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7.12.2005
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Volume Three
Issue Seven
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Welcome to July's Arts Marketer of the Month. In this issue, we visit Ireland, where Sharon Corcoran, Artistic Director for the Courthouse Arts Centre, shares her insight into marketing a rural multi-disciplinary arts venue. Read on...
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Featured Arts Marketer: Sharon Corcoran
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Sharon Corcoran, Artistic Director of the Courthouse Arts Center
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Ex-pat American, Sharon Corcoran, has been the Artistic Director for the Courthouse Arts Centre in County Wicklow, Ireland since 1996.
With the help of one full-time and three part-time staff members, Sharon heads an ambitious program of visual art exhibitions, all genres of music, touring theatre, and a film society. The Centre also holds literary events, dance concerts, hosts a resident youth theatre company, art classes and is used by local groups, including an amateur drama group, a yoga class, and the Tinahely Women's Network.
Although the Centre is located in the small village of Tinahely, it serves all of South and West County Wicklow, North County Wexford and part of County Carlow in southwest Ireland.
Sharon is originally from St.Louis, Missouri where she worked at the Washington University Art Museum. In the Q & A that follows, she discusses strategies for marketing, from urban America to rural Ireland...
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Q & A with Sharon Corcoran,
Artistic Director of The Courthouse Arts Centre
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The Courthouse Arts Centre, Tinahely, Ireland
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Sharon, to begin, how did you come to be Artistic Director of the Courthouse Arts Centre in Tinahely, Ireland. And, by the way, where is Tinahely exactly?
Tinahely is a small village of about 600 people located in south County Wicklow. It's about 60 miles south of Dublin, in very hilly countryside of farmland and pasture - wonderfully scenic. I ended up here because my husband, Terry (from Dublin) used to come to this area with the Boy Scouts, and always loved it.
When we arrived here in 1991, the 1843 courthouse building in the town was in the midst of renovations, initiated by the local community. When it was finally finished, I applied for the job of running it - as a venue dedicated to a combination of cultural, artistic and heritage functions.
In comparing your former job at the Washington University Art Museum to your role at the Courthouse, what would you say are the biggest differences? Particularly, how do the patrons vary - from an American city to the Irish countryside?
Washington University was always bustling with students and faculty, and of course, it was in an urban setting which helps to encourage a certain amount of attendance. Here we are dealing with a community of farming families and people whose work is related to agriculture - so priorities are quite different.
That said, Tinahely is quite cosmopolitan, with lots of "blow-ins" from other parts - including a couple of other Americans. And because of the low house prices, more and more "city-folk" are moving here to commute to jobs in Dublin.
So how has your marketing approach changed? Are there any significant differences to the way the arts are marketed in Ireland compared to the US?
I'm very much a self-taught marketer, so I'm not sure I have a perfect perspective on these differences - but obviously mailing lists (snail mail and now more and more e-mail) are equally important in both places. I think this stems from the importance of building loyalty, something that is certainly not unique to either location.
What does vary - at least between the Courthouse and say, an urban art museum - is that we do not aim our programme to tourists at all, but instead focus on the local community. Because there are so few cultural and artistic opportunities within at least a one-hour driving radius, we have a very strong relationship with local residents.
Perhaps internet use has been a little slower to catch on here. There are still quite a few elderly or technophobe patrons who don't own a computer, and want to receive traditional mail... And, even if they receive e-mail promotions from us, they will often phone rather than e-mail their bookings!
That said, our e-list is growing very rapidly - from almost nil 3-4 years ago to over half our mailing list today.
You've been using e-mail as a tool for marketing for about six months. What results have you seen?
Before PatronMail, we were doing in-house e-mail promotions, but it was quite a headache - keeping track of good addresses, bad addresses, and we couldn't do nearly as much with graphics. When we changed over to PatronMail, we got a lot of compliments right away from the improved look of our e-mailings.
For our film club it has been particularly successful in increasing our audiences, because we can upload film stills, which look great on screen and can really give a taste of the film. We show two films per week, so the two-column campaign format really works well in promoting two screenings in one email.
Our plans for the future are to 'capture' ever more of our patrons' e-mail addresses. The ratio of e-mail to snail-mail addresses is increasing all the time, though some people still hesitate to give their e-mail addresses. I'd be happy to see our open rate increase all the time, too. To be sure, there's no going back!
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Visit The Courthouse Arts Centre's Web Site
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Register now for Early-Bird Pricing: Full-day E-marketing Seminars in Chicago, Los Angeles, Washington DC & New York
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Smart Web-Based Marketing for the Arts: Full-day seminar with Eugene Carr, president of Patron Technology
By popular demand, we're repeating the very successful seminar we offered in March here in New York, in 4 cities this summer.
This seminar will prepare you to make the most of your e-marketing for next season. It will offer you results of a national study of online arts consumers, as well as specific techniques you can immediately implement to improve your results.
"I was so very impressed with Gene's wonderful presentation at the Chorfest Conference. There was a sense of integrity and authenticity in the presentation he gave - I have not always had that confidence with other "technology" presentations."
-- Donna Otto, Coastal Sound Music Academy
"Gene was right - the seminar was the best thing I did at the Chorus America conference. As a matter of fact, I think it was worth the entire price of my registration."
-- Jordan Sramek, The Rose Ensemble
Dates & Locations
Chicago: Thursday, August 18
Los Angeles: Monday, August 22
Washington, DC: Thursday, August 25
New York City: Friday, August 26
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Click here for complete description and registration
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If you have interesting and creative initiatives that you would like to have featured or know of an arts marketer that you would like to recommend for one of our upcoming editions, please contact info@patrontechnology.com.
Please watch for the next edition of our Arts Marketer of the Month, coming August 9, 2005.
Note: The CAN-SPAM act mandates that all commercial e-mail contains a physical mailing address, and ours is: 850 Seventh Avenue, Suite 801, New York, NY 10019
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