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How Quickly Things Progress

August 9, 2017

by:

Joe Patti

If you want some evidence about how quickly new technologies and methods of doing business are having an impact on our lives, check this out:

In May 2009 I wrote about the potential legal consequences of posting solicitations for project investors online. It just so happens that Kickstarter was founded a month before, April 2009, but it hadn’t really started to have a noticeable presence.

October 2011 I started writing about legislation and rule changes starting to take place that would remove many of the previous limits that limited giving to Kickstarter type campaigns to donation status rather than allowing investment with an expectation of return.

By December 2011, people were talking about this as a potential funding model for productions with Off-Broadway show or smaller budgets. A short time later, people were writing that some of the limitations may not be conducive to those type of project.

I am not sure where things stand at this time. I know the laws have continued to evolve. In 2015 Broadway producer Ken Davenport wrote about how recent regulation changes would have made the crowdfunding effort he engaged in for 2012 Broadway production of Godspell a lot easier. At the time he claimed, “Yep, my friends, for-profit crowdfunding is here.”

This might be a funding model people would want to look into for future projects.

While it didn’t seem like it unfolded that quickly at the time, looking back I am surprised as how quickly things transitioned from the founding of a crowdfunding platform to the establishment of a critical mass that made authorization of new avenues of investment important. (Though granted, anything that facilitates the flow of money for investment is going to be prioritized in the US)

Finance, Fundraising, Government Relations

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If You Don’t Have Anything Nice To Say, We Don’t Want To Hear It

August 9, 2017

by:

Joe Patti

A long time complaint about arts coverage in newspapers has been that the writers seldom get it right. They don’t present the full story or employ fair criteria.

Of course, more recently the complaint has been that newspapers have completely eliminated their staff providing arts coverage.

Back in 2009, I wrote about an exchange between the communications director for the Guthrie Theatre and a writer for the Minnesota Star Tribute.

The former accused the newspaper of not engaging in substantive journalism about real stories and the latter accused the Guthrie of only participating in stories they liked and shutting down in the face of potential criticism. The incident was so noteworthy that even though the link to the communication director’s original letter no longer works, Minnesota Playlist reprinted it as part of a retrospective in 2014.

Even though arts organizations may not get arts coverage from local media the way they once did, I think the real value of my original post is in the discussion of transparency that arts organizations exhibit when sharing information about themselves in any forum.

Audience Relations, Marketing/PR

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Looking Back At Some Of My Favs

August 8, 2017

by:

Joe Patti

Back in the day, Drew McManus ran an annual series on Adaptistration during the month of April which he christened, Take A Friend To The Orchestra month. I found an old post which recounted some of my favorite entries which provide some great insight into the way different people experience attending the orchestra.

One post I linked to but didn’t quote was composer Alex Shapiro’s. As I re-read some of the entries I cited, I wanted to call attention to some of what she said.

If this orchestral thing is so enjoyable, why the heck do we need to fortify, inform, pre-warn, pre-inform and generally pre-experience it for someone? Is it actually that scary? That risky? Will body armor be necessary? Are we supposed to treat a new listener like a piece of food and soak her in a rich marinade of background information in order to ready her for the searing flame of the auditorium seats? Ouch!

As with all live concerts in any genre- chamber, jazz, rock, reggae- symphonic music washes over us as a sensual experience. If we insist on viewing it as difficult and challenging (perhaps because that automatically makes those of us who like it look awfully darn smart), we’re missing the point. And equally sadly, we’re sending a message that it’s an awful lot of work to listen to music. With an implication like that, people just might stay home, or opt to do something with their money that they perceive as a more obviously enjoyable experience. Hmmm. Sound familiar?

Later she talks about the way the L.A. Phil was advertising concerts. While this was in 2006 and the L.A. Phil has probably made changes to their promotional style, I am pretty sure there are still groups that employ the methods about which she complains:

One day last year as I was driving, a radio ad for the L.A. Phil came on. A haughty-sounding middle-aged white woman was cooing an oily, British-inflected voiceover into a high-end microphone, telling listeners just how marvelous the upcoming season was and that we won’t want to miss the “divine splendor and magnificence” (or some such combo of adjectives) of the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

I was livid. This was “my” wonderful orchestra that was trying to get backsides into the seats, but this truly obnoxious ad “reached out” to only a very small and specialized segment of our population. How was this elitist presentation supposed to build audiences for the future? I love hearing the Phil at Disney Hall, but that radio spot even made me want to stay away, thinking, “gee, I guess this isn’t for regular folks.” These are the kinds of approaches that must be reconsidered, if the great tradition of the symphony orchestra is to continue. It has to do with the attitude we wear- not the clothes.

I know you have heard these sentiments about promotional efforts made before, but it is always good to be reminded. Especially because we don’t often hear “insiders” empathizing with the negative impression audiences might have of the way arts organizations talk about themselves.

Any way, I hope you will check out some of my suggested posts. They are a good mix of humor and insight about the experience of concert attendance.

Advocacy, Audience Relations, Marketing/PR

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Shredding Perceptual Barriers

August 7, 2017

by:

Joe Patti

From the “Stuff We Didn’t Know We Wanted” file, a few years back I wrote about the idea of using a mobile shredder to help lower perceptual barriers with your community. At the time I had seen sign inviting people to “engage in some Spring cleaning and bring their sensitive documents to be shredded. While there people can participate in a potluck/streetfair type event.”

I totally forgot about that, but you can bet before I started writing this entry I added it to my running list of ideas so I wouldn’t forget it again.

As I had written in my post,

It struck me that this is the type of community service an organization could offer that will NEVER in a million years show up on a survey as something you could do to help the community. It is one of those things people need but don’t realize they need when asked.

This is also the sort of thing that breaks down barriers to attendance. You advertise an open house barbecue picnic at your organization and as someone who has never been to an arts organization, I might figure the only difference between the picnic and attending a performance is good ribs. Faced with the prospect of being the only person there who doesn’t know how to speak theatre/ballet/classical music/visual art, there may still be a high anxiety factor even if I don’t have to go into the building.

A shredder truck in the parking lot on the other hand is a service I can actually use. While I am there, maybe I grab some hamburgers and look around a little. If things get a little uncomfortable, the shredder provides my excuse as I notice the line is getting shorter, excuse myself and go over there. Heck, there isn’t much danger in bringing the kids either. Even if the arts stuff doesn’t appeal to them, watching papers get consumed by a giant machine is always interesting.

Though as I noted, even with this approach it still may take people showing up five years in a row before they feel comfortable participating in your regular activities.

Audience Relations, State of the Arts

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