Marketing the competition

First full week of being open for applications and it's going well.  I will be honest with you, my blog friends, that secretly (well not sooo secretly...I told Jamibeth and Andy) I wanted to have 100 applications by this point.  In one week.  :)  Aim high.  I also wanted to be able to market this all with just social media to prove a point.   

BUT we are new and pretty much only you guys, and our quickly growing facebook page (which is also awesomely on our website home page...and it updates in real time! www.nptheatre.org) know about us.  So I had to do some traditional stuff. 

Nick Mitchell (our American Idol star cohost) and I will be on ABC tv next week as well as FOX tv.  I am being interviewed by the CT Post (Joe Meyers, love him!) tomorrow and on the Milford Radio show tomorrow night.  On Weds I am being interviewed by an NPR reporter.  The New Haven Register's editor called me and I sent a press release..more like a press story...to him.  CBS is also trying to get us in there.
I tied in the Broadway Babes cabaret for the United Way that is Jan 21st as a bit of a two-fer as well.  I am having that show come under the auspices of The New Paradigm Theatre now too.  Shows our "helping other non profits raise money" portion of our mission statement too.

I contacted some other local newspapers as well as got us on Actorslife.com http://wp.me/p13w9t-fL
and have us on Stamfordplus.com.  Also contacted bizzbuzztv. 

I sent emails with an invite to 20 different high schools here in CT. Their vocal and theatre departments. Have already gotten some responses back that are good.  Offered to do a free master class for their students so that I can chat with them about a career in theatre and invite them to participate or be an audience member for the competition. We are also providing a "talk back" session with the judges before the show on Sunday, at 2pm.  All in the name of the educational portion of our mission statement.

I won't lie. This part takes work and I am happy that my colleges are not back in session yet. But I will not stop once we hit the audience and participants number we need. The trick is in the "marketing event to event". Market-forward...if you will. So soon I will start working on how to make this group into a "tribe" who will become our best advertising.

My checklist is long so I will call it a night.....   "Post on blog"...check.

COMPETITION IS OPEN!

"So ya wanna be a Broadway Star" competition!

Please share this on your facebook pages, or in person with everyone you know.  I can't believe the quality of judges we have for this!   Check out the website for a list. And the prizes that have been donated!

Paul Bogaev (musical producer for Spiderman, Aida, and the movies Nine and Chicago) is a judge!  Also Richard Sabellico, Casting directors Barry Moss and Jamibeth Margolis!  

While the title of our competition/fund raiser seems splashy, it's only for marketing purposes and to take advantage of the popularity of those types of shows.  It's truly another chance for us to prove our mission statement, which is: to let the community contribute to the "making of" this theatre.  It's also to show some educational elements by letting the audience feel what a casting director feels like when they see 100 people a day (or more!) for roles.

The fact that contestants get to give their headshots and resumes to these well-connected judges who could get them roles (and will give feedback) is also a perk for them.  We plan on having a talk-back on Sunday with some of the judges as well.

So post away! We are also trying to prove that social media and a few big mouths can really promote a show better than paid advertising and mass mailings.

www.nptheatre.org   (just visit it to see how proud I am of myself that I figured out how to put the Facebook feed on the right side of the home page!)

New Website

I am pretty proud of myself I must say.   Just finished working on the new website. It has all the info for the upcoming "So ya wanna be a Broadway star?" competition.   The cool thing about this website is that it's so advanced you can do more with it than a usual site.  I can totally change that home page once the competition is over.  I can add videos and photos and there will soon be a Facebook feed from our site added to the side bar.  I will also be adding an "Education" tab and some other things.  But for now it's a good start I think!

www.NPtheatre.org     Give me some feedback!

You can also view this flyer for the event.  One of my terrific students (high school!) made it.

OH and it's far from finished, but at least when we send folks to the site they will be able to enter the competition.

Yet again...

I am on a kick about this because this is where our marketing veers off dramatically from others.  But I have Seth Godin to back up my "selectivity".  From his blog again:

The trap of social media noise

If we put a number on it, people will try to make the number go up.

Now that everyone is a marketer, many people are looking for a louder megaphone, a chance to talk about their work, their career, their product... and social media looks like the ideal soapbox, a free opportunity to shout to the masses.

But first, we're told to make that number go up. Increase the number of fans, friends and followers, so your shouts will be heard. The problem of course is that more noise is not better noise.

In Corey's words, the conventional, broken wisdom is:

• Follow a ton of people to get people to follow back
• Focus on the # of followers, not the interests of followers or your relationship with them.
• Pump links through the social platform (take your pick, or do them all!)
• Offer nothing of value, and no context. This is a megaphone, not a telephone.
• Think you're winning, because you're playing video games (highest follower count wins!)

