Marc van Bree

Blog (2006-2015)

  • Why performing arts organizations are not app-ropriate

    Let me start with a simple question: How many of you have opened an arts organization’s mobile app lately? And no, it doesn’t count if you were just looking to see what your competitors were doing.

    Even more generally: How many apps have you used in your personal life just this last week? Email, news and Facebook. That’s about it for me. Maybe Instagram, Yelp, Fandango, LinkedIn and Google Maps. The average user has about 65 apps installed, but only uses about 15 apps per week (source).

    What am I trying to tell you? Don’t waste your money developing an app for your arts organization.

    Yes, the debate is still raging on whether the future lies in the World Wide Web or in apps. The Pew Internet Project invited experts to predict where things might be by the end of the decade. The results: 59% believe the web will dominate; 35% believe apps will dominate.

    But many challenged the idea of the apps vs. web framing and considered the question to be a false dichotomy: “Apps are generally better for narrowly defined repetitive tasks,” as Tony Smith of the Open Source Developers Club in Melbourne, Australia wrote. “The Web will remain better for asynchronous exploring and continue its gateway role.”

    Another, anonymous writer, states: “Apps will continue, as will app stores, but they’ll continue to be mass-market outlets for lightweight products on the one hand, and very narrow vertical outlets for very specific platform-dependent professional tools on the other, while the entire middle-ground will continue to belong to the Web.”

    And that’s exactly why I don’t see apps as a viable option for most arts organizations. They live in this middle-ground; they don’t have the mass-market appeal and they are not a tool for a narrowly defined repetitive task.

    Only a handful of large performing arts organizations will have a large enough following to keep a sustained audience for their app.  And then only if they can keep the audience engaged with fresh content, or say lets the audience stream an entire catalog of music.

    Looking at current performing arts organizations apps, they mostly follow the same functionality: browsing snippets of content, some entertainment and info, and buying tickets.

    Interestingly, as this simple infographic from MDG Advertising shows: users prefer mobile browsers for shopping, search, and entertainment. The key functions of most arts organizations apps! Users prefer mobile apps for managing data and connecting with others.

    Well, so it’s decided, let’s go with a mobile website! Not so fast. There are some important pros when it comes to apps, and to make things more complicated, there’s a third option: responsive design.

    What is responsive design? It is a development method that allows you to create a single website that will adapt to the device on which it’s being viewed, whether it’s a desktop, a smartphone or a tablet. A site built with responsive design will automatically resize, and can customize content or options, for different devices.

    So I decided to put together a little matrix to outline the strengths and weaknesses of each option:

    Of course, cost and time to develop apps or sites will differ greatly depending on your wants and needs: you can have a cheap out-of-the-box mobile app developed and an expensive responsive design site; or you can go all out on a mobile app and spend less than $100 on a responsive WordPress theme for your site. A mobile site will consistently be the least expensive to develop.

    While I would put my money on responsive design, sometimes it might not be immediately attainable. A site overhaul can be expensive too, and that’s probably when you’d have the best opportunity to make your site responsive. At the Austin Lyric Opera, we made a huge stride forward by going from a Flash-based website that could not load on any mobile device to a WordPress site that loaded just fine on mobile devices. Yet it wasn’t a fully responsive design, so we opted to develop a low-budget, purpose driven mobile site that focused on elements such as key event information, program notes and traffic and parking info. All it took was an installation of a mobile specific WordPress theme on a sub directory (see ALOontheGO.org).

    Another complicating factor is the fact that a lot of organizations will depend on a third-party, hosted ticketing solution. Unless you have the budget to work with a ticketing solution’s API (if they even offer it in the first place) in your design, you’ll likely develop a website with responsive design and you’ll get stuck with a third-party ticketing site that is not optimized for all devices. Even a mobile specific ticketing site will make a much smoother transition and some ticketing systems will offer at least that.

    In developing a mobile app, you will be all but forced to use an API if you want box office functionality. The affordable, standardized apps offered by Instant Encore offer integration with Tessitura, but typically only larger arts organizations can afford Tessitura in the first place.

