Getting Social

20 Oct 2009 in Audience Development Blog

A Social Butterfly at Woodend Barn

A Social Butterfly at Woodend Barn

Social Media is taking centre court amongst audience development and marketing professionals. It’s free, its accessible anywhere and everywhere, it’s a new and interactive way of communicating with your audience, your visitors, your customers, and it’s used by millions of people around the planet.

The benefits of using social media as an audience development or marketing tool are vast, but only if you are using them in the right way. These are not applications for you to promote your products, advertise your events, or generally bombard your ‘fans’ or ‘followers’ with marketing bumpf. It’s about being social. Being friendly, entertaining, engaging, being a real person. If organisations can’t do this, then social media used the wrong way is far more damaging to its brand, reputation and audience attraction. While print media, tv advertisements, brochures, reviews, flyers etc, all disappear eventually, what you post online, stays online, forever!

I’ve been working with arts organisations across the Highlands and Islands to encourage them to get active and social online, participate in discussion, get chatting and posting, and start establishing relationships beyond the four walls and traditional marketing techniques of their organisation. And social media does not simply remain in the domain of the organisation. In my previous blog about branding, personal branding for individual artists or makers, can be achieved through social media.

For the next couple of months I will be working on organising a series of web marketing workshops for the Highlands and Islands, to promote and support individuals and organisations in their online development. These workshops are aimed at people who want a practical introduction into the world of web marketing, including social media.

I’ll keep you posted on the developments of these workshops, hopefully they will be up and running by the new year.

In the meantime check out my social media tip sheet, developed for HI-Arts. http://bit.ly/2VCpvL 

The postings on this site are my own and do not necessarily represent HI-Art’s positions, strategies or opinions.