Marketing and Communications

• A Primer on Marketing
• Public Relations and Media
• Presentation Skills
• Building Networking Skills

Going viral ain't common and it ain't easy. So how do we get our names out there? During this unit, we'll discuss the basics of building a marketing plan, how to work with media, and networking and presentation skills.

1. A Primer on Marketing

Three sections to this topic:

• Marketing Basics
• The Marketing Mix
• Segmentation and the Customer Path

Marketing Basics

WTF is marketing?

Marketing is hard to pin down as it covers an entire field of business and has numerous connections to activities like public relations, product development, advertising, and more.

For our purposes, we're going to define marketing the following way:

"Marketing is the act of connecting customers to products" Source(http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2008/03/01/my-definition-of-marketing/)

Marketing is all about getting your offering of value in front of the right people.

— Why is Marketing Important to a Creative Practice?

Because while we all create something of value, it does not automatically get to the right audience. The challenges are:

• How do we get that in front of the right people?
• How do we get them to spend and/or invest (monetarily or emotionally) in what we have?
• How do we continue that relationship long-term?
• How do we accomplish this without burning out or wasting all of our money?

Marketing provides the framework for tackling these challenges.

— Basic Marketing Models

There are a ton of different and esoteric marketing models, but they can all be simplified to the following two models:

• B2C: Business To Customer — A business delivers something of value to a consumer.

  • What's an example of this for a creative practice?

• B2B: Business to Business — A business delivers something of value to another business.

  • What's an example of this for a creative practice?

— Our Marketing Case Studies

We're going to apply our marketing frameworks to the following four case studies:

• An album by death metal band Drawn and Quartered

• A tv show steeped in magical realism The OA

• A mushroom burial suit by artist Jae Rhim Lee

• The floating art installation Swimming Cities by artist Swoon and co.

The Marketing Mix

The starting point for most traditional marketing is what is commonly referred to as The Marketing Mix. It is a set of simple frameworks that help us strategize where, when, why and how we can market our what.

We're going to focus on the two mostly widely used: the four P's and the five C's

— The Four P's

The four P's of marketing help us put into words how a target market is reached by understanding the blending of four strategic elements. The four elements are Product, Price, Promotion, and Placement.

• Product — Product strategy is two-fold. It is firsthand about what makes up the product itself. Secondly, it is about the value (both perceived and real) that a consumer will anticipate for the product.

  • What are some of the product strategies for our case studies?

• Promotion — Promotion is all about how we (the producer) communicate value to a target market. This is where things like advertising, public relations, and sales strategies come into play.

  • What are some promotional strategies for our case studies?

• Price — We've covered setting price in previous units. How do we determine how much something should cost?

• What are some factors we should consider when setting a price for our case studies?

• Placement – We know our product, our promotion strategy and our price... but how to we get in front of the target market? Online? Brick and mortar business? A distributor? Placement is all about planting the right plant in the right soil so it will flourish.

  • Where should we place the products for our case studies?

— The Five C's

The four P's are all about understanding our relationship between us and the target market. The five C's take a step back and help us look at the market environment as a whole.

The five C's are Company, Customers, Competitors, Collaborators, and Context.

• Company — Company is all about who we are. Are we a scrappy sole proprietor? A multi-national corporation? A radical cooperative? Knowing who we are has a direct effect on how we communicate to a market.

  • What are the types of companies represented by our case studies?
  • How does their make-up affect how they communicate to their target market?

• Customers — Who are we trying to sell to? How many are there? Are they rich or poor? Fashionable or basic? Can you see them in your mind?

  • Describe the type of customers that would be interested in our case studies.

• Competitors — Who's the competition? How are you similar to them? How do you differ?

  • Name one competitor for each of our case studies.

• Collaborators — Who are our key partners? Do they share a vision with us? Are they just a means to an end? Are they our agent? Are we their agent?

  • Name some key collabs for our casies.

