Minaj Mania grips the capital

There’s only hours to go before the Niki Minaj entourage exits the UK.

“We haven’t witnessed this kind of hysteria since the late Michael Jackson was here.” said staff at the Dorchester hotel. Throughout Miss Minaj’s five day visit to England up to one hundred teenagers pitched outside the Dorchester hotel and tracked her every move.

Paparazzi teams including: Optics, Exposure, Splash, Smart, Big Pictures, Wenn and FLYPICS continued a twenty four hour surveillance on Niki Minaj’s movements. The demand for pictures was overwhelming said a photographer from Optics.

Niki Minaj’s UK success was largely due to the fact that her PR team maximised the full extent of utilising the power of social networking sites such as Twitter. Throughout Miss Minaj’s five day visit to the UK fans were able to log on to her everyday thoughts and track her movements.

With two ‘A’ list stars in town, P Diddy who was promoting ’Dirty Money’ and Niki Minaj, there could only be one winner as far as media exposure is concerned.

So where did it all go wrong for P Diddy?

In recent months some UK based PR agencies have been accused of ‘Cherry picking’ black talent and then restricting minority publications from attending their events.

This was not the case with Niki Minaj’s PR team who welcomed national and minority press. This universal approach enabled Niki to thrive in the UK and the take the limelight from the P Diddy’s press launch.

“It’s fairly simple,” commented Journalist Mark Weir. “Restrictive media generates restrictive responses; I would suggest, judging by the muted response from P Diddy’s lacklustre launch that the PR team did not clearly identify his target audience or extend media invites to publications that reach his demographic. There are clearly plenty of lessons to be learned from the past few days.

1. Utilising the power of social networking sites to identify her target audience enabled Niki Minaj to maximise her reach and build on her fan base in the UK.

2. The fact that P Diddy’s ‘Dirty Money’ press launch failed to resonate amongst his target audience would suggest that the media invites were selective and non representative of his demographic.

Nicki Minaj’s press team to put it simply held all the trump cards; they did not operate an elitist approach with regards the media.” concluded Mark Weir.

A staff member from national picture agency Camera Press who was accredited to cover P Diddy’s launch party said: “We started receiving email updates which was unusual, it all seemed a bit desperate.”

 ‘Minaj mania’ started from the moment the diminutive star arrived at Heathrow airport where she was greeted by over one hundred fans and photographers.  Checking in at the Dorchester Hotel, Minaj continually used Twitter to keep her fans regularly updated on her whereabouts. Visits to T4, Capital Radio and Radio One enabled her fans to stay in touch and feel involved, however not everything went accordingly.

On Thursday, Niki Minaj visited Oceania Night club in Watford and then Runway in New Oxford Street, London. Nightclub doormen were confronted by over thirty revellers who were angry at being denied access to the party due to over capacity. Some people reportedly paid over £60 for advance tickets.

Metropolitan police and specialist dog units were mobilised to keep the peace. Some people vented their frustration by targetting Niki Minaj’s entourage.  Despite several frantic attempts to enter Runway nightclub, Niki Minaj was unable to safely embark from her car and had to return to the Dorchester Hotel.

“Her car was blocked and people started thumping the window’s, she was terrified.” said a FLYPICS photographer.

On Friday the mass hysteria of her fans resulted in Niki reportedly being asked to vacate the Dorchester Hotel. The doorman appeared to have been caught in the mêlée.

Miss Minaj checked in fifteen minutes later at the Landmark hotel in West London and within hours social networking sites had posted her new location.

Saturday, Minaj visited Radio One’s Tim Westwood show but fans for the first time during her visit showed signs of fatigue. “I’ve lost quite a lot of respect for Niki for doing this to us. They used us to help promote the radio show with a live link however they refused to acknowledge us on the way out.” said Melissa who had been waiting several hours in freezing temperatures to see Miss Minaj.

Niki is expected to travel to Paris before heading back to the UK.