No one tells you what New York is going to cost you.  Emotionally.  Physically. Monetarily.

I am close to finishing my first year in New York, and I can only begin to tell you how much this year has been one hell of a roller coaster both professionally, and as an individual.  For my friends who are considering making this leap or for any young arts administration professionals looking to make the leap and move to bustling city, here are some thoughts.

1.) ITS EXPENSIVE - I would estimate that New Yorker’s spend an average of close to $100 a day.  That’s your $104 metro card a month, the rent you will pay for your terrible apartment, the food you have to buy from over priced grocery stores, the food you have to buy when you forget to pack a lunch or a dinner because you can’t easily just stop back at home.  Even with all of that, you still manage to find more expenses everywhere you turn.  You pay double the national average for movie tickets, if you don’t eat at the right places you will end up paying double the national average for mediocre food (only over priced because chances are its some kind of fusion-esque crap.)

2.) YOU CAN’T SET ANYTHING DOWN.  ANYWHERE!  - Having had two bags stolen now (all at my own fault – no blame) you start to feel like you can’t trust a single person out here.   At the end of the day you kind of live in fear of owning anything expensive.  You also have to realize that at the end of the day its just possessions…you come to find a new definition of the word possessions.

3.) AS AN ARTIST: YOU ARE VASTLY UNDERPAID AND RELATIVELY UNDERVALUED - You spend a bulk of your time trying to make ends meat, so you start to compromise yourself artistically.  I think I have spent a good portion of my year teetering on burn-out.  Living in New York you have to work doubly-hard to play remotely hard.  Its hard to satisfy yourself artistically when all you can think about is getting at least one healthy night of sleep at some point during your week.

4.) YOU SACRIFICE – I think one says it all in the header.  Everyone knows that you have to sacrifice on some level for any venture you take in your life.  You eat the knock-off versions of everything, you drink the booze that you wouldn’t usually give to your worst enemy, you stay in and fantasize about the amazing things you could be doing in New York.

4 A.) YOU GROW UP – You realize as a young adult that you are finally responsible for the dumb ass decisions that you make.  The trouble you get in…you are responsible for.  You have money issues…you are responsible.  You grow up and stop holding on childhood ideals of the blame game and scapegoats.

5.) HAVE FRIENDS BEFORE YOU GET HERE - New York has one of the most difficult social circles in the world.  For actors its a little easier cause you are going in and out of auditions, meeting new people, and bonding with people that are struggling just as hard as you are to try and make their mark in the world.

6.) YOU ARE LIVING IN ONE OF THE GREATEST PLACES ON EARTH - As long as you are willing to work for it, talk to the right people, and find the right places to be…the opportunities are endless.   At the end of the day, I am thankful that I made this decision.

7.) FIND WAYS TO TAKE LITTLE VACATIONS - There are times when you just have to get the hell away from this place.  Take a ferry somewhere.  Take a bolt bus to a friends place in the near area.  Hell, call your mother or father and ask them for some money to come home and visit them…I am pretty sure they will understand.

8.) TAKE RISKS AND DON’T BE AFRAID – Its scary sometimes, but once things finally manifest themselves you will be happy no matter what happens.

Note: For some reason Slideshare never likes the fonts on my presentations.  Sometimes it looks like I didn’t use the space bar, but that’s just how it translated my fonts.  If you have any suggestions on better ppt presentation sharing software please pass that on to me.

Below are some links to documents from my final defense portfolio:

Academic Narrative

Assistantship Narrative

Organizational History

Internship Narrative

1.) One of the pivotal steps in creating new audiences for the theater is creating a two way conversation with potential customers.  Ask questions or pose ideas/thoughts when updating your twitter or facebook updates to entice patrons to interact with iO West.  Try to avoid cryptic messages about teams that no one is going to understand.  (i.e. “The Cartel defeats Waterloo… Napoleon smiles…”)   My mantra when running social media pages is “One Click Equals One Call.”  When you post something on these pages you want someone to either comment about how great something is, ask a question about is going on at iO or call to purchase tickets for an upcoming performance.