• Context — It would be a terrible idea to try and sell MAGA hats at a live show of RuPaul's Drag Race. What is the context in which we are operating? Is it a good fit? Is it a major challenge?

  • Describe the context that each of our case studies may find themselves in.

Segmentation and the Customer Path

Now that we're prepped on what we're marketing, how we're marketing it and who we're marketing to—we need to find those markets and catch 'em!

Segmentation is all about wittling down factors to find the right market to spend your energy on. Think of this like how you would use filters and keywords for a search engine.

The Customer Path refers to how we're going to build a relationship with people in that market.

— Segmentation

For segmentation, just remember STP

Segement » Target » Position

1. Segment — Don't go after everyone! Drop people into categories that make sense.

   There are four main types of segmentation:

   • Geographic - Local? Regional? National? International?
   • Demographic - Black? White? Hispanic? Old? Young? Educated?
   • Behavioral - Big spenders? Penny pinchers? Fanatics? First-time buyers? Fashionistas? Minimalists?
   • Psychographic — This one is tricky, it's about targeting specific groups within a population. So... like juggalos. What are some of the characteristics of juggalos?

   Why are segments important?
   — Geographic determines the size of the market
   — Demographic determines the needs of the consumer
   — Behavioral determines how they will respond to our marketing
   — Psychographic determines the social dimension and gives us context for the group

2. Target — Now we have a ton of segments, but we only have so much time and money. Which of the segments are the most valuable? i.e. who are the best targets.

3. Position — Now we know who we are going after, how do we get in front of them?

— The Customer Path

Think of the customer path like a black hole — the closer you get, the stronger the connection.

Our target market is just floating out in space, how do we pull them into our orbit?

The elements of the Customer Path are:

Awareness » Consideration » Conversion » Loyalty » Advocacy.

• Awareness - Think of this like 'catching someone's eye.' How do you make a targeted market aware you exist? A great advertising campaign? A article in a respected publication? Underground word-of-mouth?

  At this stage, you've just made your target market aware of your existence.

• Consideration — Ok, they're paying attention... now what? At this stage you need to sell them on what you're offering. They're weighing options, looking at competitors or maybe just not feeling it today... they're considering all their optoions, but you want them to choose you.

  This stage is the main sell.

• Conversion — You did it! They bought in! Maybe they bought your product or even just walked through the door to see your work. The point is—the transaction has happened and you've successfully connected with your market.

  Are you done?

• Loyalty - Conversion could be fleeting. How do you keep them coming back? How would your stategy need to change?

• Advocacy - How do you get your customers to love you SO MUCH that they start advocating for you? Create an army of believers to pull more people into your orbit.

2. Public Relations and Media

In short, public relations is how we communicate with the wider world. This could be through publications, through agent relationships, social media accounts, etc.

Public relations is all about public image.

Most of you have some experience already in public relations—as creative practitioners we have to self-promote to survive.

Earned Media vs. Paid Media

"Advertising is what you pay for, publicity is what you pray for."

Simply put:

• Paid Media — Advertising. Quid Pro Quo. You have to surrender something of value (money) in order to gain access to a channel of publicity.

• Earned Media — When people talk about publicity, this is usually what they mean. Someone has chosen to write/advertise/advocate/criticize your work for the benefit of their channel of publicity.

  • You do not pay for earned media.
  • Think reviews in art magazine, youtuber critiques, twitter retweets.

The name of the game here is convincing someone your interesting enough to get attention on their platform.

Publicists vs. Journalists

When you're working on getting your message out there, understanding the difference between a publicist and a journalist is crucial.

• A publicist works on behalf of the principal
• A journalist works on behalf of the publication

Publicist:

Journalists:

Tools of Public Relations

The best advice I can give from my time in public relations is do the work for them.

Journalists are often busy people, working on deadlines and the not-so-great ones are often... well... lazy. They will pick the first photo that looks good, misquote you or just miss the point entirely in their article/blog post/video.

