Ideas

It’s no secret that email is still an important channel for arts marketers. 87% of arts buyers regularly hear about upcoming performances through email, and email continues to deliver the highest return on investment (ROI) for marketers across all industries.

Even with these stats in mind, it’s easy to feel like you’re stuck in a cycle. You might get in the habit of only sending emails when a performance or exhibition goes on sale. Or, you’re looking for a solution that will help you automate email processes to get valuable time back in your day.

We’ve outlined several different ways to help you get out of a rut and level up. These are achievable steps that will set your organization apart from the oversaturated inbox crowd.

Whether you’re preparing for a new season, or have year-round programming, video is an incredible medium to showcase what your organization has to offer. But sometimes, the process can seem daunting. How can you continually create stellar videos that inspire audiences to take action?

As the founder of Cinevative, I’ve helped organizations in the performing arts and live entertainment sectors create stunning videos. If you want to capture someone's attention, and keep them interested, it's important to produce videos that are not only visually appealing, but also effective. I've outlined five tips to help you get started. 

Compelling storytelling is the most important aspect of creating deep and engaging connections with audiences in our venues and in the digital world. The National Ballet of Canada’s digital platforms showcase the daily life of a ballet company, giving a window into the lives of our artists and all the elements that go on behind the scenes to create the magic that is seen onstage.

We were thrilled to have the blockbuster hit Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland return to the stage during our Winter Season. With its recognizable characters and colorful sets and costumes, we had a unique opportunity to create content that was shareable, relatable and showcased the wonderment of the ballet.

Everyone can provide rock star customer service thanks to chatbot automation.

For most of us, working in a non-profit cultural organization means that your role is guaranteed to be multi-dimensional. Many hats, many browser tabs open at the same time. So when it comes to customer service and visitor engagement, it’s mostly a “get to it when you can” situation if you’re pitching in with frontline staff.

However, with the rise in digital engagement and new avenues for communication, we’re also faced with expectations for shorter wait times when it comes to answering customer outreach.

What does it mean to “market” the brand? Some industries are all about brand marketing. The game we play, working in the performing arts, is most often one of conversions - get butts in those seats! I’ve been thinking a lot about brand marketing since I arrived at Carnegie Hall just over two years ago.

The Goodman Theatre has a long history of innovation on-stage. It’s the recipient of the Special Tony Award for Outstanding Regional Theatre and is known at home and abroad as a theater as much for artists as it is for the community. The team at The Goodman puts their patrons at the heart of everything they do, including their digital initiatives, proving that they are innovators off-stage as well. 

This was most evident in The Goodman’s recent website redesign, where, with funding from the Wallace Foundation, they were able to turn to user data at key moments in the process to inform the direction and prioritization of new templates on their site.

An arts organization can have the best digital strategies in the world, but so much of an organization's success comes down to people, culture, and leadership.

Without valuing people, we won’t meet the critical challenges of connecting with our audiences in the 21st century. 

I recently presented a webinar called "Creating a People-First Culture," or if you're a glass half empty person, "The People Crisis in the Arts." I am passionate about this topic and want to share this webinar with you. 

Our clients often ask how they compare to other cultural organizations. While we’re happy to point them towards the most recent Arts Industry Digital Marketing Benchmark Study, the best path is to benchmark against themselves. This is particularly true for email because email type and the size of the list both impact metrics and results.

The word “segmentation” can bring to mind images of infinitesimal details and complex analysis. In other words, plans that digital marketers of the artistic world might be salivating to try but blocked to implement by time, resources and reality. Luckily, new research suggests that relatively straightforward strategies are still valuable for arts organizations trying to boost their return on investment (ROI) on email.

Exploring trends in organizational health at the intersection of arts administration and technology, the 2019 Spektrix Insights Report analyzed a cohort of about 350 performing arts organizations from the software provider’s client base. The report shows segmented emails outperform open rates on unsegmented emails by 56%. In this case, “segmented” means sent to 10% or less of an organization’s opted-in audience base.

In a battle for inbox relevance, only anticipated, personal, and relevant emails will survive.