Taylor Swift, regardless if you like her music or not, is a business genius. Swift has been the talk of the world for the past year and people can’t seem to get enough of her. Whether you love or hate her, you for sure know who she is and what she does. From arguments to agreements, she’s still the topic of conversation. What’s not been talked about enough though is how she has made herself so well known and successful.
Many conversations had about Taylor Swift have to do with her songwriting skills. There’s only ever one question; Is Taylor Swift’s music actually that great? In honesty, the answer to that debate of if she really is a good songwriter or not is unimportant. That question alone has polarized the nation; people either love or hate her. There is no in between.
Jeetendr Sehdev, a branding expert and bestselling author of The Kim Kardashian Principle: Why Shameless Sells (and How to Do it Right), mentions, “When you get that extreme on the Richter scale, you don’t just have fans, you create fanatics. Those fanatics have a level of dedication that is beyond anything you’ve ever seen. It’s something else.”
She didn’t gain all these fanatics solely because of the controversy of her song lyric choices though. Her social media use plays a big part in her fame. Swift has a strong understanding of using social media for genuine interaction, not just promotion.
One of her tactics she uses is similar to the one by the hugely successful superhero franchise, Marvel; the use of easter eggs. Easter eggs are akin to hidden treasures waiting to be unearthed. In Swift’s franchise, they could be hidden in the clothes she’s wearing, details in music videos, or even specific emojis she uses on her instagram.
“Consumers love the feeling of accomplishment when they figure out a puzzle, ” writes Ian Ausdal at WIUX, a student-operated FM college radio station in Blooming, Indiana.
Any Marvel fan could agree to this statement, for there are many Easter eggs hidden within their movies. It’s not a coincidence that Swift is just as well known as the movie franchise.
“To find answers, they search for clues in artists’ past works, which increases streams and sales for older releases, marketing them to the public in a new light. This leads to the growth of an artist’s fanbase,” Ausdal writes. “As fans work together to sort out clues, excitement about the artist spreads to people who were originally unfamiliar.”
Swift gives many Easter eggs before she drops a new album. Before Evermore’s release, an album from 2020, Swift styled her hair in a French braid and used tree emoji, which were later revealed to mirror the styling of the album.
In another case, the simple act of tweeting a red heart emoji led fans to suspect that her re-release of Red would be her next album.
Another thing that has helped make her the talk of the town is that she is continually renovating herself.
In the 2020 Netflix documentary Miss Americana, Swift remarks, “the female artists I know of have to remake themselves, like, 20 times more than the male artists or else you’re out of a job.”
It’s been almost two decades since we’ve seen Swift show herself in Nashville with cowgirl hats, boots, and big hair, pronouncing herself as a native country singer. Since then, we’ve seen many sides of her.
There was the 1989 era in which she performed in the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show, surrounding herself with supermodels. The next era, Reputation, was her take on edginess. She adopted the use of many black outfits and songs with names such as “I did Something Bad.”
Later in 2020 the eras, Folklore and Evermore came about, reflecting more cottage core and Indy vibes. The loose braid and flannel are good representations of this. During this time she began collaborating with less well known artists such as Haim and Bon Iver.
The Midnights era changed the scene and gave off a way more dreamy feel to it. Her music videos became more mystical with the use of dim lighting. She even collaborated with the well-known Lana Del Rey during this period.
These transformations definitely kept her fan base on the edge and interested. Her broad use of collaborations also allowed for other fan bases to dive into some of her works.