 
2.) Utilize “Hash Tags” as much as possibly.  A “hash tag” refers to simply putting a “#” in front of a word in a twitter update.  This hash tag creates a trend for the given word, and will also let you collect feedback about given performances or events.  Ex:  When twittering about the upcoming Improv Festival be sure to create a specific hash tag such as, #iowest that is used in every update.  Spreading the word about this hash tag to festival attendees will allow them to leave comments, reviews, and ask questions that can be used later, or later in marketing for future festivals.  Using a hash tag in your status updates on twitter will also provide a link to that trending topic so that you can see what people are saying.  When using a hash tag, be sure to check this consistently especially during the festival, because sometimes audience members will use this trending topic to ask questions about things that are going on.

3.) Share your hash tag, twitter page address, and facebook page address with as many people as possible.  These links can be shared via the video screen that plays in the main stage, displayed prominently on the iO website, and on some supplementary printed material in the bar (i.e. table tents).  Also, make sure the house manager is pushing the twitter, facebook, and io homepage in their intro or outro.

4.) In generating interest in human interest pieces put on to our facebook or twitter, you need to provide supplementary links.  If you twitter about Trophy Wife, INCLUDE THE LINK TO THEIR WEBPAGE.  You should be letting your audience know who they can be seeing on stage, especially teachers, etc.  Ex.  Brian Gallivan has one of the number one watched YouTube series, Sassy Gay Friend.  To generate an interest in coming to see POWERHOUSE you should post that people can see Brian Gallivan play with the group and provide a link to his videos. 

5.) I would investigate the reasoning for the switch from an iO fan page to an iO friend page.  I have concerns that the friend page has a cap on the number of fans that can join, and it only offers speculatory information about fans.  A fan page offers the opportunity to get updates about fan increases for the week, and it also lets you get demographic information on the “insights” portion of the fan page.  Fan pages can be used to create discussions about performances and training center information and also allows fans to post pictures and videos that they have about iO west.  Fan pages allow you to create events, as well as send out mass updates to all of our fans.  It allows you to post links to all of our team’s webpages, individual actor’s fan pages, etc. 

6.)  Be sure to post exciting things on your facebook page.  People want to see pictures of events at the theater, of the teachers, the performers etc.  Include links to our webpage, to our videos, to our festival, etc.  

I hope this information is helpful.  Please let me know if you feel like there is anything I have missed.

For the restless social media lovers, such as myself, you are thinking, “What else can I do to not only promote myself, but promote the arts as a whole in my community?”

Have you thought about creating a facebooking, blogging, yelping, twitterverse that allows potential patrons to have one stop access to the arts in your community?  Have you thought about developing a landing pad that will not only help exposure for your arts organization but for others?  Have you thought about creating a place for arts marketers to express their organization’s individual voice as a part of a whole community?

Create a Community Page

1.) Research: Turn on your computer, your laptop, or your smart phone and search your organization on google.  What are people saying about you?  What are people saying about other organizations in the area?  Doing this research will help to formulate a plan of attack for centralizing this information.  Creating and offering a centralized forum for all of the people who are already talking is going to help bring readers, friends, and fans together to help build a database of potential patrons.

2.) Work Together: Begin to develop relationships with other marketers andsocial media coordinator at the other art organizations.  What kind of projects are they working on with their social media sites?  How can you work on it together or can you use it as a basis to try something new with your organization?

3.) Host a Forum: Bring marketers from all of the organizations in your community into one place.  Host a discussion or several discussions on social media.  Help organizations that may not, believe it or not, even understand how to operate, utilize, and evaluate their social media efforts.  Discuss creating a community.  What are the pros and cons of a joint venture like this?  What are the details?  How will you evaluate the effort’s shortcomings and failures?  What would something like this look like?

4.) Who is Running This? : Who are the page administrators for the page going to be?   Who is going to be the voice of each organization?  This group social media page should be run by a collective of administrators.  I would recommend the Marketing Manager or Director or the Social Media Coordinator/Director from each organization to step up and help this effort.  If neither of these positions are available I would recommend an intern of the organization who will be able to take this project and really have a field day with it.

