Finally got around to doing the setup work for the Four Christian Stars album project.
Good Times!
Tag Archive for 'Marketing'
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It was a long process, but I’ve finally finished up the 2010 edition of the Music Ministry Management Guide. I figured I should do something a little different for the year 2010, and so I expanded the concepts just a bit. I was really looking to develop something that was simple enough that people would want to read, but would include enough information that people would find it useful and thereby possibly pass it along.
Finishing up the guide has helped me gain a better understanding as I begin to tackle my Griffin Lake Church project. I was looking for a way to develop an analytics package for congregations that will allow them to see exactly what their footprint was at any given moment, and I now think I’m on the right track.
I’m beginning to think more and more about what projects to tackle in the new year, and how those projects will impact the other elements of my work life. But, enough of that, on to the booklet.
It’s rather large if you’re not on a hi-speed line [2mb]. 37 pages.
Okay, the last week found us in Nashville, Tennessee for the first leg of the Power of One Tour, sponsored in part by NACAMA. It was an exceptionally great concert, with Durant, Straight Company, The Committed Acappella Chorus, Southside Singers, C3, and Dorian Paul Williams. We got there Saturday morning after taking a 5:45 am flight out of Fort Lauderdale and made it there in time to get to the hotel and rest up a bit before the events of the day.
Overall, It was a great trip that allowed us to see the premier talent that will most likely fill the matinee shows at CAMA 2010. On another front, the decision was made to limit our marketing efforts to 2 separate advertisements in the Southeastern Lectureship booklet, as we won’t have anyone from our contingency in attendance. This gives us a little more time to fine tune our collateral that we will most likely try and distribute at the Northside Church of Christ Homecoming in November.
Early production work has begun on the Official CAMA podcast which should coincide with the debut of our new website in early November.
Good Times..
I’m beginning to work on the Reach Analysis for the 2010 Christian Acappella Music Awards, and, while doing so I’ve found some very interesting statistics concerning the congregations that are predominately black in the Southern and Northeastern regions of the United States of America.
- Of the 13,700 total congregations of the Church of Christ located stateside, there are only 91 predominately black congregations with 300 members or more.
- There are 103,358 members attending 998 congregations in the southern and northeastern regions of the United States.
- In the southern and Northeastern regions of the US, there are four states which have no predominately black congregations of the Church of Christ (Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont).
- There are 3 states with at least 100 congregations in the 2 regions studied – Alabama (118), Tennessee (141), & Texas (231).
- There are 7 states which have fewer than 10 congregations statewide – Connecticut (2), Massachusetts (3), New Jersey (9), Pennsylvania (6), Delaware (2), Virginia (7), and West Virginia (1).
Good Times
We’ve reached a general milestone in the planning of the 2010 show – our 6 week planning progress stop. Quite a lot has happened in the last 6 weeks as far as the planning for CAMA is concerned. In addition, we’ve made some great strides when it comes to the overall strategic push we look forward to readying for next month.
In terms of task planning, there have been quite a few stops along the way for us when looking a what exactly we are going to undergo first.
In terms of developing a true operations strategy, we’ve decided to develop a few RFP’s to deliver in the next month or so. When completed, we looked to try to contract for a show producer, a vendor relations manager, as well as a printer.
In the short term, there is the Power of One concert that we should be attending on the 26th of this month, as well as the Southeastern Lectureship that should have representation.
Until then, Good Times!
If you have a music ministry, then it’s time for you and your group to get out there and start making things happen. With all of the resources out there, there is no excuse for your group to lag in these particular areas.
This particular list is simple a starting point, as I intend to continue to push forward with ways in which every ministry can thrive and become what they envision themselves being.
This list can be found as a part of the ministry marketing resource guide that I introduced in the Week 2 CAMA Planning summary. You can download it there and read up on other ideas for your music ministry.
On to the List…
1. Start tracking your sales
This is probably going to be the easiest of all the things to do this year, but it is also the most essential to your particular ministry. Sales tracking is important to ministry management because, when done correctly, it can provide a snapshot of the ministry at any given point. Tracking can be as simple as writing on a sheet of the paper the following:
- Date
- Location
- Name of Product (in the case of multiple products)
- Number of Products sold.
