[Outside the Industry] Def Jam Forward: A Record Label Turns to Advocacy

Running a successful record label isn’t only about finding the next big star. Theda Sandiford, SVP, Commerce and Digital at Def Jam Recordings, will give us the inside scoop on how a successful record label managed to make a lasting impact not only for their artists, but for Black Lives and all marginalized communities.

Theda Sandiford, Def Jam Recordings

Notes

• • Theda leads revenue and digital strategy for Def Jam records and has been working in the music industry for the last 20 years 
  • She has won numerous awards and grants as a visual practice artist
  • Hip Hop culture is founded in African tribal music customs and emerged in the early 1980s within the Black community in NYC
  • From its very beginning, Hip-hop has embodied activism
  • Theda was asked to join the label task force in the wake of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd’s murders
  • The goal of Def Jam Forward is to fight for change and support the social awakening and equity for all and to create lasting and meaningful change 
    • The task force successfully lobbied for voters and was able to get people registered to vote
    • The company globally has days off to go vote
  • They worked with corporate communications to bring in new, fresh charitable organizations – over 500 
    • There were only twenty when they started
  • Getting out the vote is the main goal of Def Jam Forward now 
  • Hip-Hop has always been a vessel to fight for social change
  • They hired a corporate compliance officer in order to fight the right way and gain access to politicians and get people out to vote
    • Research showed that people didn’t even know where to vote 
    • They provided voting information such as profiles for all candidates 
    • They hosted voting parties — never underestimate the power of free food
  • Digital service providers, such as Youtube and Spotify, had similar task forces
  • Working together and learning from one another helps you move your own organization forward
  • Def Jam focused on its strengths — musicians and connections
    • They sent artists out with pizza and filmed videos and interviews and roundtable discussions 
    • Every bit of money goes to fund Def Jam Forward and the other partner organizations
    • Livestreaming in the last couple of years promoted dialogue and understanding through music and video to highlight diversity, equity, and inclusion
    • The program aims to surprise and delight while moving action forward
    • An artist can make music but they are also influencers, so Def Jam amplified those traits 
    • The purpose now is social advocacy
    • Black and Blue panel Livestream — each artist has recorded music speaking on police brutality, but in this panel, they were able to share their own stories
    • Def Jam Summer Fridays (Series) — DJs at an in-person event
      • They began using this on Twitch and YouTube — they had to fight Twitch to get the rights to have their music on the platform, and they won
      • They raised more than $50,000 on two events
      • The target audience was 18-24 year olds — they each pledged $10 each
      • Each of these events built on each other as they kept learning from them
  • They now do paid events and concerts
  • A goal of Def Jam Forward was to build sustainable programming overtime 
    • Respecting the DJ since 1984 — they used their platform to amplify the DJs and expand them into education
  • Edutainment — Def Jam entertains and educates – how did Def Jam Forward do it?
    • The yellow for the sub-brand is way out of their brand guidelines and it queues to the viewer that this is something different
    • They developed hashtags for rallies  
    • They organized staff to amplify frontline voices on the # — “I got 10k new followers because of you”
    • The staff was decked out in Def Jam gear
  • Def Jam is breaking barriers in the field
    • They celebrated Women’s month and had another compilation record just on women of Def Jam
    • They celebrate women at the company — in 1984 they had very few women working in the hip-hop industry
    • #Frontlinemessages
    • #Ivoted
    • #BreakingBarriers
    • They had artists from all over the world posting 
      • They asked them to share that they had voted 
      • Def Jam gained 1% of the discussion globally 
  • A mix of video messages mixed with static messages played very well with the social algorithms
  • Artists committed to different issues and then wrote a comic with Marvel and shared their aspirations for the future — police brutality, LGBTQ+ rights, mental health
    • One song on an album may just be a statement, but when you put them all together it creates a different experience
    • The record that was handed out at the beginning of the presentation is an example of this — a soundtrack for social justice
  • They also created a social game to help people learn the songs 
    • They are doing another compilation series as well 
    • By listening to the community, they know what they need to deliver 
  • Mental Health and Personal Development
    • Theda wanted to start pushing the personal development of staff
    • Mental Health is rarely talked about in Hip-Hop
