The Marketing Bestie Podcast with zoeunlimited - here before Adela BLOWS up

Episode Date: August 24, 2026

Breaking down 5 key success factors in Adela's rebrand as your marketing bestie🫶🏻 NEVER start a presentation from scratch again. Try Gamma for FREE https://taap.it/getgammaGet my Adela deck 🩷 https://stan.store/zoeunlimited/p/free-adela-branding-deck→͢͢5 years of social media and marketing notes (free): https://tapx.it/unlimitedyou-challengeJoin our glow up community🤍🧚⁠https://stan.store/dearunlimited/p/glow-mafia-email-list-⁠ ✍🏻FREE EMAIL LIST https://tapx.it/stanzoeunlimited😋today's falvor is strawberry kiwi https://taap.it/salud 🩷 get 10% off with ZOELearn & Grow with me.💖 Instagram: https://tapthe.link/zoeunlimitedig💜 TikTok: https://tapthe.link/zoeunlimitedtiktok🖤 Listen on Apple & Spotify: https://tapthe.link/zoeunlimitedapple https://tapthe.link/zoeunlimitedspotify🪭 All my outfits https://tapthe.link/zoeunlimitedltk👩🏻‍💻 LinkedIn https://tapthe.link/zoeunlimitedlinkedin🛒 Amazon Essentials https://tapthe.link/zoeunlimited👉use code ZOEUNLIMITED for 10% off ALL travels on Klook https://t.ly/aA76T👉 get 30 extra days of free Stan Store https://taap.it/freestanstore📧 Business inquiries: [e-mail] //🕙Timestamps: 0:00 Intro2:57 Adela 1.04:14 Adela 2.0 5:06 Success factor 1 6:44 Success factor 2 8:09 Success factor 3 9:26 Success factor 4 10:49 Success factor 511:43 Homework

This episode is brought to you by Accenture. When your advertising operations fall out of sync, everything else follows. Spotify and Accenture are working together to reinvent the rhythm of ad sales, using automation, analytics, and smarter workflows to simplify campaign delivery and access better data across the business. The result? Less time spent on operations, more time connecting brands with the moments and fandoms that matter most. Learn more at Accenture.com slash Spotify.

can buy you attention, but can it buy you brand? Adela. Adela! Might have gotten the lowest votes that eliminated her from Katzai. Adela will not be joining us in Korea. Thank you for your unwavering hard work and boundless passion. But why does it feel like everyone is talking about her now? Can losing be better for your brand than winning by the end of this video?

You will understand the five branding wins of Adela that you can borrow to turn your losses into wins and why we might be witnessing the role. rise of a very rare generational star. Adela is the next pop superstar and from there it's all going to go up for her. I fear Adela is doing way better than all of Katzai combined. As your marketing bestie, who graduated top 1% UCLA business economics with a background in marketing, we are going to study how to turn the worst rejection into an iconic lasting brand. Through five branding wins, each of which will be more powerful than the last

And I will share at the end what actions you can take for your brand. They'll look at this era in 10 years and we'll be like, like we had it so good, now it sucks. By brand, I don't just me squeezing your face into a girl group. It is how your future college, future boss, future boyfriend sees you. And yes, you have one. I'm creating the series to analyze pop culture icons from a marketing perspective. Because I believe business can actually be fun to learn and hot take.

Making presentation is more fun. I'm not joking, I've actually been making presentations for fun and sending my resource decks made on gamma to my followers. These beautiful decks literally took me less than two minutes to make. Yes, minutes. How? Wow, it is not 2006 anymore. Stop making ugly slides from scratch.

Our partner, Gamma, saves you so much time and frustration with slides for free. So you can focus on building your brand and not changing the font of every single slide. Let's say I want a brand analysis deck for Adela. Open Gamma, pick a template, customize it, done. No design skills required. No blank page, no stress. Just a tool that makes you look amazing, professional smart. And I can send my Adela deck to you for free.

Link in description. And you get to try Gamma now for free. Also link in description. Today's sparkling drink of choice is strawberry kiwi flavored. Originally, I was working on another video when I opened Miss Adela's music video. Immediately stopped what I was doing. Watch five more than spend my entire afternoon. in the Adela universe.

