Case Studies

Source: Something Special Campaign Wrap, v24: campaign 5/8 to 9/1/26, figures as of 9/17/26 except Linkfire, Marquee and Showcase, press, D2C sales, the FUGA DSP and territory splits and audience geography, which are as of 9/1.

Delivery through September 17 across six platforms, with Spotify Marquee in its own section below. Clicks and CTR are as each platform reports them; Snapchat's clicks are swipes. YouTube and Search were bought for views and cheap clicks, so their low CTR is by design.

Ad media by platform, from the Spend column of the table below, with YouTube's three flights ($29,732, $5,339 and $424) shown as one $35,495 segment in Google's hue. Spotify Marquee ($21,156) sits outside this $97,930 and has its own section.

Benchmarks are the latest published planning averages (Whatagraph, Digital Applied, Shno, CalculateCPM, MightyScout and InfluencerFee, 2026), not audited music-vertical data. YouTube and Search were bought for views and cheap clicks, so their low CTR is by design; YouTube CPV uses Google Ads paid views. Where sources disagree (LocalIQ's 2026 Arts & Entertainment search benchmark of $1.63 CPC and 12.75% CTR against Digital Applied's $0.63 and 5.62%), the table uses the source already anchoring the rest.

How the seed started it

Chaotic Good went live in release week. Three creators did 5.3M views in three days (its_gamma 5/26, jasonshields_ 5/27, hebaglow 5/28), and the sound went from 37 videos on day one to 294 by 5/30.

Then the organic wave

tweakingg (6/16, 1.76M) and sofireynes (6/12, 980K) took it from there. TikTok sound views per week went from 513K in release week to 1.36M in the week of 9/4, with no decay, and the sound has held about 1.35M a week through 9/17.

Earned against paid

15.5M earned views at no media cost, more than all 15.2M paid TikTok views; $0.74 per 1,000 sound-usage views on $20,900 of actual creator spend.

Basis

Songstats, 9/17, is the single basis for every sound-usage figure. It restates its TikTok and Shorts history between pulls, so the Shorts video count moved from 1,147 to 558 without a matching change in views. FUGA's panel counts higher (TikTok 31.5M views) and is not used here.

Streams

7,830,768 Luminate streams activity to date on the October 19 Connect export, 5.11M stream equivalents and 969 song sales (66,122 in the week to Oct 15). The wrap's KPI overview through 9/15 read 7,504,639, of which 7,501,156 were on-demand (3,905,251 premium, 3,595,905 ad-supported). About 12.0M all-in audio and video including Content ID. Top markets on FUGA's 8/29 territory split: United States 5.67M (78%), Japan 169K, Canada 157K, Mexico 132K, Philippines 106K

Sound usage

28.12M creator sound-usage views across TikTok, Instagram and YouTube Shorts (Songstats, 9/17), 15.5M of them earned at no media cost: more than all 15.2M paid TikTok views. TikTok 829 videos, Instagram 4,269 reels, YouTube Shorts 558. The sound has held about 1.35M views a week through 9/17

Videos

13.94M views across four videos on YouTube and Vevo by 9/17: the official music video 12,289,900 in 42 days, the lyric video 1,208,181, the Topic audio 306,176 and the Behind The Scenes video 139,667. 12.61M more on social video posts, 11.12M of it from the two Out Now posts

Playlists

88 Spotify playlists all-time, 11 of them Spotify editorial, and 25 live on 9/17; 7.28M lifetime Spotify playlist reach, 5.64M live at the 6/6 peak; 13 Amazon editorial playlists. This Is Khalid (1.1M followers, #4 peak) is still on after 16 weeks. All New K-Pop #3, New Music Friday Japan #13, France #34, Canada #66, and UAE, Egypt, Maghreb and Belgium; Groovin' R&B #13, Next Up #54, All New Pop. MTV Fresh Out #5 peak, Lagu TikTok Viral 2026 #8, World Top 40 #24 peak. Apple Music Relationship Goals #3, New in Pop #3 and New Music Daily; Amazon Brand New Music #15; Deezer 100% Khalid #1 peak; YouTube Music K-Pop x Pop #7. Across services on the September 15 count: 118 placements, 32 live (88 Spotify, 13 Amazon Music, 6 TIDAL, 6 YouTube, 4 Apple Music, 1 Deezer)

