So… the museum decided to do the silly video thing again,
but this time it didn’t go so well. Take a look:
http://vimeo.com/63070252
For those who don't know, the Carnegie International is a big deal survey exhibition for not only the museum, but the city of Pittsburgh and the international arts community. The event has been going on for 100 or so years and it is a more serious/formal affair. I'm not sure this video reflects this. I think the museum should have invested more in the production value and maybe a bit more in the talent as well. My opinion is that guerrilla marketing is a great option for saving money and attracting a niche audience, but maybe it should be reserved for less formal events. What do you guys think? Do you have some examples of good or bad guerrilla marketing in nonprofit arts?
Check back for more examples!
For those who don't know, the Carnegie International is a big deal survey exhibition for not only the museum, but the city of Pittsburgh and the international arts community. The event has been going on for 100 or so years and it is a more serious/formal affair. I'm not sure this video reflects this. I think the museum should have invested more in the production value and maybe a bit more in the talent as well. My opinion is that guerrilla marketing is a great option for saving money and attracting a niche audience, but maybe it should be reserved for less formal events. What do you guys think? Do you have some examples of good or bad guerrilla marketing in nonprofit arts?
Check back for more examples!
The two examples that Hannah has posted point out what I think is one of the essential reasons that established institutions with staffs over the age of 25 are afraid of guerrilla marketing - it is highly sensitive to trends and unforgiving of mistakes. Audiences are much more likely to forgive traditional marketing (post cards, print ads, etc.) that is not as hip as it could be or doesn’t quite embody AIDA, but marketing that is innovative and non-traditional in form must meet a much higher standard of cultural relevance.
ReplyDeleteI imagine that an observer external to our culture would have a very hard time determining what makes one attempt at guerilla marketing effective and another go horribly awry. An outside observer can learn basic design principles and understand what makes a postcard eye catching, but he or she would have a much harder time identifying the line between awesome and creepy in a promotional video due to the extreme cultural subjectivity of the medium.
Here are a few more examples:
http://www.inc.com/ss/7-successful-viral-marketing-campaigns#4
http://www.cracked.com/article_18569_the-6-most-insanely-misguided-attempts-at-viral-marketing.html
I believe the different results of the two videos are partly attributed to the subject matter that the videos want to deliver. The first video was more about an invitation to an event, which is targeted more to younger audience. Free cake is enough to appeal to the segment. On the other hand, the second video’s purpose seems to just announce the artists who are selected for 2013 Carnegie International. There is no call to action for the audience, and the audience would find it difficult to see the relevance of the content to themselves. However, I believe this trial would help build some pre-awareness about the event, which can be linked to the next campaign.
ReplyDeleteHannah’s post reminded me of the last year’s photo on MoMA Facebook page. The shot was about the staff of the Museum of Modern Art going Gangnam Style in support of Chinese artist Ai Weiwei. (For those who are not familiar with this, please find the article here: http://hyperallergic.com/60436/moma-goes-gangnam-style-in-support-of-ai-weiwei/) This photo looks a bit silly, but the message is a rather serious: Chinese government’s censorship on arts vs. an artist who are opposed to that government. Therefore, I think serious topics like this case can also work for guerilla marketing, if the content is made relevant to the issue and the context. Also, maybe better work for younger audience.
As quickly as guerilla marketing can spread, negative feedback can spread even quicker. I was introduced to the second video (for the international), before Hannah's post, by two (separate) people exclaiming how bad it was on social media. So, if CMOA's goal was simply to get the word out, then I think they achieved their goal. For me, personally, it did not generate any anticipation of the actual event and I'm curious if anyone had a different personal response?
ReplyDeleteI think that Kate makes an excellent point that audiences are more likely to forgive poor traditional marketing materials over something that is more of a risk like this video promotion. I do think its cool that the CMOA took an unconvential approach to generating buzz around this event, even if it was poorly executed. Simply looking at responses to the video on CMOA's Facebook page it got some mixed reviews, but the overall sentiment still seems to be positive support for the International. So, I don't think CMOA's audience for the International will be highly affected by this video. I think it was a relatively safe event for CMOA to experiment with a different marketing technique, given its strong reputation and history of attendance.
This seems like an appropriate time to highlight some of the work we are doing at the City right now as an outreach component of ARTPGH and DESIGNPGH-the city's first-ever comprehensive public art and urban design plans. The City chose to engage Jon Rubin in artist-led community outreach and is launching TALKPGH this Saturday. More info at talkpgh.com. Basically, the concept is a mobile talk-show vehicle traveling to all 90 of Pittsburgh's neighborhoods over the next three weeks and, apart from outreach, is also a means of non-traditional marketing for the plans and upcoming community events in April. Sadly, the marketing for talkpgh in itself has been pretty poor (things move slowly at the City), but it should be really interesting and I encourage you all to check out the schedule, participate in your own neighborhood, or just go check it out as its about town.
