that only appear in the interactive version of the Blank Space video.
 
For example, in the course of following Ms. Swift and her fictional love interest throughout the video, fans can tap-open a book on a coffee table to find personal photos of the pop star from her younger years that have never been shared before.
 
Hidden content
Users will also come across clues leading them on a hunt for 41 various collectibles from Ms. Swift?s personal and professional life that are hidden within the app experience.
 
The app also includes behind-the-scenes footage, exclusive interviews with Ms. Swift, tour dates, the option to purchase the album and information from the American Express Unstaged program.  
 
The app was first unveiled on ABC?s Good Morning America show yesterday.

 
The music video premiered on Nov. 10 on music video app Vevo as well as online and on television.
 
The video can also be viewed on YouTube at YouTube.com/TaylorSwiftVEVO.
 
Blank Space is the latest single from Ms. Swift?s new album, 1989.
 
?For the first time ever in the music space, fans can literally go inside the storyline of Taylor?s ?Blank Space? music video through an immersive, 360-degree video experience,? Mr. Frye said. ?Both the official music video and the digital Experience were developed in tandem, seamlessly weaving the narrative of ?Blank Space? across both platforms. 
 
?This allows fans to experience the story through the video and then essentially step into the world of ?Blank Space? allowing them to explore the video?s fictional setting, and uncover clues and exclusive notes and photos from Taylor?s personal life,? he said.
 
Final Take
?Chantal Tode is senior editor on Mobile Marketer, New York