    So when would you use a mobile app? If you have the resources and the audience for sustained engagement, a mobile app will offer the best user experience. But the keywords are resources, audience and sustained. You’ll have to measure and judge for yourself if the return is worth the initial and continued investment. I suspect for most organizations it is not.

    But considering that, for the Austin Lyric Opera, more than 20% of traffic came from mobile devices, yet it only delivered 10% of revenue, and considering that mobile traffic has grown with the dawn of tablets and will continue to grow, you must address your mobile device traffic.

    What you opt for will ultimately depend on your objectives and your budget. Just don’t neglect it.

    Here’s my advice: forget about mobile apps, and aim for responsive design when you’re ready. You can use a mobile site as an intermediate option or for a very specific set of objectives and uses.

     

    Postscript

    Perhaps it would make more sense to create a Fandango-like app for the performing arts. It has a narrow function and a mass-market appeal. Fandango, as you may know, sells movie tickets to most theaters in the country. But even this idea would be tremendously hard to implement: you’d need agreements with different arts organizations to sell tickets through a central point, and ticketing for the arts is much more complex than for movie theaters. Not to mention that the app would likely focus on a specific metropolitan area, rather than an entire country, so would you have a large enough pool to draw from?

    Some Suggested Reading

    Mobile Sites vs. Apps: The Coming Strategy Shift

    Google How To Go Mo | Test Your Site

    Drew McManus on responsive design

  • Marketing Automation in Performing Arts

    I’m in a new industry, which means I come across different marketing approaches. I always like seeing how these new perspectives translate to the performing arts. My current industry is heavy on lead generation and marketing automation. Skip forward a little to this week, when I came across an interesting post from the TRG Arts folks.

    The post, “Too Many Tryers to Sustain the Arts,” echoes the Orchestra Churn study I have written about in the past:

    In our firm’s decade of arts consumer research, Tryers are the most prevalent type of patron behavior.  They are households that have infrequent, one-time, or long-ago transactions with your organization. Right now your database–like those of most arts and entertainment organizations–is likely comprised of 90% Tryers.  And most of them are patrons you’ve allowed to lapse.

    In my Take A Friend to the Orchestra post about flipping the funnel, I cover a strategy on how to market to these “Tryers,” or “Unconverted Trialists” as the Churn study calls them. In particular, how you follow up with them after an experience is crucial.

    A November 2011 post by PatronTechnology CEO Eugene Carr eloquently and anecdotally explains it in different words:

    Often as arts patrons we are thanked personally for our contributions. But when buying a ticket, is a generic “Thank You” screen enough after a completed transaction? Actions speak louder than words. If patrons receive a “thank you” email after they buy their ticket, it registers. If they receive a reminder before the show, they are impressed. If you send them a message after the performance asking if they enjoyed it, or if you provide them with an invitation (or discount) to future productions you’ve proven to those patrons that you not only appreciate their business, but you appreciate them. In the end, individual attention is worth its weight in gold.

    Speaking of emails, I’m always happy to know if an event I’m interested in is coming to town. On the other hand, I’m not terribly happy when I receive emails that have nothing to do with me. For example, if I bought tickets to see The Messiah, do I want to know when the Megadeth tour is coming to town? Keeping all correspondence relevant to a patron is not only a responsible marketing approach, but a respectful one.

    Enter marketing automation. Marketing automation is all about a follow up sequence, or rather sequences, on leads you captured in some form or another.

    Capturing leads

    You may well consider these “Tryers” and “Unconverted Trialists” to be very hot leads for future performances (although technically, they would be repeat buyers). In addition, there are many ways for generating leads and capturing those leads. You likely already do so in a very basic form with a simple “Sign Up for Our Newsletter” page on your website.

    Generally, the more information you can get the better (not just name, phone number, address and email, but also what performances interests them, what performance day they prefer), but the more information you ask the less likely a lead capture form gets filled out. The all-important question becomes: how do you segment your lists? Followed logically by what information do you need for your segmentation?