Remember that the majority of media is about who is first and can grab the most eyeballs.

If you want the right message out there, you have to do the work for them. This essentially is the relationship between publicists and journalists.

A few tools:

• Website — Common sense, but have a website ready, easy to find, with all of the pertinent information. The first thing someone will do is google you.

• Press Kit — A good press kit will include all of the language, logos, images, and quotes someone would need to write about you.

  • Images — Include multiple options, at high resolution with captions.
  • Language — Have a press release ready as well as short descriptions that are good for web publishing, tweets, facebook, etc.
  • Quotes — Writer's often just need a statement from parties involved. Give them a number of usuable quotes
  • Biographies — Great press kits have a long, medium and short length bio for all of the parties involved.

• Press Release — Part of a good press kit, a press release is essentially an article you've written about yourself. It should contain all of the pertininent information about what you've publicizing.

  Writers will take a press release, grab the information they need, and customize it for their platform.

General Tips

— This isn't sales

Remember that journalists, critics, bloggers, etc aren't here to buy your work, they're here to talk about it.

— Cold calls rarely work

They just won't answer the phone or they'll just say their on a deadline.

Send press kits, emails, tweets, etc. Unfortunately earned media has to be courted. Think about how well you respond to unsolicited cold calls.

— Tie into trends

You're work doesn't exist in a vacuum. If there is a major trend that your work relates to, craft the message to tie into that trend.

— Don't assume they will share your agenda

A huge mistake early on is to assume a writer is on your side. They are on the side of whomever signs their paycheck.

Think about the different agendas of the following publications/channels:

• The New York Times
• TMZ
• Rando YouTube channel

— Be clear and concise

My friend was once interviewed for local TV and she told me that she had explained her view beautifully, if not a little long and verbose.

She wasn't happy when she saw the segment air later and they only played 5 seconds of her 2 minute diatribe.

Be clear and concise. Think in tweet-length statements.

— Be prepared for anything

The number one mistake in public relations is thinking "Nah, they probably won't ask about that."

If it's interesting, they will ask about it.

Before taking something public, it's a good idea to role play with a peer to practice answering difficult or uncomfortable questions.

3. Presentation Skills

You're all in college and have had to give a presentation as some point for a class, club, event, etc.

So, for this section, we're going to focus on some general tips that will make us better presenters and public speakers.

Two sections to this topic:

1. General Tips
2. Lightning Presentations!

General tips

Know your audience

• Never give a canned presentation. Always adapt it for who you are speaking to.
• Is it a technical crowd? A crowd well-versed in your medium? Are they clueless about your medium?
• If the presentation is not aligned with your audience they will tune out.

Have a literal agenda

• Presentations are stories. Have a beginning, a middle, and an end.
  • You could even share the table of contents with the crowd with a literal agenda slide.
• Have a theme to tie everything together
• Have a point

Dress for comfort (mental and physical)

• This is highly specific to gender presentation and expectation, so take this with a grain of salt.
• Dress in a way that makes you feel comfortable in your own skin. Discomfort shows on stage.
• Dress in a way that makes you feel good about yourself.
• Dress for the occasion
  • If you don't know — ask.

Slow down

• We all have a tendency to motormouth when we're nervous.

• Some tools to help you slow down:

  1. Pause for effect
  2. Play a video to give yourself a break
  3. Take a drink of water
  4. Take a moment to lock eyes with three audience members

No middle-school dancing

• Don't bounce from foot-to-foot like an uncomfortable tween at a middle-school dance.
• Widen your stance for stability
• Pivot on your foot to emphasize a point (and get some of those leg jitters out)

No wand waving, Harry Potter

I'm super guilt of this

• If you have a prop (a pointer) and you make a lot of expressive hand gestures, you can end up looking like you're casting a spell.

Don't fall prey to self-deprecation

I'm extremely guilty of this

• People don't find self-deprecation funny or modest—they usually find it sad.
• This is ok if you're making a humorous point, but in general avoid self-deprecating on stage.
• Project confidence.

