As Easy As One, Two, Bree

Being involved with the High School Musical stars from the early days and Ashley Tisdale’s tour with High School Musical, I had the opportunity to watch Zac Efron’s career unfold up close from the early days. He set himself apart from the other cast members making not only smart PR and Movie Role decisions, but smart brand decisions. Every role, every magazine cover, every appearance, even every public outing was extremely strategic and on purpose to set apart Zac as “the guy from High School Musical” and really show the world Zac, the person, the actor, the brand.

Part of making that brand wasn’t just to set him apart from HSM, but also to make strategic steps away from the tween crowd and as a respectable actor, and here’s the key… mainstream. Mainstream meaning, guys and girls of all ages.

Yet, through all his smart movie role choices, etc. He still has NO website or web presence. I’m sure if we spoke to the manager they have some calculated intentional reason as to why, but I’m sorry, I don’t buy any argument against not having a website.

I do not think he should have a teen crazy site so girls can just comment “OMG OMG OMG” on the homepage, because, well that would just defeat the purpose of his mainstream re-branding. And I always hear the argument from celebrities about how it’s part of the plan to stay larger than life, and separated from “regular” people. But no one said it your website or presence had to portray you that way. The whole point of owning your web presence is just that… you own it. You control it. Yes, a community is a living breathing thing, but you have to make calculated steps to lead it the way you like it to go. It just doesn’t make any sense to me to not have one. I also tell all my clients and friends that their e-mail list, or whatever you are keeping it on (twitter, facebook, etc.), is going to be one of your most valuable assets online.

Unfortunately (or fortunately for my business) a lot of actors lean this way. They have never had to build a brand in the past like you have to today. Before, the movie studios did your marketing, and your choice of movie roles did your branding. In my experience, this side of entertainment, the talent marketing side is way behind the times. Although Zac might not need the website for his career, imagine how much more could be happening with it.  It will be interesting to see what Zac finally ends up putting on ZacEfron.com. I’m sure it won’t dissapoint, it will be just a little behind the times.

In the meantime here’s just a sampling of that progression and some of Zac’s key moves (Pictures courtesy of the online destination that IS controlling Zac’s web presence, teen fan site Zefron.com):

promoting HSM in Teen People '07

First big cover opp on Cosmo Girl '07

First big step into re-branding. This cover blasted Zac in front of the eyes of a mainstream (and not just female) audience.

After starring in Hairspray and HSM3, promoting his latest movie 17 Again with the cover of GQ

Photo opp from the GQ spread. So long High School Musical.