    Looking at industries other than performing arts, we can learn a little about lead capturing. Usually, companies offer a white paper or a webinar or other content in exchange for contact information. Interestingly, I have not seen any performing arts organizations use their content for lead generation. Free downloads of music files, when offered, are often just openly available on a website. And what about that behind-the-scenes video you created? And why not generate a white paper from a lecture on a particular opera or symphony?

    Nurturing and converting leads

    When you’ve captured your leads and you’ve tagged them appropriately, you can start the nurturing process. Tagging is important, because a tag will determine how you’ll follow up with your lead.  Some examples:

    • Tag based on: money spent (Can we put them in a sequence for an up sell?)
    • Based on: repertoire (Indicated interest in what? Previously attended what?)
    • Based on: [insert tag that makes sense for your segmentation]

    The tags determine in what marketing sequence your leads will be placed. Simplistically, it goes something like this: “If patron has A tag, then they’re in A marketing sequence” or “If patron has B tag, then they’re in B marketing sequence.”

    This tagging and segmentation is key, because as Carr writes you need to keep “all correspondence relevant to a patron.” The Churn study too showed that offering a relevant “killer deal” will get those Tryers and Trialists back in the door.

    And once they’re back in the door—once the lead is converted—they’ll be put in another marketing sequence. Perhaps you can put them on a path toward subscriptions.

    If they don’t respond to a marketing sequence, tag them accordingly so you don’t keep bombarding them with messages or abandon the lead altogether. If, let’s say a marketing sequence consists of 8 email messages (or better yet, a mix between online and offline messages) and they haven’t responded by the time the eighth message appears in their inbox, you can put them on in a sequence that nurtures them more slowly, keeping the lead warm, but not annoyed.

    Sample sequence where the patron is moved into another sequence if not converted by the campaign’s end, keeping the lead warm, but not annoyed.

     

    Of course, marketing automation does not mean impersonal. In your sequence, one or more of the touch points can and should be a phone call or personal conversation. If a patron with tag A is in stage 4 of the sequence, you can flag your box office or sales team to call them, for example. And not all messages in the sequence have to be a hard sell; let’s say the purchase of a show is the entrance into a sequence, then that thank you note after a show should be part of the sequence.

    You cannot execute a well-structured marketing automation campaign without accurate analytics. I’ve written before how I set up e-commerce tracking for the Austin Lyric Opera. This becomes key. One of the most important elements of marketing automation is testing and configuring the optimal messaging. This should be an ongoing process.

    I admit, setting up a marketing automation campaign is complex (a lot of “if this, then that” scenarios). Even more so for organizations that do not have the resources to work with the software or vendors specialized in automation. In fact, I’m not even sure how well most ticketing solutions are set up for this. I suspect very few to none.

    The point is also not to completely automate all your marketing, push a button and sit back. There should always be room for flexibility. You should take elements and apply them where you can and where you know they make sense. Perhaps you just want to test the concept with lapsed subscribers and put them in a nurturing sequence.

    Start small, segment well and keep testing. Then, rinse and repeat and scale up.

    If you have any examples of marketing automation in performing arts, leave a comment below!

  • Building a performing arts website on no or close to no budget

    While I have developed websites from scratch, when I developed a new website for Austin Lyric Opera, I chose to go with a vendor. I needed the help, the service and the security. After all, my job was marketing director, and not web developer, and the season brochure still needed to get produced and the hall still needed to rescaled and re-priced.

    Since October 2011, I have been a board member of Chorus Austin. I offered my services to develop a new website. This time, I did not have the financial resources to go with a vendor. All I had was my time and my knowledge and know-how.

    My objectives were similar to the redevelopment of the Austin Lyric Opera website: driving conversions, being able to measure, customizable and easily manageable. In addition, a couple of things needed to happen:

    • Chorus members needed a guarded section and a login
    • Patrons needed to donate and buy tickets or merchandise directly on the site (events are general admission; payments processed through PayPal); an ecommerce/shopping cart system needed to be set up.