5.) Set a Style Guide: Though most social media sites are played fast and lose by arts organizations, its going to be important, with a project of this scope and size, to set formatting for the page.  Think about things like; What should picture albums look like?  What will “Info” pages look like?  What are appropriate pictures and videos to post?  What links or click-thrus are ok publish or post?  How are responses to page viewers to be responded to?

6.) Host a Discussion: Once this community page has been set up, remember to engage your potential audiences in communication.  Don’t just keep posting event information and pictures for your organization!  Get your audiences talking about the arts and the community that it exists in.  What are some of your favorite restaurants in the area?  What shows or events did you go to this weekend?  Do you have any recommendations for Coffee or Ice Cream after the show?  You could even go so far as to ask your viewers what kind of things they want to see done in the area?  Discussion not only builds the value of the arts community, but also can help to build the social media page’s importance as a valuable online resource tool.

7.) Evaluate, Evaluate, Evaluate: Using analytic software and statistics, be sure to monitor the successes and failures of this joint venture.  Is it increasing website traffic for organizations?  Is it generating interest?  Is it making an impact?  Don’t be afraid to host another forum with the arts organizations and have an honest discussion about the group efforts and to formulate new plans and strategies.

The most important thing to take away from this idea is the importance of creating a stronger community between local arts organizations.  There are a million ways to achieve this, but I feel the most important aspect of an arts community working together is communication with each other and communicating with their community as a unified collective.  As we come out of an economic recession, and as we recover from a dip in corporate, foundation, and individual giving, its going to be important to build/strengthen the value of the arts in our communities.

Social media has changed the game in so many ways for so many different types of organizations.  We have all learned to make it work for ourselves, now lets work to make it a tool we use together.

The following are some key things I felt were important that I took away from this opportunity:

1.) The Power of Flexibility- In watching Katie meet with countless educators I observed how she was able to adapt any of the 5 offerings to fit what the educator was looking for.  The touring repertory itself is vastly flexible in that all of the different shows are able to speak to a variety of different issues, ideas, or themes that have general yet specialized appeal.  I know what you are thinking, “Justin, you can’t have a ‘general yet specialized’.”  Here’s the catch; though the shows have a general appeal Katie was able to talk with the schools about how the cast can put together a specialized focus on themes and ideas that are relevant to the school’s programming needs.

2.) Being a Great Salesperson- This past January I was in New York and met with mygood friend Lisa Ellerbee from The Offstage Group.  While we were out to lunch and I was stressing about my impending graduation, I asked her about for any advice that she might have for a future Arts Administrator.  She came back with, “Remember that you are always a salesman.  It’s not that you are trying be shady or trying to trick someone into buying something from your organization.  It’s that you are selling the experience of your theatre or arts organization, and you cannot be afraid to ask people to give you something.”

While at the PTA Conference with Katie, I watched as she seamlessly met with person after person and effectively sifted through the people that would potentially book the organization.  She wasn’t afraid to make “the ask” with the school’s representatives while still building a relationship by actively listening to the school, and responding with creative ways in which Georgia Shakespeare’s programming could benefit the school.

3.) Don’t Be Afraid to Experiment- In most cases theatre organizations are in a fiercely competitive environment, especially when it comes to educational programming.  What you offer, how you offer it, and how you market it is what is going to set you apart from the rest of the pack.  Play with how you sell your work, and don’t be afraid to try new things with different resources.  All materials and productions that you create should reflect the image and purpose of the organization, but don’t be afraid to give your organization a point of view.

A great example of this are the cast bios for Broadway‘s recent production of Hair the Musical.  The bios not only sell the essence that is Hair but its a chance for potential patrons to learn about their favorite actor’s favorite in New York City.  Some videos let you learn some words out of the hippie dictionary, see dance rehearsals, see technical rehearsals, be a part of triumphs for the show, and even go into one of the star’s dressing room.

