Is it worth it? An analysis on Louis’ stunts
Lately there has been a shift in how Louis’ stunts are being presented to the fandom, with babygate mentions growing and seemingly being pushed by Louis himself.
I have taken some time to go over some (very arbitrary) success indicators that could possibly justify this push in stunts as a marketing ploy, however I have only confirmed my suspicions that the fanbase IS NOT HAPPY and that has been translating in Louis’ numbers.
(May I add that I focused more on louis’ relationship with his fanbase and I know that’s not everyone’s definition of success so I also added streaming numbers)
I took my numbers from this website and I looked through late 2021 and 2022 mostly
Starting off, lets look at Louis’ twitter following and activity:
Throughout August, September, October and November 2021, louis gained between 20k and 40k followers each month, those numbers were much higher during the earlier months of 2021, so what could have sparked that change?
The first picture of louis with F in years dropped in August, which happens to coincide with the sudden drop in Louis’ following
In December, the First Christmas BS happened, and that generated a drop in his following (he didn’t actually start losing followers until 2022, but he only gained 4K in December 2021) that would be weird on its on, but paired with the start of his tour (in which his numbers should be increasing much more) it was very obviously correlated.
Now onto 2022, which was quite an eventful year
2022 marked the start of LTWT which was not only an incredible time for preexisting fans could have been a great opportunity to increase his fanbase by giving him more visibility, especially paired up with a new album. We’ll see that this wasn’t the case
The beginning of the year presented Louis with a slow, especially if compared to 2021, but steady raise in following. This drastically changed in July.
The infamous dm leak happened on July 30th 2022 and it greatly impacted the fandom, which was translated into Louis social media following. Looking at it comparatively, in June 2022 he gained 129k followers, in July that number dropped to 26k, showing the impact of those final 2 days. In August, his numbers only continued to drop, with him losing 7k.
With the album announcement, one could’ve expect a raise in following and activity, but the opposite happened, and I can’t help but link it with the marketing strategy that was chosen, with further mentions of his “personal” life, especially bbg
The promotional interviews began July 2022 still during LTWT and, at first, they were stunt free (with the exception of one Interview on July 21 2022, in which he stumbled when saying F’s name, something he seemed much more comfortable with later on).
September 6, 2022: It is during an interview with Radio Deejay Itália that the mentions truly begin. Louis brings up Freddie unprompted and says he travels to LA often to visit him, from this point forward, the kid is often brought up.
November 2022 we get all those articles saying “louis finds parenting to be challenging”, over 100 copy and paste articles of this nature were posted.
December 2022 the Christmas Bs 2.0 took place, with the kid being flown to the UK and spending around a week there, between Christmas and New Years. The only footage of louis and F interacting was posted on Louis’ birthday, in a short video of the two in a dinner with the rest of the Tomlinsons.
How did this translate in his twitter following? When FITF promo started, Louis only lost followers
September 2022 he lost 33k
November 2022 he lost 29k followers (not good right after an album announcement)
December 2022 he lost 28k followers
January 2023 he lost 43.9k (the most so far)
But did all this only happen to his twitter following? Surely that’s not the only indicator of his success and relationship with his fanbase?
I agree, although louis does seem to use twitter the most when connecting with fans, lets look through his instagram
When FITF promo started, Louis only lost followers
September 2022 he lost 18k
November 2022 he lost 49k followers (not good right after an album announcement)
December 2022 he lost 33k followers
January 2023 he lost 62.8k (the most so far)
Looking at his streaming statistics
(I’m using walls as a comparison for timeline purposes, although im well aware walls promo was far from stunt free, it seems most fans have, understandably, a harder time dealing with bbg than Eleanor)
*Walls debuted at number nine on the US Billboard 200 with 39,000 album-equivalent units
*Faith in the Future debuted at number five on the Billboard 200 selling 43,000 album-equivalent units
So there was obviously an improvement on FITF debut, but has it been consistent since the album release?
The “this is Louis tomlinson playlist” on Spotify
May 2021 The "This Is Louis Tomlinson" playlist reached 250k likes
February 2023 The "This Is Louis Tomlinson" playlist reached 320k likes
Over 100 million streams on Spotify: February 6th, 1 week after its release
Over 100 million streams on Spotify: December 10th, 1 month after its release
So, overall, the situation does not seem to be improving…
I will later go through his tour sales, but given the different venue sizes this could be a bit tricky
My interpretation of those numbers i presented is that no, it is not worth it. Regardless on your opinion about bbg, from a marketing standpoint this image doesn’t seem to be doing Louis any favors…
(Please feel free to add your thoughts, I’d love to have deepen this discussion)
Also, I don’t think any stunt that furthers a queer person’s closeting could ever be “worth it”, this was just my attempt to try to see what could be their motivations for this (although if its commercial success, it’s definitely not working)
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