    I had proposed a rough navigation structure, with the theme functionality partially dictating it, and other members provided the site copy. While I donated my time, there were still some minor expenses. I spent roughly 120 hours (included in this was time learning about the theme, the shopping cart system, and creating some of the visual elements). Here are the elements that went into the site functionality and their costs (warning, some of it might be a tad technical):

    Premium Theme

    Genesis framework

    There are limits to what you can do with a free WordPress theme. Customizing a free theme can be time consuming and not update friendly. Premium themes can be very affordable and can offer a range of added features. After some research, I opted for StudioPress’s Genesis framework and picked the Associate child theme. I did very little customization and the end result mirrors the demo site closely; it is a fairly standard out-of-the-box version. Cost: $79.95

    (I was so pleased, I in fact later upgraded this blog to a Genesis theme!)

    Plugins

    Events Calendar Pro

    Modern Tribe’s Events Calendar Pro does not offer the great features of Venture’s proprietary events manager, but I could make it work with some customization (mostly customized the event page template; see example) and more importantly it does integrate nicely with the Genesis framework. I’m particularly happy how it works well with using an event’s featured image (regular setting in the Events Calendar custom post type) as a home page slider image (Genesis allows the slider to draw from custom post types). Cost: $50.

    Gravity Forms

    The main reason I needed the Gravity Forms plugin was for integration with Woocommerce and being able to set up a donation page with functionality such as custom donation amount and a dedication message or special requests. Later, this plugin can also serve handy to create customizable subscription packages (with functions such as “If option A is picked, then display $XX price” or “If option B is picked, only then allow option D as an additional order”). In addition, it is good to have survey and form capabilities on your website. Gravity Forms offers a world of possibilities. Cost: $39

    Woocommerce

    The shopping cart and ecommerce functionality was of major importance on this site. Not having previous experience setting up shopping carts, Woocommerce offered good documentation and was easy to install and set up. I made a couple of customizations in functionality and in the CSS rendering. Because Woocommerce is a product by Woothemes, it naturally works best with themes by that company. I later found—but have not yet installed—a plugin for integrating Woocommerce with a Genesis framework (Genesis Connect for Woocommerce). Cost: Free.

    Gravity Forms Add-ons (Woocommerce extension)

    As mentioned, I installed Gravity Forms primarily for the donation capabilities. With this Woocommerce Gravity Forms extension, you can customize donation pages where this would not be possible in a vanilla Woocommerce installation (unless you’re happy with only giving your patrons fixed options like $5, $10 and $25). Cost: $35

    Order/Customer CSV Export (Woocommerce extension)

    Manually tallying customer orders is painstaking. This extension allows you to download the data in one fell swoop in a CSV document. Very handy for keeping track of sales in a spreadsheet and reporting to others. Cost: $35.

    WP-Members

    Chorus Austin wanted a singers’ portal, a members’ area. I needed to have functionality where Chorus members could register for access to information and calendars hidden from public view. In addition, members can pay their dues and buy scores (set up through a non-public, non-indexed Woocommerce product); members can change their profile settings and password and recover their username and password. Administrators can manage users and approve registrations and the plugin is based on WordPress’ “User” functionality, but the great thing about this plugin is that it integrates login functions on pages, rather than having to rely on the standard admin login screen. Cost: Free.

    MediaElement.js – HTML5 Audio and Video

    I needed a simple player for embedding audio and video files. I found this particular plugin visually clean, easy for patrons and easy to implement with short codes. Cost: Free.

