Tinpan NSAI presentation
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Increasing Audience Attendance. While music is a business, fans and audience members want to feel a relationship to artists. This is a brief overview of how to convert an audience into fans that will promote and support you with a brief discussion of other PR strategies.
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Tinpan NSAI presentation
- 1. Increasing Audiences at Live Performances Tara Dunphy lulu@luludemaine.com
- 2. Amplifying Musicians • Super Fan – Ambassador • Industry Experience – Merch Maven / Cashier – Street Team Manager – Office Manager – Grant Writing – Publicity – Assistant Tour Manager – Festival Experience (CMW, Tin Pan)
- 3. It’s Only Rock & Roll to a Sold Out Show • Cycle • Development • Merch • Networking • Learn your Demographic • Audience vs. Fans
- 4. Friends and Family • Built in Fans – Advocate for you • Lessons – Know what you are asking – Saturation
- 5. Common Problems • Music / Performance • Market • Shows are Stale • Reputation
- 6. Don’t KNOW • About You / Your Band – Website! • About a Specific Gig • Free Calendar Listings – Now, Eventful, Show Gopher • Your Networks – Facebook event Page – Artistdata, bandsintown, Reverbnation, Fanbridge, CBC etc • Online Forums – Meetups, Fan Forums, Facebook Groups
- 7. Knowing your Audience Getting your Message to the RIGHT Market • Surveys • Create a persona • Personal Engagement – Online – Mingle • Create a Call to Action
- 8. Newsletter • Every Show • Minimum: Name, Email and Postal Code • Frequency • Mailchimp
- 9. Online • Bloggers and Podcasters – Build your own list • Turn the Record over • Bigger guys follow the smaller ones – Build Relationships (e.g. retweet them) – Offer Unique Content – Think Local • Social sites – Regularly update content – Respond
- 10. Few Other tips • Have email that will not be sent to spam and will demonstrate professionalism – Not hotmall or gmail • Tweet about shows – Include hashtags and include handles of local magazines and bloggers
- 11. Traditional Media • EARLY • Promo Package • Radio College Stations • Newspapers/Magazines • Follow-up, Follow-Up, Follow Up – Don’t be afraid to call • Extend Invitations (guest list)
- 12. On the Ground • Posters/Postcards – Vistaprint – Fiverr • Invite the Right People • Leverage Other Artists Fanbase
- 13. Take Away • Start Early • Research • Be Patient • Build Relationships – Don’t be afraid to ask • Remember Fan Base grows one person at a time
- 14. Tin Pan is Unique Opportunity • To create unique experience for your fans • To grow fan base • To Meet Venue Owners/bookers – Demonstrate ability to secure audience
Editor's Notes
- Madison Violet LyricJust More Fun to play to a full House. Cycle: bands find themselves between a rock and hard place - to get a gig, you need an audience, but to get an audience, you need a gig. Can’t get a gig without an established fan base .Many venues ask for you to demonstrate that you have fanbaseE.g. C’est What? “if your band shows up to play and only a handful of people come through the door, nobody wins. Your band goes home without cab fare, the staff doesn’t make their rent money and the club can’t afford to pay the sound tech.”Horsehoe Tavern – new artist Mondays want you to be able to bring in 40 people. Need live gigs to develop a fan base.Development: Playing to the same circle of friends doesn’t challenge your music.Being surrounded by “yes” people Motivates you to do your best workIf you discover a song in your program that gets a strong response, if the applause is especially prolonged, or if people comment on the song when speaking with you after the show, then it's a keeper! That's a song to be lovingly polished and properly recorded. If a certain song tends to meet regularly with an indifferent response (although most likely, no one will boo!) then this may be a song that needs workMerchMore and more income for independent artists comes from live performances and off-stage salesNetworkingBuild relationships with other artistsYou can open/tour/co-write togetherLeverage their fanbase into yours Learn your Demographicthe best way to find out who was going to listen to your songs was to play live as often and in as many places as possible.Who is in your audience? Is it a blue rinse crowd, under 20sKnowing your audience, allows you to target your message to themConvert Audience to FansYou may have people who like your facebook page, but are not engaged. They don’t come out to shows and don’t tell others about your music.Your goal is to develop a fanbase not just an audiencePeople that want to return to see you again and again as well as advocate for you
