Monday starts off quite busy. For Yan Ran, she kicks off the day with a meeting with her new agency management team. A lot of planning goes into releasing an album. Since this is the first time in Country C, everyone wants it to be done perfectly. Since she is already made in other countries, they do not want Country C to be seen as the one dropping the ball.
From her management team in Country A, the only members in the current team who were in the original team are her Manager whom she addresses as Brother Han, her secretary An He and her assistant Chu Hua.
The whole team is seated in one of the board rooms of Future Dream Incorporated. The team comprises of ten people, the Vice President in charge of the music department and his secretary, three from the Marketing department, two from Public Relations, and from the Vice Director of the Music Department. Since it is their first formal meeting, all the different departments had been called for this first meeting.
The company's Marketing Manager for the Music Department, Ming Yuan, is chairing the meeting. He gives defers to the Vice Director, Shui Hui to officially welcome Yan Ran. Although Yan Ran is new in Country C and Future Dream (shortened FDI), she is already a renowned artist with an established fan base so the company is treating her in a special way.
The first order of business is discussing the Title of the album. Ming Yuan presents several options for discussion. After a lengthy discussion, they end up with two options; Closer and Insight. The Marketing Manager decides to leave the final decision to Yan Ran.
The album has twelve tracks on it and Yan Ran had written the title track called "Under My Skin" which is a dance pop song. The other song that she had written is "Note to Self" which is an acoustic pop song.
Yan Ran can play both the guitar and the piano. She had always wanted to diversify into different genres of music but acoustic pop was her favourite. From the time she started her career, she always insisted on having live instruments instead of synthesizers.
After a few minutes of contemplation, Yan Ran picks "Closer" as her album title. She picks it because it embodies the theme of the album which is about getting closer to a person either emotionally or physically.
The next item on the agenda is the music video for the title track. In Country C most artists only do one or two music videos per album. However, Yan Ran had requested the company to allow her to do three instead. She feels that as she is being reintroduced into the market of Country C, it would allow for new fans to get closer to her and know a bit more about her style of music and dance performances.
Brother Ming was initially against the idea but Yan Ran and Brother Han had managed to convince him. It meant expending more resources but the management team firmly believe it is worth it.
Yan Ran had already presented her ideas on what she would like the music video for the title track to be like. It had already been approved and the theme board drawn up.
"Ms Yan, we are going to present to you the mood board for the music videos."
A Lady named Ting Ling from the marketing team stands up and walks towards projected images on a white board. She presents the mood boards for the different music videos. Yan Ran is happy with most of them and only asks for a few changes.
"Thank you Brother Ming. I am quite happy for you to proceed with the casting of the models once you have made the changes."
Brother Han is impressed as well. "Mr Ming, have you thought about the models we are going to use? Are we going to cast someone from our agency or outsource from other agencies?"
"Does Ms Yan have any preferences or anyone in mind that she would like to cast?"
Yan Ran has little knowledge of the local models. "I am not fussy as long as they suit the roles."
Brother Han has no objections. "Two of these videos have choreography. I'm sure Ms Yan would like to be involved in the selection of the backing dancers."
Mr Ming nods in agreement. "Of course, we don't have any issues with that."
"I also have several proposed sites for shooting the MVs. Please have a look as well. I have included an USB flash drive with pictures of the different sites in case you are not familiar with them," Brother Ming continues.
Yan Ran smiles impressed with how thorough the marketing team seems to be. "Thank you for working so hard Brother Ming. I appreciate it,"
Mr Ming is surprised at how humble Yan Ran seems to be. "Don't mention it. It's my job,"
"We have also done a proposal on our marketing strategy. We think that since it is your first time releasing an album here, we should show you off to the public as much as possible. So you will be appearing on a lot of different variety shows and doing a lot of interviews, both on radio and television."
"Brother Ming, I'm really not good at some of these," Yan Ran says uneasily.
"Ms Yan, we have selected the best and most reputable shows and hosts. They won't ask weird questions nor ask you to do uncanny things. Their questions will be presented to us beforehand and you can take out any that you deem unsuitable to you," Brother Ming reassures.
Yan Ran smiles wryly "Well, I guess they can't be as bad and intrusive as some of the ones I participated in to in Country A."
"That's not necessarily true. We have equally bad ones here too, but we are here to make sure you get the best exposure with the least painful experience. So don't worry. We will take care of you."
"In that case, I leave myself in your capable hands. Senior, please take of me," Yan Ran says respectfully bowing.
"Ms Yan, we have arranged for your first short interview and photo shoot with a local entertainment magazine on Friday. It won't be anything overwhelming so don't feel under pressure. I will send all the details to your secretary."
"That is okay," Yan Ran accents.
"Our PR department will also be announcing at a press conference on Thursday that you are collaborating with our agency. This will help us with publicity for the album. Please may you kindly attend? You will not be required to say much. You can just greet the press and the fans and ask them for their support." Mr Sun from the PR department asks of Yan Ran.
Yan Ran's secretary takes note. She knows that her boss's schedule will be full for the next few months.
"Ok great. I think we have discussed a lot today. Let's go and work on the things we discussed today. We will have another meeting in three days' time to go over what we discussed today. Ms Yan, Mr Han, do you have anything else that you would like us to discuss?" Mr Ming
"Ms Yan and I had discussed some ideas for the album cover. I know it's usually your job but maybe you can have a look and see if they will do," Brother Han suggests tentatively.
"It's not a problem. I like that Ms Yan knows what she wants. It makes it easier for us to suggest things and make decisions. Please send them to us as soon as you can. We can discuss them in the next meeting.
"If there are no objections, let us adjourn this meeting for today. Our next meeting will be on Wednesday at 2pm.