Songfacts®:

• The second single from Drake's sophomore album Take Care finds the Canadian MC expressing his admiration for females who are working on achieving their goals. The song features Nicki Minaj both crooning and rapping and was debuted October 13, 2011 on Funkmaster Flex's Hot 97 radio show.
• Drake told Funkmaster Flex the song was inspired by a conversation with a female. "I just want to say this is an important moment for me because I got a lot of records out right now that are anthem, club, party environment," he explained. "A girl actually, a girl whose opinion I respect greatly, hit me and she was like, 'There's nothing on the radio for us right now. There's nothing to make women feel good like they did when we had 'Best I Ever Had,' which was the reference that she made. The song's called 'Make Me Proud.' So it's a moment, go out and make me proud, baby."
• Speaking to MTV News, Drake explained the song: "Whenever I make songs surrounding women, I always try to find refreshing stances to take as opposed to just like, 'Oh, you're sexy' or 'Oh, I want you.' The song, it really came up in passing conversation, just being like, 'I'm proud of you.'" he said. "Not even necessarily that a woman has to go achieve grandiose things to be proud; it's just that I'm proud of you for trying. It's hard to be a woman out here these days, especially to be pretty and especially to be smart and want something for yourself. So I'm just proud of you whether it's Nicki or any girl that I've ever known in my life that's doing well for herself."
• The song was helmed by T-Minus ("Moment 4 Life," "How Low"). The Toronto-based producer told Complex magazine how he came to work with Drake on Take Care: "I talk to Drake on a regular basis. Man, I've known Drake from a long time ago. I've known him since 'Replacement Girl' days, me and Boi-1da produced that. But what happened was, because me and Boi-1da weren't working that much together, and because Boi-1da was so close to Drake, we didn't really get to talk as much. But about three months ago, we kind of hooked back up in L.A., and he invited me onto Take Care. We're all working on his album; me, 40, and Boi-1da."
• The song leapt from #97 to #9 on the Hot 100 in October 2011. In doing so it tied with Akon's "Smack That," which catapulted from #95 to #7 in 2006, for the biggest ever jump by a male.
• This was one of four T-Minus creations that ended up on Take Care. He told MTV's RapFix about his contribution to this track: "Drake hit me up asking for a record for him and Nicki. He had a certain energy in mind, so I tried my best to emulate the idea he had," he said. "It might have taken me an hour to come up with the beat. He let me know it was a single days after he recorded it. I've been constantly contributing to the album since late last year, so I was going in with the intent of producing more than one record. I sent him beats like 'I'm On One' and 'She Will' with the intent of it being on Take Care, so we had plenty of records in the works."
• Drake had good reason for feeling proud when this became his eleventh #1 on Rap Songs. In doing so, he overtook Diddy for the highest number of chart-toppers since it was launched in Billboard magazine as a sales survey the week of March 11, 1989. Whilst Diddy racked up his seven rulers over the space of seven years, Drake took less than three years to overhaul him.