- Your friends and family are undoubtedly your biggest supporters and want you to succeed. You can leverage this support.They will help promote you, even if they aren’t particularly fond of your style of musicMaybe grandma won’t come to a show, but she knows a lot of people and can help spread the word (flyers/posters/social media)Call in favorsHave an uncle in radio? A cousin who writes a blog? Try to get as much exposure as you can.Make them feel special and a part of what you are doing and don’t forget to say THANK YOU!Text them to remind them of upcoming shows.Social media and email are great but we often get overloaded. A personal text message is a simple way of reminding friends you are playing.When texting be sure to ask your friends and family to tell one other person. If your friends tell just one other person, it can make a huge difference.Word of Mouth is important. Having someone “vouch” for you gives a personal incentive for new people to attend your showGetting new people to attend your gigs often isn’t the main challenge for new performersEven motivating friends and family can be difficultKnow the reality of what you are asking.You are asking them to travel to a loud (often unclean) pub. Listen to loud music and be surrounded by intoxicated people. Pay at the door to endure this in support of you and leave with ringing ears and a headache.SaturationThere are other more convenient things for people to do: watch TV, surf the netIf you play 25 gigs a year, how many of your friends/family will attend more than 4 of these? So, of course you need to build new audiences tooCreate A PULL – a reason for them to be there. What makes this show unique?
- The amount of things you can control to offset these common problems depends on how much control you have over the night. For instance, at Tin Pan North, you do not control COST venue or scheduling.So things like competing events (e.g. if there is a Jays game that night) cannot be helped.Music and Performance IssuesOne reason people don’t become fans may be because you lack a wow factor ,you play too many slow songs, your songs are depressing, or negativeOr you music simply isn’t strongOne way to tell if this is the issue is by watching your fanbase.If your fanbase grows, you’re doing things rightIf it declines, time to re-evaluate. I won’t be addressing these issues today other than to say practice and be entertaining.You have to Balance How Often you play the Same MarketIf you play too often, people lose interestNot enough people forget about youIdeally you’ll return to the same market every 6-8 weeks until the fan base is strong. The Gigs are all the SameYou haven’t done anything new. Played new material in awhile.Offset this by doing something different:Create anticipation: Make a promo video. Post it on youtube and your website. Ask friends to share it on facebookReputationIt takes a while to build up enough of a great reputation that people are anxious to come see your shows. Be sure that you getting as much publicity as possible. Ask for quotes from fans and venue owners to put on your website. Follow what the press says about you (e.g. using google alerts) and if it is good, plaster it on your website and social networks. Create your own buzz.
- Biggest Problem that will will Talk about today.Don’t Know If fans don’t know about your gig or people don’t know about you, they won’t be in the seats at the venue.About You/BandOn average, people need to hear your name 9 times before they will take an interest in your musicWe’ll talk about ways to get your name out there as we proceed for now I’ll talk about.Having a Weak Online PresenceMake it easy for people to find you.Let’s say you are fortunate enough to have a blogger write about you or heard your music online. A potential fan googles you and finds an out of date website or worse no website at all. What incentive do they have to continue searching?WebsiteNO EXCUSE to not have one. Wordpress makes it simple Make sure it is ALWAYS current. Gigs listing and fresh content on the welcome page (not things from last year)Ideally have an embedded sound payer that stream your music. Sound Cloud allows you to do this.You want to ensure that a fans first experience with you is positive so they will continue to engage with you.If your website and social network pages don’t convey what your act is really like on stage, you may be repelling your target audience. Have a videographer shoot some live footage showing the highlights of your shows. Make it exciting. Be sure the sites represent you well.About your show: Make SURE YOU PROVIDE A COMPLETE MESSAGE MAKE IT EASY FOR PEOPLE TO FIND YOU (GIVE THEM THE SET AND DOOR TIMES, TICKET LINKS ADDRESS)If people don’t know about it they won’t come. Make sure you use every opportunity to advertise the showPost on Popular Community Calendars Now, Eventful, Show GopherAnd Social Networds(artistdata, reverbantion, Myspace, Facebook [event page], sonicbids, Fanbridge, Twitter)Online ForumsLike Meetups.com and facebook groups (e.g. Toronto Blues Lovers)Try to Avoid Industry groups and Look for FansLook for Groups for the general public that would be interested in your musicPost on pages on similar artists or better known artists that you have performed with or associate withBUT HOW DO YOU KNOW WHAT FANS TO LOOK FOR?