A nonarts discussion of video and viral emerged in my in box as well:
ReplyDeletehttps://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?tab=cm#inbox/13dd6b0e0e551696
I think that Allison brought up some really good points above - I also think that it was safe for them to have used this event to experiment with some non-traditional marketing. And even though the production values aren't particularly stellar, I actually think more people probably viewed this video and became aware of the event BECAUSE it was kind of bad. One of those kind of "this is so terrible that it's actually hilarious and I want to watch it again" type videos.
ReplyDeleteI think that Marissa brings up a good point that addresses the idea of "there's no such thing as bad PR." It's not something that I think is correct 100% of the time, but there are a lot of times when organizations receive a lot of press for something that isn't very good...and yet their company isn't incredibly damaged by it-in fact, some people will go to see a show because it's so terrible and gotten so much press (Spider Man the Musical, anyone?).
DeleteI think what people either don't realize, or at least forget, is that just because marketing via social media is "cheaper" than our more traditional channels, it takes the same amount of care, creativity, and professionalism (even if the tone is lighter). The majority of the time, successful guerrilla marketing is sophisticated and has been subject to a thoughtful, strategic planning process.Furthermore, it requires monitoring and a level of prolonged engagement on the part of the marketing dept(e.g. responding to positive response, attempting to increase distribution/awareness, or handling crisis mgmt), that items such as postcards do not demand.
ReplyDeleteAlso, no one has pointed out the obvious to Hannah's examples: ONE INVOLVED CAKE! I love art and everything, but c'mon- cake, especially giant cake impressively crafted to look like a building, is a way bigger draw (even if you don't understand it, at least you get to eat it! And there was booze, too, right? That might have helped the events success...)
Interesting...I figured that the more traditional marketing methods (i.e. print materials) would require more monitoring and updating. Social media content usually has a much shorter half-life/peak impression time than more traditional types - a brochure broadcasts its message for as long as it remains in the recipient's physical possession (scary thought, right?), but a Facebook post may be more or less "forgotten" as more new - and hopefully great - content is posted. Of course, that's no license for an organization to be reckless with social media branding... :)
DeleteAn example to illustrate the permanency of print: when I was at the PSO last summer, we lost our beloved Pops conductor Marvin Hamlisch, and had to change all of our marketing materials (digital and non-) to reflect that unfortunate event. If, say, Pops season brochures that featured Marvin had continued to be sent out to area households, we might have found ourselves in an extremely awkward PR situation that would have been hard to control and mitigate. Print materials have to constantly be tweaked to remain relevant and optimal, and that's a pretty laborious process every time.
I agree. It's definitely important to note that even though guerrilla marketing may be more cost efficient, we must still remember the opportunity cost of planning time and efforts. The end product must be at least as valuable as the effort put into making it.
DeleteHowever, I also still keep thinking that when it comes to marketing, generating a buzz, (good or bad), is still good. We may not like the final product, but at least it drew our attention and perhaps sparked our curiosity in some way.
Michelle, I think that's a great point about permanency. It strikes me that there is a trade-off between print and online media that is heavily tied in with the permanency concept. Print brochures are able to be made, disseminated, and more or less forgotten about unless something like Marvin's passing happens to change the initial information. A brochure can be placed inside someone's planner and referred back to throughout the season, for example, without the marketing department sending out new brochures to remind them. Online media, on the other hand, seems to need constant reinforcement to keep it from disappearing in the maelstrom of internet messages. Marketing staff, and sometimes ALL staff, need to be constantly involved in social media activity.
DeleteThis can be problematic. One issue I've seen is when a marketing director really struggles to keep staff involved in social media for the organization after the initial introductory incentivized push had ended. The director's understanding iss that social media would become part of "business as usual" for the rest of the staff; the staff's understanding is that, like all the marketing they'd previously done (if they'd done any), their involvement would be temporary. Their understanding of marketing did not include activities that they, or anyone, would have to be perpetually involved in to make it successful. This dichotomy of understanding makes the marketing director's job difficult, since the alternative to the whole staff pitching in on social media was her doing it all him/herself.
So while I agree that print materials may need tweaking from time to time, I'm not sure I would agree that print is more involved to monitor than online media is. Making something once and changing it only when absolutely necessary seems way less involved than spending time every day or week making things that will be obsolete and need to be remade the next day or week.
