Audience segmentation for the next decade is the theme of the latest issue of the Journal of Arts Marketing, the quarterly publication from the Arts Marketing Association.
My latest piece argues for an approach to sustainability that moves past the simple eco-checklist approach to putting your house in order, and rather returns to the core brand values of an organisation. In this way sustainability becomes a strand of programming in its own right and another way to think about and talk to our audiences.
The implications for understanding how an audience’s attitudes to green issues and sustainability might integrate with our more traditional segmentation strategies are still being uncovered, but it’s clear to me that failing to include this line of thinking in our planning is a failure to grasp new opportunities for building relations with our target markets in the decade to come.
Here’s the article in full:
Like a latter day Johnson and Boswell, Dr Ben Todd of Arcola Theatre and I have been out on the road performing a green marketing double act at AMA Networking events and other choice locations across London and the South East.
The idea has been to inspire discussion on the different ways a green marketing mix can benefit broader audience engagement and, as Ben pointed out, take advantage of the biggest and best networked marketing team we possibly can to help test out our theories.
One of the main questions we’ve been posing is whether a venue’s marketing team should be the ones taking the lead on green initiatives.
Unfortunately there is no one size fits all simple solution to the problem of sustainability.
Rather there’s a need to navigate any number of different positions. You’ll want to encourage investment in meaningful change, avoid the slippery greenwashed slopes of a quick carbon neutral cop-out, seek out new lines of communication and explain what you’ve learnt so that others can follow in your footsteps.
During our mini-tour one theme has become increasingly apparent – if you really want to position sustainability as a central part of your venue, it needs to be embedded right through the corporate identity. In other words we’re back to brand – the natural home of the modern marketing team.
Talking about the Arcola’s own experience, Ben outlined how evolving their own sustainable strategy has been a long, slow burn in direct contrast to the quicker promotional ‘splash and dab’ of selling theatre tickets.
The first lesson they learned after deciding ‘We’re all going to be sustainable – Yeah cool!’ was to start asking what that really meant to them as an organisation.
The answer was to go right back to Arcola’s corporate branding and mission statement, so the place where long term work on building company identity and relationships with stake holders, funders and audiences becomes the home for sustainability as well.
As Ben explains it, there are two divergent approaches to adoption. Treat sustainability in the same way you would Health & Safety (forms and tick boxes basically) or position it directly as a strand of your core programming. For Arcola their three main strands of programming – Professional Productions, Youth & Community Work and Sustainability – are now all intrinsically linked, cross-pollinating creative ideas and creating new and exciting ways to engage with Arcola’s audiences.
As Ben explains it ‘we’re identifying a whole new way of engaging audiences, building loyalty and accessing new markets.’
We think you’ll agree that rather than just viewing this as adding another task to the teetering pile of to-dos, the opportunity to engage with new ideas and talk to our audiences in new ways is precisely why we became marketers in the first place.
At it’s best arts marketing is about capturing people’s imagination and inspiring them to try new experiences. It’s exactly this kind of engagement we need to encourage a cultural shift towards more sustainable practises, and this is precisely where the arts are in a prime position to reach people and help create real change for the better.
Full Disclosure:
London Calling is the current sponsor of JAM, supporting the Arts Marketing Association and working in partnership with our recommended printer, Greenhouse Print, to ensure each issue is printed to the highest possible standards of environmental management.
We’ve chosen to use the promotional space that comes in kind as part of our supporting package to create a series of advertorial articles highlighting issues of sustainability within the arts and cultural sector.
We rather like writing these, and all comment and feedback is always greatly appreciated.