This looks like winning (the numbers are going up!), but it's actually a double-edged form of losing. First, you're polluting a powerful space, turning signals into noise and bringing down the level of discourse for everyone. And second, you're wasting your time when you could be building a tribe instead, could be earning permission, could be creating a channel where your voice is actually welcomed.

Leadership (even idea leadership) scares many people, because it requires you to own your words, to do work that matters. The alternative is to be a junk dealer.

The game theory pushes us into one of two directions: either be better at pump and dump than anyone else, get your numbers into the millions, outmass those that choose to use mass and always dance at the edge of spam (in which the number of those you offend or turn off forever keep increasing), or

Relentlessly focus. Prune your message and your list and build a reputation that's worth owning and an audience that cares.

Only one of these strategies builds an asset of value.

Great advice

I love today's blog from Seth Godin. Below.  Being in the arts for a while will teach you to just keep going through the roadblocks.  Keep going or pick and roll right around them and improvise a new path as you go.  

My motto has always been,  "The worst they can say is 'no'" .  Then if they do, whew, they just disqualified themselves from being a part of whatever fun thing we are doing.  And I can concentrate on the few "sneezers" (viral marketing) that will spread our message. 

 I was recently advised to "buy email lists".   But gang, here is where new marketing comes in.  I am "spam" to those email lists. They don't know or care about us.  I will be gathering emails, at our events, at our networking.  If I have 300 folks as opposed to 3000 that is ok.  That is 300 folks who said they wanted to hear from me and will support what we are doing.  No wasted effort there.  

But that kind of talk sometimes garners you odd looks from the old standby's.  See blog below.  :)  

Unexpected turbulence

Is there really any other kind?

If we see turbulence coming, we tend to avoid it. The art is in knowing that turbulence might come and looking forward to it, bracing for it and embracing it at the same time.

If your plan will only succeed if there is no turbulence at any time, it's probably not a very good plan (either that or you're not going anywhere interesting.)

Creating strategic alliances

This week we created two very important alliances.   One was with the Hilton in Stamford.  We confirmed a date for our next event there,  "So ya wanna be a Broadway star".  A two day event that will be like a mini American Idol for anyone 15-32 years old.  We will have them all sing 16-32 bars the first night and narrow them down to the top 10 for the next night.  All of them will be judged by NY agents, Ny casting directors, directors and folks that could potentially get them jobs.

The prize for the winner is being added to daily, but so far it's 1. Interviews with the NY agents in their offices. 2. a photo session 3. Makeup and hair consultation 4. voice lesson 5. consultation by Jamibeth Margolis on their "package" and rep book. 6. $50 gift certificate for Restaurant.com 7. a NY audition.

I think the most exciting is the sit-down meetings with the agents.  Plus everyone gets to give their headshot and resume to the panelists.  We are confirming our "star" guest who is an American Idol star.  More later when we have it firmed up.   The dates are Jan 28/29th.  The application is only $50.00.  The tickets to see the show are only $40.00 and that covers both nights. We will also have a "Fan's Favorite" winner.

Also this week we had a meeting with the Development director (Liz) and Event coordinator (Jen) at the Bruce Museum.  I gotta tell ya, we meet the most intelligent, talented and beautiful women while networking this theatre!  Both of them were terrific and very onboard with the idea of "partnerships" and strategic alliances between Non Profit Arts groups.   And since they are a super credible and well-known Museum in Greenwich, this could be the start of a lovely relationship where we can impart our marketing know-how on how to reach the "Millennium" group (ages 18-31) and they could lend their extensive knowledge of that area and their prestige.

Often, Non profits consider each other competition i.e. "if you come to see our show you won't go to see their show".  But we believe there can be more synergy in not only events, but education outreach as well and we have developed quite a few ideas that were met with enthusiasm.  Will keep you posted...

Bank Account and stuff...

We opened our bank account for the theatre on Thursday.  It feels so official.   Lynn and Cathy (our accountants/treasurers) and Jamibeth and me were at the bank in Stamford.  See picture below of Lynn and Brandon, our bank rep.

After that meeting, Jamibeth and I headed over to the Hilton in Stamford http://www.hiltonstamfordhotel.com/    I was there for Matt Castle's wedding (cast mate from "Company" on Bway) and loved the space.  We met with the marketing director, who couldn't have been more lovely.  She agreed that we could use the ballroom for our "So ya wanna be a Broadway star" event in Januaray and also showed us their wonderful smaller space that looks like a cabaret room.  We can use that for smaller shows right now.

This is all very exciting.   Next week Jamibeth and I have a meeting with the Event director and Development director for The Bruce Museum in Greenwich.  When I tell you that is a big deal I am under selling it.  More later.....