- Trying to find groups to promote you and your shows to requires that you know your audience.Who are your fans and what is important to them?Where will you find them?How do you get their attention?Where do they listen to music?Do they stream or buy?Most importantly, how do you get them to interact with you?You may already have an idea from past shows, and current fans.You could even survey them to see what other things they are interested in.GOOGLE SURVEY FORMSNeed google account, but it lets you build forms and embed them into your website via widgetsHowever, you don’t want to hassle them eitherPersonaCreating a story about an almost real person. For instance the soccer mom or the fashionista.Make some assumptions from similar local artists fanbasesKnowing about the ideal or typical fan in this way will help you put yourself in their shoes and think about the kinds of places they shop, visit, or live online.Which will let you focus your efforts in that directionEnagementThe relationship: When a fan messages you or retweets you, reach out to themAsk them how they came across your musicMingle After A showMake people feel important. Ask them about themselves.Encourage interactionTodays fans are used to interacting with artists via FacebookandTwitter. They feel like they are friends, getting a glimpse into your offstage life as well. Build on this connectionCall To actionTell Fans What you want them to doCome out to XShareLike
- WHY?MailchimpIdeal free up to 2000 subscribers and lets people unsubscribePlace a sign-up link and your websiteAllows a “share with friends” link the the footerAllows geo-targetingSo you can separate fans by region. A Toronto fan doesn’t need to know about a Vancouver gig
- Build Personal RelationshipsBiggerblogs tend to follow the smaller ones. Find smaller blogs and you may have better successDon’t just send these a guys a standard press releaseRead a couple of their entries. See if your music fits with what they write aboutRead their about section. Find out their interestsAddress them by nameOffer something uniqueTickets/ CDs to shows for them or as prize to one of their readersSpecial cover video they can post on their siteExclusive Coverage of SomethingYour sitesUpdate wih new MP3s fresh popcasts, videosKeeps people coming backRespond when people message you
- EarlyThis applies to event listings we talked about earlier. Just as people need to plan their time, publications do to. Dailies won’t need as much leeway as monthly magazines. However, the best rule of thumb is to start early and follow-upPromo PackagePress Release: with details of gig. Be sure to write as a story. Often smaller papers will publish it as is. So will some online publicationsInclude link to bio via drop boxDigital access to hear your songs and colour photos (Drop box)Quotes from any press coverage you have had in the pastContact info and website(s)Radio – ask for interviews and airplayContact Music or Programming Directors and HostsOffer to do Free Give away (Tickets or CD)Make sure your CD is in their libraryAgain, make the contact personalWhen approaching hostsKnow what their show is about. How you could fit inNewspapers/ MagazineDon’t forget LOCAL e.g. Toronto Community NewsIf you went to school in Scarbourough email the Scarbourough Mirror “Scarborough Boy to Share stage with Music Legend)Live in Bloor West Village email Antoine Tedesco of Bloor_west Villager
- Personally, I prefer postcards. They are more portable and fit onto a community coffee house bulletin board easier. However, they are also less visible.If you cannot print them up for every show, make a generic one with a blank space so you can reuse it in different marketsLeave at places where your audience will visitCoffee shops, venues you have played before, record storesHand them out at concerts you attend. Have friends and family do the sameOnline digital printing has made this more affordable (VISTAPRINT)And if you are looking for great art Cheap try fiverrPersonally reach out to people Some people bring an entourage. Get influencers interested
- DifferentiatedAs Tin Pan is set up “in the round” and allows you to share the stage with a Headliner, this is a built in way to promote this gig as different from all of your other gigs.It is more important that your gigs are unique from each other and not necessarily from what other bands do. This encourages your fanbase to come see you do new things they wouldn’t see otherwise.Meet bookers re: booking future gig