Now not everyone can boast Broadway’s marketing resources, but take a look at what some other theatres have done with a camcorder and simple editing software.   For instance the Utah Shakespearean Festival has created a webseries on YouTube called The Festival in 5 that lets the viewer in on some nifty USF secrets.  Or you can take a look at how The Guthrie Theatre that has created a simple promotional video for the Gift Store.  Georgia Shakespeare has used their YouTube to both offer promotional commercials as well as show off their creative energies.

With these three things in mind I feel like I am better prepared to go out and be a flexible salesman who isn’t afraid to take risks when it comes to selling his organization to potential patrons.  I am better equipped to offer a unique point of view of my organization that allows potential patrons the chance to experience the organization in a new and exciting way.

You can also check out the videos mentioned in the slides at:

I have recently completed my Master of Fine Arts in Arts Administration from Southern Utah University.  Having just graduated, I am looking for work that will help me to grow and learn as I continue towards my life goal of becoming a Managing Director at a regional theatre.

As a part of my graduate studies I spent the past two years working as the Assistant Production Director at the Utah Shakespearean Festival.  This position afforded me chances to get in depth training in balancing and planning budget lines for productions, and gaining a vast perspective on centralized scheduling for an 8 show repertory season.  I was also able to serve as the Production Director for our Shakespeare in the Schools touring production ofThe Taming of the Shrew. As Production Director I handled contract negotiation for technical positions, negotiations for rental equipment, scheduling of the entire production, and creating and maintaining the productions $200,000 budget.

While pursuing my degree I was able to serve as the Managing Director for a small producing organization called Off the Cuff Comedy Improvisation.  Working with Off the Cuff I established financial goals as well as systems to monitor programming success.  I coordinated and managed the marketing and merchandising for the organization.  I also worked to establish touring protocols in coordination with the actors and artistic management staff.  By far, my favorite accomplishment was helping to create the 1st Annual Ye Olde Shakespeare Competition and the 1st Annual Red Rocks Improv Festival.

I have found that I am very good at creating something out of nothing, and pride myself on my initiative to tackle creative project with limited resources.   I have a strong eye for planning and event coordination and find that I work very well in groups.  I commit fully to any work that I engage in, and find it’s always best to pursue my day’s challenges with a smile on my face, infecting others with my sense of joy.  Most importantly I love people, and I love artists, so I am fiercely dedicated to procuring the funds to ensure that both theatregoers and artists have a place to call home.

Attached you can find a copy of my resume and references.

Justin Taylor Scholl Resume 2010
Justin Taylor Scholl References 2010

Sincerely,

–

Justin Taylor Scholl

MFA, Arts Administration

757-651-1877

JustinTScholl@gmail.com

Goal:

The goal of this audit is to examine Georgia Shakespeare’s social media presence and develop three distinct purposes for the three social media tools that our organization uses, including WordPress, Facebook, and Twitter.  All of my recommendations are prepared to the best of my knowledge of the current social media workings of our organization.

As a reference the following blogs, and websites were used to gather information on social media and how to make a deeper impact in the online community:

24 Usable Hours: Where Numbers Meets Art

The Producer’s Perspective

2Amt

This Little World

Mashable

Below I have prepared a list of recommendations that will hopefully help to create a unique, cool, social media presence that will attract a wide variety of untapped patrons, and new viewers.

Preface: Social Media Doesn’t Sell Tickets

In all of my research, one of the most common thoughts that was offered up by the social media guru’s is that social media, in all of its glory, doesn’t sell tickets.  Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, and/or any of the blogs that we use should be particularly geared towards creating and engaging our audience in a lasting conversation.

Furthermore, arts organizations in general need to start using their social media as a way to strengthen their Brand Value and strengthen their Customer Value Proposition in the market.  This can be accomplished by using our social media sites to engage our potential patrons in conversation, listen to what they are saying, and respond.  With most of social media being used to access “backstage” information, its important that we are talking to our viewers, and getting them talking with others.  The conversation over the information that is presented via our social media is what translates into ticket sales.

The following is a promotional video for Georgia Shakespeare’s King Lear, that I composed music for.  I am still in the baby stages of learning how to use Garage Band, but I am slowly but surely getting a handle on it.

Please feel free to leave comments!