I had to make this video. I actually have not been this excited about an artist for a very long time. True art makes you feel something and I'll go over why Adela's art is so mesmerizing. But first, we have to begin the lore with Adela 1.0 was born to be different. As early as 3, she began taking ballet in Moscow and aspired to be just like Hannah Montana. As she wrote in her song, on, a girl taught herself English at 8 and was determined to be a global pop star.

Where at 19, Adele's dream finally had a once-in-a-lifetime chance of coming true. Moving to LA as one of 120,000 young girls who signed up, Adela joined the Pop Star Academy show by Hype and Geffen Records. These labels are behind the biggest stars. BTS, Olivia Rodrigo, Lana Gaga, Selena Kendrick. This has to be Adela's only chance to shine, right? As we touched on in our cat's eye episode last year, TLDR on the show,

it is literally the Roman gladiators, but instead of sweaty slaves killing each other for the rich to be entertained, its teenage girls pitted against one another for a chance to debut. You're already good. I need you to be better. And Adela was just that lucky.

During the very first challenge, she was one of the first to be eliminated after receiving the fewest fan votes. The story should have ended here, except, Adela 1.0 has to die. So Adela 2.0 can be a f***ing icon. Hi, I'm Adela, and I'm interviewing Adela. Adela 2.0 is becoming that girl.

Touring with Demi Lovato, approved by Grimes, Charlie XX, Christina Aguilera, Chauvin, on the cover of nylon and about to go on her own tour. From Grimes, quote, I mean, the only way you don't become a massive pop star is if you join a nunnery or become you or something. And even then, it's still. Likely. Guys, I am so excited to geek out about this. I'm breaking down Adela's rebrand into five key success factors.

Each, especially the last, is essential to the blow up you're about to see. This is what she was born to do. Like this person said, quote, while most pop girlie spent many years trying to find their brand, Adela came out knowing exactly who the fuck she is. I agree. It is so rare and so refreshing. but nothing is a coincidence. Marketing success factor one, the why.

Every new artist, every new brand deals with this. One question. Why should I care about you specifically? If you don't answer it, your brand will fade faster than your McDonald's ice cream melts. The rejection was actually a gift to Adela. It gave her a story, a reason for people to care. She has an incredibly clear narrative art.

Exceptional talent somehow eliminated but rebuilding publicly. As humans, we love it. love reading for an underdog. This episode is brought to you by Accenture. When your advertising operations fall out of sync, everything else follows. Spotify and Accenture are working together to reinvent the rhythm of ad sales, using automation, analytics, and smarter workflows to simplify campaign delivery and access better data across the business.

The result? Less time spent on operations, more time connecting brands with the moments and fandoms that matter most. Learn more at Accenture. It's not a sob story, but a motivational revenge story. Like Doja, she turns hate and drama into source material. Like finally, apologizing. Mean girls and machine girl, super witty.

Adela, I'm just going to need a lot more rage from you, more vitrial. Her win now becomes a collective win. To fight a system and let talent speak louder than rules and internet votes. How often do we get to watch a megastar rise from before? before they make it. It is often the reverse, where so-and-so is rumored to be another industry plant. And even people of great talent get slapped on that label.

And that's the thing. Your biggest weakness might actually be your biggest asset because you earned your respect. Now the press uses a new framing. Adela was meant to be a solo artist. We see Adela as a solo artist. Hashty, eliminate it, but too big for the group. I'm glad Adela didn't make the group

because she's too damn talented for this hot mess. But how do we 20x that? Marketing success factor two. Visuals. In the digital age, no matter if the product is audio or visual, a brand needs a visual identity. This was crucial to Sabrina Carpenter

going from just another forgotten Disney child to trendsetter, starting with colors. We all know Taylor Swift or red. Sabrina Carpenter for Baby Blue, Charlie XX for Brat Green. It is such a simple but powerful branding technique. Adela owns hot pink to the tea. Her insanely artistic music videos, check, her music cover, check, her Instagram grid down to her Instagram stories, check.

You might not immediately like her, but why can't you forget Adela after the first time you see her? Well, the solo debut began with the perfect hair change, and Hot Pink became her. It is bold, it is loud, and it is unapologetic, it is provoking. Why this is so important is when we go into her endorsements and partnerships and eventually even future brand launches, That association of hot pink will remind anyone of her. The MET collab on brand. How about an Aro-Wan hot pink, dragon fruit, or a strawberry smoothie? A nail line?