After watching the two videos I realized that the first video was a call for action. It had a specific event, date, time, and theme. The second video is vague, no call to action, no description of what or who the artists does.. I was left wondering 1) why are these girls dancing? and what does that have to do with Carnegie International?
ReplyDeleteAlso as a side note, the music in the second video clashed with the dancing... or was that just me?
Agreed! The first video clearly covers the 4 P's (I think, I should probably go count again), the second doesn't and goes on for far too long, as Elyssa mentioned below. However, even if the second video had all the right information, I don't think I would draw a connection between the dancers and the International.
DeleteI strongly agree with Joanna's point above about the fact that just because the marketing is more casual or is cheaper/free, does not mean that it requires less planning or thought. And I think for many arts organizations, this could in some ways require even more research/planning than the traditional methods since it is so unfamiliar to the staff. If your organization is like many others, your audience is generally older, so you also need to be particularly careful about not scaring or confusing them - especially if you, for example, were using target marketing and advertising the same event is a different light.
ReplyDeleteThis is a bit off topic from the guerrilla marketing, however where I work it is a challenge sometimes to make something look or sound 'newer' or 'cooler' or more modern in order to appeal to new and younger audiences, without scaring away our base audience by making it seem like they might be out of place. There are many materials that both audiences could end up seeing, even if it is not directly intended for them.
I don't think this has been touched upon yet, but since we're on the topic of guerrilla marketing... I have a pet peeve confession--flash mobs. Don't get me wrong, I love flash mobs, and I think they can be done extremely well, but I'm not sure how effective it is as a marketing tool. I feel like too many people are seeing the trend and are saying, let's do a flash mob! and I'm like... why? and their response is usually, I don't know, but it's super popular, fun and seems cool! I'm sure it can work in a lot of markets, but as we discussed in class, always have to run it through AIDA.
ReplyDeleteHere's an example that I think worked pretty well actually...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5mqPPW0hY0
(Although, I don't think orchestras can do it as well mainly because holding a violin on a train is not really that... in cognito. kind of ruins the element of surprise in my opinion)
The two cases are great examples to show what's needed to make a successful guerrilla marketing. As others already talked about the effectiveness of the tool, I'd like to focus on what to consider when making such marketing campaigns. First of all, it has to have a strong storytelling so that it can be even more powerful with viral campaigns. Whereas guerrilla marketing grabs people's attention when they least expect it happen, viral marketing happens when people voluntarily share stories. Therefore, guerrilla marketing becomes even more successful with the help from interactions of people and customized stories based on the original. Although they are two different marketing tools, each supplements and strengthens the other. Secondly, powerful guerrilla marketing needs to have strong stop/hold/close power. The Cakeitecture campaign had a great stopping power with an interesting story and an unusual theme and event setting together with great hold and closing power by providing detail information of call for action. But, even if the theme itself isn't unconventional or unexpected like the second example, we can still create buzz and bring newness by differentiating distribution channel or allowing more customer interaction.
ReplyDeleteI am not sure that either of these campaigns did anything for me and I don't think I would attend either event. Guerilla Marketing is supposed to catch your attention through creativity and should make you want to know more about the product or the event. Both of the ads that Hannah posted, left me kind of annoyed and wondering what both companies were thinking. Did they do a focus group on these ads to test viability and effectiveness? I think not. To me, both these ads lacked an incredible amount of originality and creativity.
ReplyDeleteI found this while looking for creative guerilla marketing ads: http://www.creativeguerrillamarketing.com/guerrilla-marketing/122-must-see-guerilla-marketing-examples/
What really struck about some of these, is that they made me smile or laugh and say "Now that's clever". Just food for thought.
I'm so glad Hannah brought up this video (the Carnegie International one). I, too, was introduced to it through multiple Facebook friends commenting on how horrendous it was (and I admittedly shared it with the same sentiment).
ReplyDeleteImmediately after seeing this video, I did some research into the creator. He's the first occupant of the new position of Multimedia Producer at CMOA. His wife co-produced the video with him and his mother/family did the catering. I was expecting there do be a more direct connection to the Steel City Angels, but I have yet to find one. For the creator's dignity, I'm actually strongly hoping that nepotism is to blame for that choice as well.
Here's a blog article from the museum's web page about him: http://web.cmoa.org/?p=7741
I think it's great that the Carnegie has hired a Multimedia Producer, and I wish him all the best. Hopefully this video will be a small snafu in a successful career. And hey, at least he's not Suzy Lee Weiss.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/dinagachman/2013/04/03/suzy-lee-weiss-and-the-age-of-entitlement/
I think Joanna is correct in scolding the museum for not being thoughtful enough in their planning. I think they wanted to capitalize off of the success of the first video, so they made another video without really thinking about whether or not this was the best way to convey the message they wanted to send.