- Price of Products
- Net Profit
Now, the key to keeping good records is to take the data as it is collected and input it into a spreadsheet that can keep track of various sets of information. The Type of information collected will determine the scope of the research you can do in the future.
2. Build an Identification System
One of the great things about your music ministry is individuality. I’ve personally gone to concerts where two groups can sing the same song but sound totally different. Individuality is what makes your ministry what it is, and there is nothing more impor-tant to the cause of being seen as an individual than to have an identity system.
For the local group, an identity system is essential as its components are basically the first things that people will see when looking at your brand. A standard identity system consists of a coordinated letterhead, envelope and business card. In expanding upon this idea, you could go ahead and develop a logo to really bring home the nature of your brand.
3. Develop an Internet Presence
Now, there was a time not too long ago when having a web presence meant just having a website. These days, with the emergence of social networking sites, it is not that necessary to have a top-level domain site of your own [i.e. nacama.com], in-stead, there are a number of options available so that you can have a genuine presence on the internet. Sites like myspace© and facebook™ are perfectly alright when used properly, but, with a little more research, you can find plenty of niche sites that offer ample space to host photos and other things. The Key is to put together an internet strategy for your group beforehand and don’t be quick to just post a profile on every site you see. A simple plan to follow to get started is this:
- E-Mail Address – This can be as simple as yourgroupname@host.com, or for a little money, management@yourgroupname.com. The second can be achieved by purchasing a domain name and utilizing free services like google apps to host your dedicated mail. The Best thing about having your own domain name is that every member of the group can have their own personal email address pointing to your-groupname.com. Gmail.com is probably the best for groups to use. They’re free and offer basically limitless space to save your email.
- Personal Website – Blogs are really big these days, and actually, for groups, this is probably the best way to go. You can keep fans informed by posting photos from concerts as well as info on future concert dates, and ticket information. With a little help, you can also setup a shop to sell your products online directly from your site.
Perhaps the best thing about a blog is that most are free to host and simple to maintain. Sites like wordpress.com and blogspot.com offer free websites and for a little extra, you can have the blog point to yourgroupname.com. For those who are a little more advanced, there’s wordpress.org and joomla that offer DIY solutions for groups that want to produce their own site. Whatever you choose, look at what best fits in to your overall strategy.
- Photo Sharing – These days, it’s not good enough to just be heard, people want to see the action also. You can host all of your photos online for fans too see and comment on at various site. Flickr is a site that offers the ability to group photos and connect with other users. They offer a free service that allows you to post up to 200 photos, or a premium service for $24.99 annually that allows for unlimited uploads and also the posting of short videos. Other sites for sharing photos include:
SmugMug – fee-based photo sharing site [smugmug.com]
Flickr – Offers free and Premium photo sharing solutions [flickr.com]
Snapfish – offers free image hosting and sharing [snapfish.com]
- Video Hosting – Pretty much everyone knows of Youtube™, the site that allows for posting and sharing videos, but there are many others out there that are infinitely better.
Youtube – Offers video hosting and broadcasting. Strong emphasis on video channels. [youtube.com]
Vimeo – Offers hosting of HD quality videos. [vimeo.com]
4. Start A Fan Club
This Is the Year to start a fan club for all your fans. Now, it’s fairly easy to dismiss the idea of having a fan club if you only think in terms of young pop star fan societies. But, the reality is that a ‘fan’ club is an intriguing marketing opportunity that will allow you to engage fans on a more intimate basis. Another thing to consider is that this doesn’t have to be a paid fan club, no, you’re simply trying to stay connected and relevant in the mind of those who follow you.
One good place to get started is at the community portal site, ning.com. At ning.com, you can start your very own social network, allowing members of your particular network to have their very own profile page that ties directly into your network. The good thing is that this will allow you to disseminate information across a more broad cross-section of followers.
Now, you’re probably asking how this is different from just having a website. Well, while a website is a great promotional tool, they tend to be static in nature, that is to say, they don’t tend to be updated as often as maybe even a conventional blog would. This creates a problem in that sites that don’t generate content as often are generally unable to continue to draw fans back in after the initial visit. A social net-working site, on the other hand, has the built-in feature of allowing interactivity through the creation of fans individual profiles. So, while your content may not change for a few days or weeks, or even months, the fans investment into the network will continue to bring them back to the site. Add to this the ability to host the network at a top-level domain, say, club-mygroup.com, or some other neat name, and you have the continuous stream of people who, every time they visit your site, pay to you the name recognition that you’ve built. That’s equity!