    • She started a virtual mental health day and staff began using the tools that the company provided for mental health
    • Use breakout rooms to discuss communications and breakdowns 
      • Communication is the cause of most breakdowns
    • She noticed that digital literacy was lacking and people couldn’t share their stories or thoughts and experiences
      • She created a weekly digital happy hour — free booze works too (like food)
      • They have guest speakers and conversations about all kinds of things — NFTS, sports, music, the metaverse, bitcoin
        • These are incredibly valuable because now there is a baseline understanding of all of these concepts
  • Day to day experience as a Black woman in the world has not changed much in two years
    • The amount of gaslighting and othering behavior would shock you
    • When you add in inflation, the assault on women’s rights, and the war in Ukraine, there’s a lot to handle, so Theda focuses her energy on the one issue 
  • Free Your Mind is a public textile art that collects and exhibits personal narratives
    • It’s becoming a bit of a physiological experiment
    • Theda is taking this to other cities and building a website that you can click on and see the stories
    • She just received a grant and is going to add all kinds of things that bring this project to life
  • Surviving the revolving door of trauma — she hopes for a life free of all of these things that people are struggling with and being bombarded with every single day 
  • Theda is bringing people together to assemble something new and she is a creative activist seeking justice for the social arts 
  • Questions: 
    • Def Jam rolls out campaigns the same way they roll out their records
      • They have a meeting every Friday where they talk about all of their social justice work since they use the same channels – they run Def Jam Forward like a business
      • They are also able to move money around to pay for these services 
    • HR and Corporate Communications
      • HR loves Def Jam Forward because they advocate for all the things they care about
      • Corporate Comms is another story – there are times when “they don’t need to know this”
      • They sometimes have to pivot to find new ways to get exciting ideas done 
    • Internal Campaigns for change tips:
      • No one wants to talk about mental health, but then you see people suffering and see how they’re impacted – reaching out to your team to make sure they’re okay shows that you care
        • People are really suffering from the issues and we need to do something about
        • Personally reach out and offer help and invite them to join events
      • Cancel stuff – mandatory 24 hours without looking at email and taking calls off
        • Sometimes the job isn’t the right fit for you and it also allows for others who are excited about it
      • Winning trust 
    • Evolution of your role as a leader
      • She feels that she is doing the same job – educating and informing and being curious 
      • The best skill to have as a digital person is being curious
      • Things get recycled – you drive new things but other things come back (ex. Vine to TikTok)
      • Attaching fan clubs to NFTs – she’s doing the same thing but the platforms have changed (ex. records to Spotify)
      • Ownership model to an attention economy 
      • Theda went to Barnes and Noble and bought HTML for Dummies to learn how to build Def Jam a website 
        • Digital knowledge is now a baseline 
    • What tools does the team lean into?
      • We love Slack
      • Monday.com
      • Box
      • Zoom
      • Microsoft tools 
      • Adobe Suite
      • Tons of free tools online and on app stores
      • Def Jam uses everything and they’re willing to try everything 
      • They have built great efficiencies through all of these tools
      • They are early on a lot of things – one of the first advertisers on FB and one of the first to put videos on YouTube without a licensing agreement 
    • The process of wrangling artists for Def Jam Forward
      • It is easier to do when it’s their idea
      • Jadakiss wanted to deliver pizzas to the frontline workers
        • The news came out about this and then several other artists said “we’re doing something similar”
      • Ask and listen to what they want to do 
      • In the past two years, people have really wanted to get out there and do something 
      • If it’s something the artist cares about then they really want to do it 
      • Finding people from the songs are generally already halfway there because they’ve talked about it
    • Planning
      • Set goals and KPIs up front – we want x people to show up
      • Every day they look at how far away they are from reaching their goal
        • This is the same that they do for their advocacy work
      • How much did I get? Personal stories, messages, videos, etc. 
      • Most of the time people want to be seen and heard
    • Why do you show up at the office every day?
      • “I make people’s dreams come true, what could be better than that?”
      • Theda meets with people and finds out what their goals are, then she and Def Jam Forward makes it happen