All Is Bright: Cutting Through Holiday Noise on a Budget
Context
Amazon Music launched a holiday playlist exclusive to Prime members, featuring unconventional artists like Yoko Ono and the Flaming Lips. The release landed during the most competitive and expensive advertising period of the year, where audience attention and media inventory are both heavily saturated.
Situation
The challenge was earning attention during the holiday season without relying on traditional broadcast-heavy media spends. The campaign needed to stand out creatively while remaining cost-efficient and authentic to both the artists and the platform.
Constraints
Media budgets were extremely limited, broadcast inventory carried holiday premiums, and the campaign needed to work across owned channels, organic social, and artist participation without appearing overly promotional.
Decisions
We chose to replace paid scale with participatory mechanics. Rather than pushing messaging outward, the campaign invited fans and artists to co-create, turning engagement itself into the amplification engine.
Execution
CROWN designed and developed a socially integrated microsite where fans created cover art for their favorite artist’s song on the playlist. Submissions were opened to public voting, and winning artwork became official playlist covers and artist social profile images. Distribution relied on Prime Video pre-roll, on-site placements, organic social, and artist-led sharing.
Measurement
Performance was measured through participation and downstream engagement rather than impressions alone, including content creation volume, site traffic, and playlist downloads.
Outcome
With minimal paid media, the campaign generated over 750 artist posts, 50K page views, and 12K playlist downloads, proving that participatory design and creator amplification could outperform traditional holiday media tactics.
Learning
In saturated moments, attention is earned through involvement, not interruption. Systems that empower creators and audiences to participate can outperform paid scale when budgets are constrained.