Self-perpetuating marketing through online collaboration in cultural projects is my prediction for the Next Big Thing. This is because the medium of the internet lends itself so well; because audiences are ready for it; and because it’s an efficient marketing model in these economically-challenged times.
To demonstrate the concept, consider Scissor Sister’s launch of the single ‘I Don’t Feel Like Dancin’. In conjunction with a relatively modest video of themselves performing on a moving background, they launched a web page to which you could add portraits of yourself and others and those faces would replace some of the faces of the band. The quirky, amusing results of users (and other celebrities) seeming to strut their stuff with the Scissor Sisters (much like a contemporary seaside photoboard) were forwarded to friends, posted on YouTube and linked to from Facebook and the like. The band remained intact, their expenditure was finite and yet their video (modern music’s core marketing tool) was being replicated and distributed for them, along with a reinforcement of the message that the band are contemporary, inclusive and fun.
In another recent example, Dr Martens commissioned an online boot design campaign, aimed to shift perceptions of their brand to that of self-expression. As entrants promoted their entries on blogs and social network sites in an attempt to gain enough votes for their design to be put in production, the company claims to have reached ‘six or seven times the number of visitors that we thought we could possibly hit’.
Of course the exponential effect of viral marketing on the internet is nothing new, but it’s the addition of user content (a key part of Web 2.0), and the resulting commitment to the project, which move the model forward.
Consider a typical museum wanting to involve visitors in a historical exhibition both on and offline. A member of staff suggests, ‘Visitors could try on a costume and take a photo on their phone and send it in to our site’. This is a common enough and promising-sounding suggestion, but, from experience, we know that visitors don’t get behind these kinds of processes. And it’s not because you’re asking too much of them – this is a pretty straightforward requirement – it’s a more complex issue of motivation, determined by a delicate balance of commitment, reward, process, novelty, relevance and timing.
A very successful proponent of Web 2.0 marketing is Penguin books. Anna Rafferty, their Digital Marketing Director, spoke at an Arts Marketing Association event last year. They have built a network of people in different age groups who are interested in Penguin products and are keen to engage with the brand. Rafferty believes that the key to their audience being willing to spend significant amounts of time and energy engaging with their products, their brands and their websites, is to give them control (such as Spinebreakers, the teen book review website). And they have found that the more they ask of people (e.g. compose a theme tune to a new audio book) the more involved they are willing to be.
The combination of novelty and excellent, simplistic execution gave The Rijksmuseum great success on their ‘Damien Hirst with For the Love of God’ microsite in getting museum visitors to comment on the exhibition. They filmed them with their head through a curtain and then animated the ‘floating’ heads around the skull artwork. As a result, the museum had generated discussion; gained content for its site; amassed a collection of reviews most exhibitions could only hope for; created an additional reason to visit the exhibition; and spawned free publicity as interviewees showed the link to friends and family and fans of the site passed the link around. In fact, the museum claims that ‘never before has a work of art provoked as much dialogue’.
When planning a participatory project, it can be very helpful to create a storyboard of the process, complete with stickmen if necessary. This can help to clarify how many stages you’re requiring from visitors and what the undertaking will be on your part. It will also be of assistance when briefing and budgeting for the project with outside agencies.
In this process, it’s essential to concentrate more on ‘Why not?’ than ‘Why?’ and, equally, ‘What are target audience currently participating in?’ not ‘What are other organisations doing?’ In the above example, it’s easy to think that the motivation (the ‘why?’) is that visitors could show the pictures of them in costumes to friends and family via your website. From experience, I would suggest that visitors might do the first two actions but they can then show friends the picture directly on their phone, or if they’re keen on Facebook they might upload the pictures there, not on your site. Instead you could engage them further in the process and invite them to participate in a theoretical heated discussion online, via a webpage also accessible from the exhibition hall, involving the personalities that you provide costumes for. Or invite them to create Facebook pages, Twitter feeds or a blog for these characters. Often thinking bigger (but still simply) brings greater results.
In order to understand your audience better, the Arts Council’s Arts audiences: insight document is a useful summary tool.
Before undertaking any participation project like this, check for any existing ‘piggybacking’ opportunities; don’t start from scratch if you can avoid it. For example, use your contacts and get them involved to start forums buzzing or to generate a bigger PR story. If someone else has completed a similar project, see if you can learn from their experiences, or better still, have access to the programming element of their website! Wherever possible, start with existing audiences and networks rather than creating your own, like BBC Switch who have launched a collaborative TV series with audiences text messaging the characters and influencing their behaviour, starting with those who already watch the channel online.
Of course, if you’re encouraging interaction and creativity then you’re opening yourself to both positive and negative input. General Motors’ failed campaign for the Tahoe is a particularly harsh example; they launched a competition site allowing users to create their own advert for the new car in return for a chance to win prizes and were rewarded with adverts declaring the negatives of the car to a background of advertising muzak – which of course were linked to from blogs and forums all over the world! If you plan your project well, however, and understand your audience, this is most unlikely to happen. In most cases, generating debate is an important objective, or even mission, of cultural organisations and so, with provision for moderation of comments if necessary, people should mostly be encouraged to participate without limitation.
And if all this self-propagating content wasn’t enough, as an added benefit of this type of project, the links from forums, blogs and social networking sites will also increase your search engine recognition: free SEO as a bonus!