Charts

#39 on Spotify's Daily Top Songs USA (6/6), entering at #124 on 6/1 and charting 9 days. #1 on Local Pulse in New York City, Seattle, Austin, Phoenix, San Diego, Portland, Charlotte and Indianapolis, and top 10 in 16 more US cities. Charted in 27 countries: 14 Apple Music entries in 10 countries (best #2, Vanuatu Pop) and 25 iTunes entries in 17 (Guatemala Pop #6, Japan Pop #17). 36 Spotify chart entries all-time; 81 across all platforms on the September 15 count (36 Spotify, 25 iTunes, 14 Apple Music, 4 Shazam, 2 YouTube)

Second wind

The Aug 6 video drew 12.29M views in 42 days, 1.39M in a single day on 8/12, 138K Linkfire visits in MV week and Shazam South Korea Viral #14 (8/13). On the September 15 figures it lifted streams 70.9% in its first week and, on that document's higher creator-view count rather than the Songstats sound usage above, added 18.8M earned creator views in the following reporting week at $1.33 per 1,000

Link traffic (Linkfire, 4/28 to 9/1)

746,867 link visits and 7,540 pre-saves before release; 39,755 DSP clickthroughs (5.3%): Spotify 10,755, Apple Music 9,602, YouTube Music 6,902, Amazon 1,666, Melon, Genie and FLO 1,061, 426 and 272. Visits came from Instagram 365,925, TikTok 125,744, Direct 117,417, Facebook 99,668 and Snapchat 16,500. Biggest days: 6/12 22,163, the day after Marquee wave 2; 7/21 21,184; 5/22 20,115, release day; 8/11 18,254, MV week

Top 40 radio (promoter, 9/17)

#32 peak and #34 on 9/17, 11,392 spins and 10.04M audience impressions, then 13,910 spins and 12.70M audience impressions by Oct 19. The record is losing spins now, so neither figure is expected to grow much from here. Worked at Top 40 since June, with rotation increasing through the latest cycle and ongoing exposure on Ryan Seacrest's American Top 40 countdown and Music Choice Top 40. Songstats independently tracks 2,406 plays on 131 stations on a narrower panel

Shazam

18,986 Shazams by 9/17. South Korea Viral #14 in MV week (8/13); South Korea #143, Seoul city chart #150, Honolulu #91

TV and video channels

The official video is hosted on Vevo, the first video in Vevo's ICYMI Roundup, with 3M pre-roll impressions on its Premium New Pop and Global Pop playlists, CTV on Roku, Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV and Vewd, Vevo Pop on Pluto TV and Samsung TV Plus, and Worldwide Hits Pop Blocks. MTV Live added it in light rotation; Revolt in medium rotation from 8/28; Nickelodeon approved it for airplay; California Music Channel #22 on its video playlist. Vevo's impressions are programming, not bought media

Press (agency report)

43 published placements, 3 interviews and 1 exclusive MV premiere, with 656.6M combined outlet reach (UVPM) across the 42 in the agency's pitching report; TMRW Magazine's Behind The Scenes feature was added 9/17 with no UVPM on file, so it counts in placements but not in reach. Four waves: announcement 5/4 to 5/6, release 5/21 to 5/24, MV 8/6 to 8/7, and the BTS video from 9/14. Forbes interview with Ahn Hyo-seop (29.7M), Rolling Stone Korea interview 6/11 and exclusive MV premiere 8/6 (8.4M each), Yahoo Entertainment (379.9M), MSN (86.9M), Genius Korea (83.0M), LiveJournal (13.6M), Chosun (13.6M), Korea Times interview, South China Morning Post feature (5.6M), Entertainment Tonight, Access Hollywood, and TMRW Magazine's exclusive Behind The Scenes feature. UVPM is outlet reach, not article views

