The Courtroom, The Echo Chamber and The Alarm

Good arts marketing evolves. 

During the (often brief) lifetime of a particular artistic event it goes through a few stages.

Whenever I sit down to layout a marketing plan, here is how I think about it:

Stage 1:  The Courtroom

This stage ideally starts about 100 days before the event (theatre production, dance recital, arts exhibit, etc.) begins.  Earlier then that would be even better.

During the courtroom stage, the job of marketing is to lay out the case why a particular event is worth seeing.

Just like a courtroom, laying out the case is a mixture of facts (the awards you have won, the strong reviews you got for previous work), etc. and emotion (the impact the work will have on the audience)

When you are in this stage you have to know who your jurors are.  Are they current audience?  Are they new audience prospects? 

And you also have to understand that the burden of proof is on you.

If you can't prove that you have something worth seeing, then it isn't worth seeing.

Or as I have said before . . . if they don't come, it's YOUR FAULT.

Last point here, building a case takes time.  Make sure you give yourself enough of it.

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Stage 2 - The Echo Chamber

Now the artistic event has begun.  In this stage the job of arts marketing is to repeat all the positive comments people, i.e. critics and audience have said about the show.

If you don't have any positive comments . . . you have a problem marketing can't fix.

But you probably do have some, so start collecting them and then start repeating them over and over again.

And over again.

And over again.

Because people forget.

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Stage 3:  The Alarm

Now we are nearing the end of the run for your artistic event.  Now the job of arts marketing is to be the alarm that screams . . . THIS GREAT THING IS ENDING SOON . . . SEE IT NOW BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE.

This can be a suprisingly effective message because people hate to feel left out.

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Whenever you are planning your marketing, it may be helpful to think about things in terms of those stages because it helps you remember that what your marketing needs to accomplish changes even during the lifetime of the same event.

Comments

[RVCBard]

You're getting the hang of visual metaphors. I'll probably post more about it on my blog about it next week.