Breath, stretch and do verbal warm-ups

• Be present in your body — do some basic stretches
• Loosen your face with Lemon Face/Lion Face
• Play the AEIOU game:
  • Work your way through the consonants follwoing each letter with one of the vowels
  • BA BE BI BO BU
  • CA CE CI CO CU
  • DA DE DI DO DU
  • Do this as fast as possible

Slides are visual aids not screenplays

• Slides convey information, you convey context.
• Don't make text heavy slides. They will compete for you audiences attention.

Use notes to keep on track.

• All slide software comes with the ability to include speaker notes. Use notes to keep on track.
• Even the most skilled bands still make a written set-list to use on stage.
• If you're going to just read from notes, practice your reading voice.

Q & A's will always feel scary

• Most people are wonderful and will ask thoughtful questions that show they were really engaged with your presentation.
• For the difficult questions
  • Thank them for asking — it disarms the energy immediately
  • Gracefully pivot to a related topic
  • It's ok to say that you don't know, but that you will: (A) Take that into consideration, (B) Follow-up at a later date, (C) Think that it's a great question, but outside the scope of your presentation.
  • If they keep asking endless follow-ups
    • Politely answer and then say that you'd like to hear from additional members of the audience.

Mock Lighting Talks!

This is an in-class assignment. Completion = full credit.

Instructions

1. You have 15 minutes to prepare a 2-minute presentation on your Business Plan. You will be cut off at the 2-minute mark.
2. You may only use three slides.
3. You must present from the podium.

4. Network Building

Why a lecture on network building?

A few reasons:

• My opinion is that the most valuable advice comes from those with direct experience
• Good networks are powerful tools
• It’s hard to“seek advice,” without advisors
• Networking is supes awkward, but a necessary business skillset

Five sections to this lecture:

1. Professional preparation
2. Types of networks
3. Common opportunities for networking
4. Networking tips
5. Mock networking event!

Professional Preperation

Make sure your public persona is locked in and your tools ready:

• Make sure your website / resume / portfolio is up to date
• Set privacy settings on social media accounts
• Create ‘professional’ social media accounts
• Materials printed and on-hand
• Have your Rolodex at the ready
  • (who knows what this is?)

Types of Networks

Expansive — The whole enchilada. This is the umbrella network of everyone you know.

Nodal — A set of industry-specific or context-specific contacts

Operational — People you connect to through your place of employment

Strategic — People who aren’t necessarily tied to an industry (nodal), but can offer valuable insight, advice, or strategy from a larger perspective

Personal — Your friends, family, etc.

Common Opportunities for Networking

• Cold calls*
• Networking events
• Professional events (Conferences, seminars)
• Social events
• Informational interviews

*Cold calls are a terrible idea. Focus on getting an introduction by a third party—i.e. I introduce you to my friend within a company via e-mail.

Networking Tips

In General

• INITIATE — You have to try
• CULTIVATE — Focus on relationship building
• RECIPROCATE — Pay it forward. Introduce others. Advocate. Build trust and camaraderie

Online

• Writ wel and fcous on as efw err rs as posable
• Write for the audience and for whomever it could be forwarded to
• Double-check anything googlable
• Remember that nothing completely vanishes thanks to screenshots
• Tone—The less human the method, the harder to read emotion

In-person

• Remember Inigo Montoya

• Have your elevator pitch ready
• Don't dominate the conversation
• Ask questions about them! (shows attentiveness and respect)
• Remember S.T.A.R. for storytelling
  • Situation
  • Task
  • Action
  • Result

Utilizing Advocates

A good advocate can be your most powerful tool

• Make sure your advocate is willing
• Make sure your advocate is well informed
• Only use advocates that know you well
  • Or have at least seen a recent resume

Mock Networking Event!

Instructions:

• You will have 5 minutes to prep your elevator pitch
• I will call out instructions on what to do after that
• You must keep the conversation going