ReplyDeleteThis is not just about announcing the artists for the 2013 Carnegie International, its about demonstrating that this international will not just assert itself on its host city like so many surveys of this kind do, but engage with the place and the people who live here (hence the inclusion of the Steel City Angels who are both from Pittsburgh and appeal to sports fans with their cheerleader like appearance and dance moves). There is evidence of this ulterior message at the end of the video when the text comes up and describes the International as an exhibition and an engagement with the city of Pittsburgh.
Where this video went wrong was not so much about having different subject matter then the first video or about it being informative rather then a call to action, the problem was not considering the audience for the message and the appropriate medium to talk to that audience. The second video is not about reaching hip 20 somethings, but the everyday people of Pittsburgh. I think having the dancers perform live outside the museum and inviting the people of Pittsburgh to come and hear the announcement would have been better (plus better choreography).
I would agree with many of the points above – especially the call to action bit. The first video is short, it is direct, and it says exactly what you are supposed to do, when, and where. Contrastingly, the second video is incredibly long. Maybe I just have a short attention span, but I was lost after the first 15 seconds or so. And what relevance do the Steel City Angels have to do with a show of international art? I would love to see a show of new international art, but before seeing this video, I had no idea who the Steel City Angels were, nor do I care.
ReplyDeleteI think this is really a case of knowing who you want to attract, how you want to attract them, and what the appropriate actions are for that task. I fully believe in the power of social media and virality, but marketers are quick to use social media as a "quick fix" instead of actually using a strategy.
So I think what a lot of this comes down to is a difference in humor and trying to make the Carnegie International seem less elitist. In the end, this satire had the exact opposite effect. At the same time, if it's creating buzz on a social media sphere, and given it is handled the right way, this could bring attention to the International. It will be interesting to see what happens.
ReplyDeleteThe videos mentioned do something that I have been trying to consider at Miller Gallery, I think. The idea of print or radio marketing allows the introduction of an org or event's online presence, but I very rarely connect to something online after seeing something in the non-virtual realm. Inspiring an audience to connect through another platform seems to be a difficult task.
ReplyDeleteIt is so much easier to change from online channel to another, and the one thing the CMOA's viral video (I found MAM graduate Katy Peace's facebook post with the link) did was get me to their vimeo page, which therefor led me to their website, twitter and facebook. I had liked them on facebook a while back, but didn't see the cakitecture video or their others.
I had trouble relating the brand of CMOA to each of the videos. To echo what others said, I felt like the call to action was more apparent in the first "cake" video, but it was more of a tease and didn't really compel me to go (plus, I felt like I was going to have a seizure at any moment). I guess I wanted a "cake gaze" - basically the beauty the Steel City Angels were going for condensed into cake form. It's funny that Sara mentioned having the Steel City Angels perform outside, because if you go to their website that's exactly what they do: perform [bad choreography] on residential streets. To second Sara's comment, inviting a crowd to the scene would have been really great. That's something that is missing in each of the videos: a human-observer element. Sort of makes the events being promoted seem friendlier and more inviting.
ReplyDeleteI would have to agree with most of the points. Neither video appealed to me all that much, though the cake one is more compelling out of the two. The Carnegie International video didn't draw me in at all. I couldn't figure out who the girls where or why Carnegie Museum of Art would be promoting them. Not only was there no call to action, it didn't create any interest or intrigue. I don't necessarily think that you always need a call to action, but you must really thinking through your marketing campaign. Whether it is viral, guerrilla, or traditional it should be well thought out and researched. It somehow needs to grab your audience, so you need to know who your audience is and what you are trying to accomplish.
ReplyDeleteMail Campaign was a neat strategy to gain customers, but now everybody use it, so it may lost its advantage.
ReplyDeleteWhile we are in the social media era, when everybody enjoys surfing on the internet browse some entertaining pieces, which may usually be rich media. Video is a typical form of rich media. Research shows that rich media are more engaging because the integrated motion images with sounds can grab audience's attention better than still images. So I think this is why Video makes a better case than traditional print mail campaign.
Also, I think the reason for the success of the first video is because it is informal, and it has a engaging theme "Cakitecture" that is easily memorable. This kind of video are more likely to be widely spread on social media.
While the second video is a little bit too formal, more like an official announcement, and it is better to put it on Carnegie Museum of Art's website, but it is not suitable to be put on the Facebook or other social media.