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…
Marketing
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 new audience in Toronto and Nashville
I recently found two orchestras that are actively implementing an idea that I’ve been advocating here for awhile: marketing to the under 30 demographic. Conventional wisdom in this industry states that it isn’t worthwhile to market toward a demographic that is expensive to attract and notoriously fickle in their tastes.
But I don’t always buy conventional wisdom; I find that all too often it allows an organization to become self satisfied and no longer work to its maximum ability. In essence, it creates a follower mentality, which in this business results in nothing more than a slow and painful demise.
No Good Deed Goes Unpunished
I received an email the other day from a friend of mine that plays in solid, Midwest orchestra. She was complaining that they recently had an orchestra wide meeting with management where the Marketing Director was promoting a new audience development initiative to the musicians. Essentially, the initiative called for each player to be responsible for bringing in one new subscription sale. Do I have to mention that it didn’t go …
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…