Establishing a presence on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube is a necessary step in promoting new productions, but it is not enough. Effective social media marketing is complex and posting a few links on Facebook or fun facts on Twitter each week is just the beginning.
Using social media management tools to monitor relevant online chatter and respond to patrons’ feedback is very important. For instance, if there has been more buzz about rude front of house staff than the cast’s acting abilities, but that’s unbeknownst to management, then that’s a serious cause for concern.
To stand out amongst the noise, which characterizes social media, stay up to date about industry-wide best practices and assess competitors’ social media activity. If you want to improve your Facebook page, then find brand pages that frequently share interesting content that has high-quality visual elements and understand the approximate 80/20 split between being conversational and promotional. Viral videos like Will It Blend? demonstrate how easy it is to produce engaging content at minimal cost.
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Keith Tomasek, a digital communications lecturer at Western University, notes that the Stratford Festival consistently produces and shares high quality content online. The Stratford Festival frequently shares fascinating behind the scenes content, such as a recent interview with a prop builder. This kind of video demonstrates how easy it is to produce engaging content at minimal cost.
Where Twitter’s 140 character limit falls short, YouTube compensates. It’s much easier to convince prospective ticket buyers that a show’s a must-see through a well-edited video than merely with a hashtag. Longer content certainly has its advantages.
That said, there is often not a single social media channel that can offer businesses all of the benefits of digital marketing. “It all depends on their target market and audience,” says Tomasek. In other words, paying for advertisements on Facebook may work well to entice moms to take their children to see Disney on Ice, whereas a thirty-something crowd will probably respond well to a ticket giveaway on Twitter.
Small theatres can take a cue from concert producers such as Live Nation, who displayed Bryan Adams’ fans’ live tweets during his 2012 tour. Projecting otherwise ignorable tweets onto a large screen not only excites fans when they see their profile picture while waiting for the show to begin, but also drives awareness about the tour among the fans’ followers. Community theatres and high school bands could easily follow suit without spending a fortune.
How do you think businesses in the entertainment industry should approach social media marketing?