    Total

    Of course other organizations might require other functions and other plugins. Some might work with a third-party ticketing solution and won’t need an integrated shopping cart (although I think it looks totally cool and professional to have your own!). You can build a website with WordPress completely free (not counting hosting and domain name costs, which can start as low as about $100 a year), but free is perhaps somewhat misleading considering the tremendous time commitment I made (admitting that more skilled WordPress gurus could have probably set it up in half the time). All things considered, total actual cost: $238.95

    Optional additions

    Here’s what’s on my wish list:

    PayPal Pro (Woocommerce extension)

    For a complete integration, rather than redirecting to PayPal, this extension allows direct credit card information input in the shopping cart check out, ensuring a seamless a professional look. Cost: $50. Requires a valid SSL Certificate on your website (~$99 a year) and a PayPal Pro merchant account ($30 a month).

    Facebook Tab (Woocommerce extension)

    Can’t wait to try this out. Generally, not even the largest arts organizations have a Facebook shopping cart integration. If it works like it says it will, this simple solution can really make other arts organizations see green with envy. Cost: $35. Requires a valid SSL Certificate on your website (~$99 a year).


    Are you looking to build a new website for your performing arts organization? I might be able to help. Send me a note and let’s talk.

  • Join me for #ArtsMgtChat this Friday

    Getting back into the blogging and tweeting habit came at the right time. I was invited to guest host a Twitter chat called #ArtsMgtChat this Friday, May 11. This chat is great initiative by Ally Yusuf, a young emerging arts leader, and had its launch on April 27 with a chat about navigating a career in arts management. You can read the transcript here.

    This Friday’s chat covers social media strategies for arts organizations, a topic, as you know, that is near and dear to my heart.

    My experience with the Ask the Musicians Twitter chats has been that you never quite know in what direction it will be taken, so I’m curious to see where this chat will lead us. I think I’d like to see my role as a guest host to explore those interesting, unexpected areas and, as an analytics and data enthusiast, ask follow up questions that delve deeper into measurement other than “this campaign got us 100,000 page views.”

    Join us on Friday! Chat starts at 2 p.m. ET / 1 p.m. CT on Twitter with the hashtag #ArtsMgtChat.

  • ALO: final round up (complete presentation)

    ALO: A new website and digital strategy (complete)

    View more presentations from Marc van Bree

    This concludes a brief overview of what went into a new website and new digital strategy for a performing arts organization. At the start of the season, the opera was in a precarious position. I had to work with a 35% overall marketing budget cut, so I knew I had to be more efficient with the marketing dollars I had to my disposal.

    Because many parts of the digital strategy were outsourced, the opera had spent a little more than $40,000 on all things online in the previous season. This season, the number barely reached $15,000, yet we were able to significantly increase the effectiveness.

    Aided by a new ticketing solution launched simultaneously, we increased online single ticket sales from 28% to 55% of total single ticket sales while delivering a greater ability to analyze patron behaviors, track conversions and account for advertising spending.

    Going into the future, the next steps should include eliminating those points that skew data in Google Analytics. In the course of the season, I identified a handful of these issues and we need to find fixes so that the data is more accurate. You won’t want to make decisions on flawed or incomplete data. So even though certain banner ads didn’t seem to perform very well, I wouldn’t want to make radical decisions just yet.

    Furthermore, we only started collecting e-commerce and conversion data for one production. As all arts marketers know, no opera or symphony concert or ballet sells in the same manner. What are the noticeable differences we can detect in the conversion data and what can we learn from these differences?

    In addition to making the data stream more accurate by eliminating points that skew data, we should make sure we add certain elements in the strategy. We started testing this in Google AdWords already, and we can apply what we learn there in other areas. How does different marketing content perform in identical groups? Next steps must definitely include small scale A/B testing, in either email messages or landing pages, where one (random) half of the gets one message and the other (random) half gets another message.

    But what becomes very clear is that if you have the human resources, and a knowledgeable staff, you can bring much of your digital strategy in-house. A company like Venture and tools like Google Analytics and Google Grants offer free or low-cost alternatives to expensive agencies.

    Outsourcing can typically get you all the fish you want, at a cost. It’s much better, however, to teach yourself, or even have someone teach you, how to fish.

    I am proud to have built a strong digital foundation and by collecting and analyzing data we will be able to fine-tune this foundation to become ever more efficient.