5. Start Planning A Tour
Note: Since the publication of the Music Ministry Guide back in March, I’ve decided to rename this “Start Planning a Tour”, instead of Plan a Tour. The Start planning change is reflective upon the fact that it is tough work attempting to travel the road, much more difficult than I gave credit to initially. As Such, I plan to devote an entire article to tour planning as well as introduce some tools that will hopefully assist in the execution of the tour. Ok, as you were…
The Last thing you should be doing this year is planning to go on tour. Touring is a time honored tradition that dates back to, well… I have no idea, and yet still, touring is something that every group should aspire to do at some point.
Now, planning a tour involves a number of factors, not the least of which is building a budget for your excursion. A lot of your planning will deal with the aspects that you can control;
- Housing Expense
- Food Expense
- Travel Expenses – Including Gas and vehicle rental if necessary.
- Outlay for Promotional Materials – Written in the previous section was the idea of producing your own promotional materials.
Well then, I hope this was informative and that someone was enlightened by these simple nuggets of info. I am currently planning to expand on each one of these areas in a future post, providing links to even more resources and ideas for your ministry.
Agree? Disagree? Let me know; leave a comment.
Good Times
Week three has been all about trying to organize the processes that will hopefully allow the Christian Acappella Music Awards planning committee to run smoothly in the coming months.
The only major update of actual note is that of the website @ nacama.com that has undergone a simple redesign as we continue to develop the website that will be released in November, 2009. At the site we’ve begun uploading various music clips to see where we want to go with the process. It is our hope that the new release of the website will house our entire library of media and allow users to access all of this media in various formats, be it streaming or even downloading in some cases.
In the coming week, it is our plan to begin filling out the marketing plan and developing the gameplan for our campaigns for the first of the new year. Hopefully in the coming weeks we’ll have an entirely revamped website and a strong CAMA 2010 Marketing strategy to go along with it.
In reality, this post should be titled, ‘New Releases on the Horizon’ as I long ago began the projects that are just now producing actual results. By my own count, I have either nearing completion on for currently in the design process of 10 different resources and derivatives. Spurred by an increasing interest in information management, I am working on some sales tracking tools for musicians/ministries. In addition, I am looking to build new works around the ideas of productivity in ministry.
I’ve been working recently on a marketing project with the South Florida leadership group while also wrapping my commitment to The Youth Conference. Also, I’ve begun intense brainstorming for the 2010 Christian Acappella Music Awards marketing strategy. So, It looks like, Lord’s willing, I’ll be able to keep myself busy for at least the next few months.
Good Times //
I am back to working on the Marketing guide for ministries. Now, in my previous post, Congregation Metrics, I listed a few interesting facts about Predominately black churches of Christ in the Northeast and Southern portions of the United States.
Just a few thoughts:
- Of the 13,700 total congregations of the Church of Christ located stateside, there are only 91 predominately black congregations with 300 members or more.
- There are 103,358 members attending 998 congregations in the southern and northeastern regions of the United States.
- In the southern and Northeastern regions of the US, there are four states which have no predominately black congregations of the Church of Christ (Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont).
- There are 3 states with at least 100 congregations in the 2 regions studied – Alabama (118), Tennessee (141), & Texas (231).
- There are 7 states which have fewer than 10 congregations statewide – Connecticut (2), Massachusetts (3), New Jersey (9), Pennsylvania (6), Delaware (2), Virginia (7), and West Virginia (1).
And finally, the numerical data collected during research for the Marketing Guide.
[TABLE=2]
As I continue to work on The 2009 Music Ministry Marketing Guide, I’ve come to understand some concepts a lot better. As I had previously written about The Millionaire Artist, I still think that it is possible, even in an extremely niche situation, to find some success in the marketplace. This idea, however, is now backed with a more realistic model to go along with the revamped 12-month millionaire method.
I figure that a more strategic model is in order, and a more defined approach to putting up numbers will probably allow for more continued success for artists.
Just a Few Resources:
- The Gospel Music Association – promotion of gospel music.
- The Dove Awards – Tennessee in April, 2009
- The Gospel Music Channel - 24-hour music station dedicated to Gospel Music.