Adaptistration

The Value Of An Involved Music Director

In mid-February of 2008, conductor Bill Eddins posted an excellent article at Sticks and Drones which examines a common disconnect between artistic planning and strategic marketing efforts inside professional orchestras. Bill used an example from his own orchestra, the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra, to illustrate his point: the title selected by the marketing department for a concert series he designed was inherently counterintuitive to the artistic intention…

A Viral Marketer, An Orchestra, And A Brewmaster Walk Into A Bar…

Thanks to the seemingly endless creativity among the folks who marketing beer, Victoria Bitter (a brand in the Fosters chain commonly referred to as VB) launched a viral ad campaign toward the end of 2007 that featured 95 musicians from the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and Orchestra Victoria performing solely on 451 VB bottles and 6 timpani. Composer Cezary Skubiszewski arranged the 40-year-old VB theme music and conducted the ensemble which recorded the video, featured to your right, at the Melbourne Concert Hall.

Another Take On Orchestral Microsites

As an interesting continuation to the topic of orchestral microsites a reader sent along a link to the Berlin Philharmonic Cello Challenge, a microsite of the Berlin Philharmonic website. The microsite is designed entirely in Flash and although it is apparent that they spent a great deal of time on the microsite's aesthetic quality, it is ultimately one of the thousands of simple, repetitive flash based games available across the internet…

Google Keeps Rolling Out The Goodies

In one of their latest efforts to colonize all of cyberspace, or at least whatever Microsoft can't hide, Google has created an easy-to-use and highly effective customizable search tool. In particular, the new tool allows registered Google users to create a search box capable of:

• Including one website, multiple websites, or specific webpages
• Host the search box and results on your own website
• Customize the colors and branding to match your existing webpages

Each one of these features is useful for standard orchestra websites and even more valuable for those sites which are becoming more complex and dynamic. Let's examine each of the features individually…

Chicago Symphony Rolls Out Some New PR Bling

Right on the heels of the How To Connect With New Media series of articles the Chicago Symphony rolls out an updated press page at their website which contains some of the items from my Marketing Wish List…

A New Way To Look Before You Leap

Earlier this month, the Los Angeles Times published an article about an interactive seating chart tool being developed for the Los Angeles Philharmonic's website. Called Seat Buddy, the online tool promises to let website users get a better look at the inside of the concert hall as well as what Seat Buddy's founder described in the article as the hall's depth…

I Wonder What They Would Do For Ticket Sales

An article in the 2/13/2008 edition of The Hollywood Reporter examines a NYU study that determined blog posts can triple album sales. This is an early step toward quantifying the impact new media has on the cultural consciousness…

Microsites: The Future Of Performing Arts Websites?

I was hoping that Monday's article about the "Ode To A Ford" project would spark a comment or two about the added value Ford's microsite added to what is a straight-up viral ad campaign. I remember having a conversation with a colleague who doesn't work in the orchestra business and isn't a musician about a year ago and we were talking about the quality of orchestra website education sites. In general, we concluded that most weren't very educational from the perspective of getting the user involved in the subject material. "As someone who doesn't know much about classical music to begin with, I don't come away from educational pages feeling like I learned anything." …

How To Connect With New Media: Part 5

The final installment in this series will wrap up all of the loose ends from in addition to examining some do's and don'ts for both new media outlets and performing arts organizations. We'll also look at some current efforts to reach out to new media outlets among orchestral organizations...

How To Connect With New Media: Part 4

Part 3 of this series offered practical advice on how performing arts organizations can build genuine relationships with new media outlets. It also presented detailed instructions on how to design marketing materials especially for new media sources that are capable of making the most out of those relationships. In order to assist organizations with these tasks, this installment will examine some tools that will help with that process…

How To Connect With New Media: Part 3

Part 2 of this series offered practical advice on how to become familiar with new media outlets by reading and becoming involved through the art of submitting comments. This installment will expand on those initial steps by exploring constructive methods for building direct and enduring relationships with new media authors as well as how to adapt traditional marketing materials to the nontraditional environment of new media…

How To Connect With New Media: Part 2

Part 1 of this series defined new media and how performing arts organizations can identify and categorize new media outlets into local, national, and international sources. This installment will continue by detailing how you can familiarize yourself with the sources you’ve identified and make initial contacts…

How To Connect With New Media: Part 1

New Media: who they are and where to find them.

This installment is designed to help establish a collective understanding of what constitutes new media which can be used to move forward. Once that straightforward task is completed we’ll examine how to begin categorizing new media outlets in a way that will benefit your organization best…

How To Connect With New Media: An Introduction

This June, I have the honor of serving as a speaker in one of the National Performing Arts Convention’s breakout sessions titled The Online Salon Movement. The session’s description promotes the event as a wide ranging commentary and discussion on how performing arts organizations can interact with new forms of media and the public at large. “At a time when more traditional media outlets continue to shrink arts coverage, a wide variety of passionate bloggers writing about all of the performing arts have developed an audience of millions of readers and have challenged the critical paradigm by building a new dialogue about the arts.” I couldn’t think of a better way to describe the state in which new media exists and it got me thinking about how orchestras can enhance that interaction by refining how they reach out to these diverse outlets. To that end, I’ve come up with this series of articles to help orchestras identify, contact, and maintain relationships with new media…

