promote - promote - promote!!!

[Sc'Eric (aka darkFIN)]

Wow, great post by Mairi!  That leads me to re-iterate something that I constantly harp about, but haven't in the current discussion...

 

Promoters NEED to advertise their events far & wide AND EARLIER!!!  I live 3 hrs away from Pittsburgh, but its still the closest place to catch a show.  You can basically figure that, on average, a majority of people IN Pittsburgh probably won't see your fliers until about a week after you put them up.  After that, word of mouth needs time to spread, to buzz--"hey did you hear about... I was thinking about it, but are you gonna go?"  And let's not forget that most folks these days have jobs or school obligations that they need to plan around... which usually requires 2+ weeks advanced notice to arrange off--and that's AFTER they find out the event is happening! 

 

As far as online presence, promoters need to be posting to MANY message boards.  (Often times, they'll post to one and hope that other folks take it upon themselves to repost--which rarely works.)  There's at least two state-wide message boards on Yahoo that hardly ever get event posts outside of Philly, plus the ones that Mairi mentioned.  (Meanwhile, the Philly folk are convinced that they're the be all, end all.)  And contrary to what some folks believe, spreading the word about your event is not "selling out" or making it any less underground... unless, by "underground" you mean that two people show up.  If a promoter's got their head that far up their @$$, then their events deserve to fail.  But then, they're only demoralising the rest of the scene.

 

Street teams are key, and not just within the city.  Yahoo groups, for example, have this great section for file uploads.  Promoters can scan their fliers or capture the image from a website, upload the file and then go on to mention it to users in the message boards.  Some groups even permit attachments.  Members of the list can then go and download the file for themselves--a great way to do flier exchanges between cities wthout having to worry about postage.  Promoters could even arrange to make same-sized fliers and print double-sided to save money, while doubling the amount of info being spread.  You can also [righ-click+copy] the flier image and paste it directly into the body of an email message, for mail browsers that support html.  

 

(Have the PghGoth folks ever considered switching to a list that supports graphics?  It would GREATLY increase the effectiveness of posts.) 

 

Anyway, promoters should ALWAYS feel comfortable posting events and links to my own events board: PAdarkAlternative ( http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PAdarkAlternative/ --Yahoo claims that it's content is for adults, but anyone with a brain knows how to fake their age in a profile... =O.  As if modern teens don't know what bondage is...)  

 

~sc'e

 

     

 

 


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