Now a real estate agent, but perhaps best recognized as the winner of season one Canadian IdolMalcolm uses his musical past in an unconventional way and gets creative with his peers to market social media mentions.
His soft cover of the 1983 Talking Heads song, used to advertise a million-dollar home on a vineyard in Prince Edward County, Ontario, is part of a growing strategy by Malcolm Fitz & Doseger Real Estate Group to showcase homes with custom music videos.
A surprising success
Jen Fitzpatrick, one-third of the group along with Malcolm and Jake Doseger, said they first came up with the idea in June when a friend was listing their house.
“We thought we’d do something different, so I said to Ryan, ‘Why don’t you bring your guitar and we’ll just do an acoustic version of a song, just to promote her specific entry?'”
Fitzpatrick said the house sold within 12 hours.
Since then, they have produced music videos for almost every entry (about 30), with a total number of social media views of 350,000.
From concept to final product
A day in which an advertising video was recorded/contributed
The songs are sometimes covers, often chosen by the client and then stylized with lyrical and melodic adjustments to suit the specific frame, and other times they are original songs written by Malcolm.
The home always serves as a source of inspiration.
“We have an ad coming up in the spring with a bit of a western town behind it, so we’re going to tailor that musical experience to something more country and western,” Malcolm said.
He said they are also branching out more with visuals.
“We did that Ice Cream Baby from Vanilla Ice, and we had costumes, the whole thing. It’s more than just the music aspect,” he said.
Malcolm says that after more than twenty videos, they’ve “got it down to a pretty good science,” with the help of recording engineer Annelise Noronha and videographer Connor Mitchell.
It only takes Malcolm about two hours to perfect and record the song. The longest part is editing the video, which can take up to four days.
The team says others in the field have taken a similar approach, but many are using AI to quickly generate videos. AI is not used in any part of their process, Malcolm says.
The ROI
Malcolm said the videos have increased their media budget by about 25 percent.
The team agrees that it is worth the cost and effort. Malcolm said strangers have stopped him on the street to say they enjoy the videos.
“We’re getting a return on our investment. We’re now finding that we’re actually getting referrals or customers just from the music videos,” Fitzpatrick said.
Malcolm said he could think of four or five times when some people reached out directly about a video clip. Direct messages often come through social media, especially Instagram.
The same treatment for all clients
Malcolm said that whether it’s a $300,000 or $1.5 million ad, all videos get equal attention.
“Our marketing costs are our marketing costs, and we don’t really match that to the price of the product. The lower-priced entry-level homes still get time to shine online, and the customers still get the same treatment regardless of what the house is worth,” he said.
The team is considering other content streams that highlight the markets they serve, to bring smaller and rural communities to the attention of urban residents.
“We’re thinking of different ideas that we can do to not only expand the advertising videos, but also promote life here,” Malcolm said.
Music video marketing helped the three-person team exceed $32 million in volume in 2025 and 64. Total sales volume since the team’s founding in 2023 exceeds $74 million.
Courtney Zwicker is a digital reporter and associate editor for REM. Based in Atlantic Canada, she has more than a decade of experience covering daily business news.
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