Press (link tracker)

57 of 90 tracked articles on the FANDOM link tracker

Sales

1,648 single sales: 679 CDs sold direct to fans across 430 orders ($2,030.21 net; United States 301, South Korea 156, Japan 125) and 969 digital song sales on Luminate to Oct 19 (937 at wrap, with 618 downloads and $424.07 of Apple affiliate earnings on 129 items)

Audience

The US carried streams (5.67M, 78%); Korea and Southeast Asia carried link traffic (South Korea 90,045 visits, 12%, ahead of the United States at 64,922, 9%, then Japan, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand). At the 6/20 listener peak the top Spotify cities were Chicago 32.7K, Los Angeles 31.8K, Houston 30.3K, Philadelphia 29.9K and Brooklyn 29.5K, matching the Local Pulse #1 footprint. Geography only; no age or gender exists in the connected sources

FANDOM's own audience at release (5/22), on 7/9, the last day before Distant Lover, when Something Special was the newest release, at its peak, and on 9/17. Distant Lover released 7/10, so growth after that date is shared with that single; the 7/9 column is the cleanest read.

Cost per stream

$0.047 on the full $365,365 investment; $0.021 on the $167,865 ad-spend line alone (7.83M Luminate streams to Oct 19; the wrap's $0.049 was on 7.50M through 9/15)

Blended paid-media CPM

$2.16 across six platforms against a $5.50 entertainment benchmark, 61% below

Cost per paid video view

$0.0038 blended across 26.1M paid views; YouTube $0.0045 against $0.024, TikTok $0.0018 against $0.018

Cost per click

Meta $0.044 against $0.70; TikTok $0.099 against $1.41; Google Search/Display $0.080 against $0.63; Snapchat $0.066 against $0.84; Reddit $0.215 against $0.59

Spotify Marquee and Showcase

$1.08 per converted listener (19,560); $2.24 per save (9,440); $0.57 per click (36,820)

Meta reach

$3.43 per 1,000 people reached, 7.0M reach

Creator seeding

$0.74 per 1,000 sound-usage views on $20,900 of actual creator spend; Chaotic Good $1.95 CPM and $0.0019 per view at 16.83% engagement; PlaylistPush $0.58 CPM and $0.0006 per view

Link to DSP

5.3% of 746,867 Linkfire visits clicked through to a DSP (39,755)

Direct-to-fan

$0.09 per click across two Laylo sends (September 15 figures)

• Plan the video as a second launch, not a follow-up.

  The official video drew 12.3M views in 42 days on $29,732 of YouTube media, 1.39M in a single day, 138K Linkfire visits in MV week and Shazam Korea Viral #14, and on the September 15 figures it lifted streams 70.9% in its first week. It re-lit the campaign in month three.

• Mid-cycle Spotify beats launch-day Spotify.

  The 6/11 Marquee wave spent $1,403 to convert 2,182 listeners at 3.33%, against $10,000 for 8,513 at 1.29% in release week, and the next day was the biggest Linkfire day of the campaign. I now weight Marquee budgets past week one.

• Creator content was the cheapest reach I bought.

  $20,900 of actual creator spend returned sound-usage views at $0.74 per 1,000, and the 15.5M earned views beat all 15.2M paid TikTok views.

• Every platform bought under benchmark.

  Cost metrics came in 48% to 94% below published benchmarks, including the small Snapchat and Reddit tests: 26.1M paid video views at $0.0038 blended, and Meta clicks at $0.044 against a $0.70 market.

• The artist grew with the record.

  Inside the Something Special window, before Distant Lover, FANDOM's Spotify followers rose 96% and Instagram 178%. Monthly listeners peaked at 950K, 9.3x the start.

• Clean books, and radio still open.

  Plan and actual both land at $365,365; a $37 Reddit variance is the only gap between the platforms and the plan. Radio kept compounding after wrap, from 11,392 spins at 9/17 to 13,910 by Oct 19, before the record began losing spins.