Getting Back On The Psychologist’s Couch

Yesterday, my blogging neighbor, Jason Heath, posted an article at Arts Addictwhich touches on the psychology of performers and how it impacts interpersonal artistic relationships. It is a great topic and made me think about how the orchestra business could take better advantage of consumer psychology when approaching audience development…

Substance Over Shadows

Last week’s article examining how orchestras should approach using new online technologies generated a great deal of interest. As it turns out, it was also well-timed as the Minnesota Orchestra (MN Orch) launched a website during the same week designed to feature nearly all of the online tools discussed in the article. The website came to my attention via an invitation at Facebook from Sam Bergman, MO violist, to attend a concert event from a series that is the new website’s namesake Inside The Classics. The website’s home page, (featured to your left, click to enlarge), is dominated by photos of Bergman and MO assistant conductor Sarah Hatsuko Hicks and demonstrates that this is not a typical orchestra website project…

Losing The Substance By Grasping At The Shadow

It seems as though every time you turn around people in the orchestra business are clamoring to start podcasts, begin blogging, and get on iTunes. Sure enough, more than a few orchestras have done exactly that; nevertheless, I have to wonder how many groups looking to move in this direction have really taken the time to think about what it entails to effectively implement those tools…

Will You Be My Friend?

If you haven’t had the opportunity to go in and see what Facebook is all about, I recommend you carve some time into your schedule and get up to speed. According to their website, “Facebook is a social utility that helps people communicate more efficiently with their friends, family and coworkers. The company develops technologies that facilitate the sharing of information through the social graph, the digital mapping of people's real-world social connections.”  After giving Facebook a spin for the past week, I have to say that it is a fairly remarkable piece of technology that has some real potential for use by the orchestra field…

Adults Only

Adult education programs is a well worn topic here at Adaptistration and regular readers already know that I favor a sizeable increase in the quantity and quality of educational activities targeted directly toward adults. Meaning, it is high time to move beyond the static lecture style activities which focus on having someone talk at a group of people...

Not Your Everyday Attendance Woes In Cincinnati

At least, that's the picture depicted in the Cincinnati Enquirer from an article written by Janelle Gelfand and Cliff Peale...

We Still Need To See A Psychologist

I had a fascinating lunch time conversation yesterday with a manager in my area and we were talking about the usefulness of approaching marketing from the view of a behavioral psychologist. The conversation brought my memory to an article I wrote back in February, 2004 entitled We All Need To Go See A Psychologist...

Gathering Support For Lower Ticket Prices In St. Paul

It's an old story, but one which has become more relevant in recent years: someone in the administration has a plan for audience development but it would initially require losses and results aren't expected for at least a few years; of course, that’s assuming there are any positive results at all. So how do you sell an idea which necessitates a year or two of red ink?

Ticket Price And Competition

Colleague and fellow AJ blogger Andrew Taylor wrote a good article on Monday   comparing the rising cost of tickets at the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the Boston Red Sox... 

We All Need To Go See A Psychologist

There is a great deal of talk in the industry about building a new audience, but all that I've read in newspapers and discussed with those in the industry tends to focus on "things" to help solve the problem.  But in a recent Reader Response letter from Emily in Toronto, she says "...orchestras haven't meant to shut people out, but it would seem that some people have been alienated."  This is a very poignant statement that helps us begin to realize that it's an atmosphere which surrounds the entire concert experience that is alienating many younger patrons.

The trouble is that you can't really put your finger on any one "thing" because it's not a "thing" that is to blame.   What needs to change is the fundamental feeling a person has when they walk into a concert hall. And even adding some friendly Starbucks kiosks won't solve the problem (but speaking as a caffeine addict, it certainly isn't a bad idea).  Here's what should happen: orchestras need to hire a psychologist to help find a way to address this problem head on.

A good psychologist will be able to help identify the fundamental problem and find a way to make the atmosphere of an orchestra concert welcoming, friendly, and comfortable for everyone - an atmosphere that will make them want to return.  I don't think anyone wants a "touchy-feely" environment, and that's a pit fall that should be actively avoided given the vast amounts of trendy pop psychology today.  Sorry, Dr. Phil should not be on the top of the list to call.

What do you think, is there an atmosphere that alienates a large percentage of people from enjoying the orchestra experience?  Is psychology the answer?   

Reader Response: A Student's view on ticket price

It's funny how quickly we forget what our lives were like in our younger years. Recently I've been criticizing the industry for high ticket prices that exclude many young patrons. Several orchestra administrators have written in to remind me that their orchestras (as do most) offer student rush tickets for around the cost of a movie ticket. Although I did point out in the earlier article that these tickets have restricts and are few in numbers, I forgot how absolutely frustrating and demeaning an experience obtaining those tickets can be...

Reader Response: Talk is cheap, tickets aren't

I received quite a few responses from orchestra managers challenging my point of view regarding the recent article about orchestra ticket prices . One of which came from Curt Long, the Executive Director for the Dayton Philharmonic...

Talk is cheap, tickets aren't

Audience development is a big issue in this industry. Attendance is down, younger patrons are harder to attract, and subscription series are getting increasingly difficult to sell. In addition to all of the cultural, social, and marketing issues involved with this problem, I think a widely overlooked area is the cost of single tickets...