Music can be an incredibly powerful tool, and in an age where technology allows us to connect with those that don’t live near us, finding ways to use music to encourage that bonding can be incredibly beneficial. Particularly, in a global pandemic such as COVID-19, finding ways to connect with others remotely is more important than ever. In this study, I will be looking at how one artist in particular, Tessa Violet, manages to continue to not only grow her community, but also encourage her community to bond with each other. She achieves this by finding various ways, unique to her and her branding, that allows her community to connect with each other. By using her platform to give scavenger hunts to her fanbase, promoting and fostering community growth through various platforms, and livestreaming in ways unique to her style, she is able to connect her audience with each other. By engaging and observing these various actions on her part, I am able to see and experience this community bonding myself. I also look at ways this might be able to expanded to other artists and their communities as well. The hope is that the internet and social media can be just another form of music encouraging people to connect with one another.

Relationship marketing is a framework in which marketers aim to build two-way bonds with their customers, with the result of long-term benefits to both parties. The rise of social media and the prominence of digital marketing in general, including targeted ads, commercial websites, and email campaigns, has increased the potential for brands and organizations to build such relationships with current and potential customers over time. In the realm of politics, digital marketing has been brought to the mainstream throughout the last decade and its prominence in presidential campaigns has increased ever since, closing the gap in communication between voters, organizations, and candidates. This thesis is an exploration of the effect digital marketing had on Arizona State University students’ perceptions of the presidential candidates and political organizations targeting them during the 2020 election season. The ASU Young Democrats, ASU College Republicans, ASU Undergraduate Student Government, and the 2020 Trump and Biden campaigns were studied through three methods: an analysis of each organization’s marketing tactics through the lens of relationship marketing, interviews with each ASU subject, and a survey of 328 students. The conclusion offers recommendations to each subject based on hypotheses formulated from the analyses and discusses the interrelationship that subjects’ relationship marketing strengths and weaknesses had with students’ views of each organization relative to their desired perceptions.