Oh my.

Oh dear.

Not really valid since Bey's surprise release was a hype building strategy

Bey hyped her album for an entire year. Artists who couldn't sell **** as you mentioned, failed to live up to the hype they created. Bey's material lived up to the hype.

Yes, hype is important.
And in a way Beyoncé had hype surrounding her, she had been touring, did the Superbowl, had Pepsi ads, released Grown Woman and whatnot. That is some sort of hype, and that's not a bad thing, but don't act like she completely left the public eye.

Beyonce had tons of hype, though.
I'm not taking away from her album release strategy because it was perfectly executed. But looking back on the year, she teased everything from high profile performances and snippets and left everyone wanting more. She never mentioned a word, and had people talking for her. She's one of the very few people who could actually pull it off, it worked for her, and Beyonce should be commended for that. But to say there was no hype is a lie, when the entire year was just building more and more hype for whatever she was about to do next.

Ya'll are off topic, the question is about hyping albums, not about hyping herself.

She performed songs from the album on the tour, Grown Woman and some other were sent to radio before the release, they were putting announcements on Music Stores about a new album coming soon, which really hyped the release, and then the pictures from the Music Videos that started leaking, as you can see in the following thread:

http://atrl.net/forums/showthread.php?t=443110

The two are NOT separate phenomenon

One cannot discuss one without the other.

BEYONCÉ was not hyped up prior to release, no matter which way you try to spin it that will never change.

grown woman was never sent to radio, neither were "some others"
only grown woman was performed at concerts constantly, and that's because people knew it from pepsi.

In one thread they will argue that Bey owned the ENTIRE year

The next they will argue that she had NO hype

The insanity

The facts

Super Bowl
Pepsi
H&M
Highest grossing female tour of the year
hell her haircut got more press than anything one direction has done this year
and now the best selling female album of the year

See there's a different type of "hype".

Beyonce's hype was that people were HUNGRY for her music, they wanted more of Beyonce. Beyonce was kept on people's minds because they wanted to hear her next release. She didn't force herself into the public. No one knew if there was an album coming or not, but they just wanted it.

Lady GaGa's hype is where she talked about the album, gives off key words about slaying, builds it up with fancy saying and promotional pictures, snippets, lead singles, and appearances and performances.

Only certain artist can have Hype like Beyonce, where as seen by the latter, it doesn't always work.

Making twitter talk is the new hype.