A shoe line? A red bottoms heel line? It is so easy to stay on brand when you're known for one color. And for your look. To become something, others can dress a pass. But anyone can just brand themselves hot pink. I mean, Paris Hilton exists already. What makes Adela's hot pink unique? Third, polarity.

The genius of Adela's brand is she created the perfect contrast. It is the psychological principle of schema violation. When your expectations get violated, it forces your brain to pay closer attention. How does Adela do that? It is always the strong with the soft. Visually, we have the fine ballet precision with extreme chaos. The most exciting choreography is an understatement.

Pallorina elegance with maximalist hyperpop. Harsh metals, bold colors, provocativeness, extremely feminine pink with rebellious aggression, soft and youthful face, with bold makeup and bleached eyebrows, which enhances her sonic direction. The control of classical vocal training plays inside production of full of pulsing synth glitch distortions, sweet voice, contrasts with the power and aggression in lyrics. The whole experience is to make you feel uncomfortable, drag you in to the unexpected and make you think.

That is what good art can accomplish. It was the extreme pain I felt from her music, paired with extreme power that deeply move me. Now we have a great product, the music, the art direction, the visuals, but how do you make this brand even bigger? Well, fourth, association. What is a brand? It is essentially everything and anything that something is associated with.

For starters, we already have cat's eye. Inescapable, Adela was introduced relative to the group in nearly every piece of coverage. I'd say it's a blessing, not a curse. They can win together. Obviously, there's also Demi Lovato, who she's opening for, V Grimes, who reached out to Adela

and appeared in her Machine Girl music video, ballet as a visual motif, and pop brands like Mac and Uggs. But something that is easily missed and really powerful is artist's comparisons, aka the cluster of what she reminds people of. Quote,

You're like Kesha and Lady Gaga got pregnant by Madonna, and they chose Grimes to be the godmother. Accurate. Adela reminds people. people of a lot of iconic women. Madonna, the most repeated comparison, tied to her being called, quote, the new Madonna for boldness and reinvention. Lady Gaga cited for structure chaos and bold in-your-face artistry. Grimes, both as a sonic reference point and actual collaborator and co-producer, plus the shared pink hair, art pop outsider visual lineage, Charlie XEX, futuristic glitz, hyperpop

adjacent, and shared stylist Chris Horn. What this does is amplifying credibility. Two, Adelis and turning the pre-legacy into a positive self-fulfilling prophecy, which is amplified by the last and most important factor for Adela's successful brand. Fifth, consistency. No brand is built with one campaign in one day. Each song, each music video, each dance, each performance is a vote of what the brand is. And Adela delivers every time. As such a high quality that gave her the respect she deserves,

even as a new artist. It is refreshing. How each video breaks an old norm and sets a new standard for artistic direction and performance. Adela consistently wows the audience. While staying very center to her brand of power and soft, a brand of alchemizing pain. This is a girl who hustles and consistently pumps out great work. As a mantra I live by, no effort goes to waste. To bet on the jockey, not the horse, I would bet on Adela for her resilience. discipline and her ability to alchemize pain. But what does all this mean for you, my friend? For homework, take out your pen or notes app. First, find your Adela moment.

What's the thing you tried, failed at, got rejected from, or almost gave up on that could actually become your brand story. Fail business means lesson learned building in public. Career pivot means diverse expertise in different fields. Rejection makes you the underdog. Second, define your contradictions. The most memorable brands often live in the tension between two identities. What are two things about you that shouldn't go together?

For example, you're a data analyst but a fashion lover. An introvert and also a public speaker. You have luxury tastes with a frugal mindset. Third, consistency. I have no notes for this. You already know what to do. Comment if you think Adela will be the next main pop girl. And if you happen to be Adela and want to come on the show,

you're more than welcome. Shoot me a message. If you want to understand pop culture through a smarter branding perspective, follow the pot for more, give it a five-star review. It's completely free and will help the show help you. This is your marketing best to you Zoe Unlimited. Episodes are available on all podcast networks, Apple Spotify, YouTube. And if you didn't hate this episode, I know you might not hate these other two I made just for you.