• by Steve Smith , Staff Writer @popeyesm, January 7, 2011

After watching UK music artist Jessie J's inaugural video on VEVO, we're not sure how much active promotion this lady needs. After all, "Do It Like a Dude" has a lot of crotch grabbing, 'motherf**k'ing and enough scary sharp things pasted to her black lips in one sequence to extinguish most healthy male fantasies. In other words, this charming act almost sells itself. And yet VEVO is getting behind this provocateur with their new Lift program that advances emerging artists.

VEVO's new promotional program is sponsored by McDonalds and tries to leverage the full dollar menu of online buzz tools to popularize a chosen new artist. Jessie J's page at the VEVO site will roll out interviews, music videos and clips as well as live concerts and behind the scene clips. The key components in the effort are social/viral, however. The users can Tweet questions to Jessie and VEVO will post video replies. The VEVO page at Facebook has a Jessie J tab that is launching a fan contest. People can 'like' the new artist and actively promote her on their own Facebook pages in order to accrue points and win prizes. You get points whenever your friends click on links Jessie links that appear on your pages.

But VEVO is not just hosting a fan contest and generating buzz for new artists. Part of the program is active promotion offline as well. The site will be use the buzz and fan-generated data around the online program and pass key metrics to radio stations to help get the artist on playlists around the country. VEVO says this model empowers the fans to drive the offline music industry. Well, maybe. Sounds like some pretty well-polished and highly produced 'grassroots' effort to me.

And I am not entirely sure I get McDonalds' connection to this project. The brand match is a bit beyond me. The dissonance between a raven-haired songstress with a booming voice grabbing crotch and sporting razor-edged lips and McDonalds Dollar Menu promotion is pretty striking. The links on the site kick you over to a page on McDonalds.com for playing simple games with menu items. In fact the pre-roll now running before the Jessie J videos is bland light-hearted scenario involving clean-cut husband and wife banter at the kitchen table. Okay, remember the happy meals for junior, honey. Okay, now cue the foul-mouthed dominatrix with the diamond-cutting lips.

Ba da ba baba. I'm loving it