As we enter a new chapter for the performing arts across the world, it is now a question of whether the necessary changes we’ve agonized over for the past year will be made fully operational or whether we will “snap-back” to the way things were. The snap-back is admittedly my greatest fear for all of us—a retreat to less inclusive, less accessible, and less responsive ways of working and engaging with audiences.

So how do we make sure that change is structural, not cyclical? Particularly with regard to equity, justice, and belonging, any changes we make need to be holistic rather than piecemeal. We need to examine every aspect of the system. In this article, I will focus specifically on arts marketing, but future content will examine the broader context of our industry and culture with additional voices.

We help arts organizations evolve and transform marketing operations—sometimes with new leadership, sometimes with new team structures, sometimes with new strategies, and often by building the capacities of the teams on the ground.

As you approach this next phase and develop your own roadmap for change, we offer you our nine areas of assessment to help you think holistically about the ways in which your marketing operation can serve your renewed vision and goals. We encourage you to think through each for your organization and reflect on the questions, “Are we where we should be? If not, how do we get there and what do we need?” And if you need help, please get in touch — this is quite literally why we exist.

Marketing Strategy and Planning
Does your team have the expertise and ability to craft strategy and resulting action plans with a focus on clear targets, intentional tactics, and opportunities for evaluation?
Team Structure
Does your marketing team contain the necessary roles and expertise to serve your larger goals? Does the team represent a range of experiences and bring varied perspectives to the organization? What balance of staff and vendors/agencies are right to serve your needs on an ongoing basis?
Brand Management
Is your company identity conveyed uniformly across public-facing materials, including graphic identity, design systems, tone of voice and experiential touch points? Is your team effectively managing the company brand in the execution of all campaigns and across all channels?
Campaign Development and Execution
Is your team creating and implementing marketing campaigns that meet organizational goals and effectively reach target audiences? Do they speak to the artistic vision on stage and in your halls? Are you maximizing all of the channels available to you – paid, earned and owned – with relevant targeting and effective content and messaging?
CRM and Digital Platforms
Are you effectively leveraging your customer database to deliver relevant messaging to audience members, with content and calls to action informed by customer profiles? Are your digital platforms serving user-centric content based on your understanding of audiences, and do you have tools to allow you to gauge the effectiveness of content and messaging?
Pricing and Revenue Management
Are you able to effectively measure and forecast demand in relation to available inventory, to ensure that pricing and seat release schedules are maximizing your ticket revenues? Does your team have the skills and the tools they need to make revenue-led decisions and take action? How does your pricing strategy align with your values?
Audience Research and Analysis
Are you routinely gathering qualitative and quantitative data to answer key organizational questions about current and potential audiences, including their attitudes and perceptions? Do you have mechanisms in place for audiences to communicate about their experiences with your company?
Audience Development and Engagement Strategy
Are you thinking critically about who is and is not represented within your existing audience base? Within that, are you segmenting your audiences and crafting communications to reach these segments with relevant messaging in a timely, authentic, and meaningful way? Are you providing avenues for audiences to gain a deeper understanding of and involvement with your artistic offerings beyond the performances onstage?
Customer Experience Strategy
Is your organization taking a thoughtful and dynamic approach to the design of audience experience to remove friction in the arts-going experience, and ensure that feedback mechanisms are in place to identify opportunities for improvement?

Whether we’re conducting a 360-degree assessment or vetting a marketing leader for our executive search clients, we are thinking critically about all of these areas to enable change within arts organizations. You may recognize areas where your organization or marketing team could use support, either with internal reflection or with guidance from an objective thought partner. If you need that help, please do get in touch.

But what is most important to impart is that marketing and audience transformation don’t come about simply through a new logo, a new piece of technology, or one new hire. All of the elements we’ve outlined above are parts of a system that move together, and this is a time for forward movement.

Tom O’Connor is the President of Tom O’Connor Consulting Group. TOCG is a New York City-based arts consultancy offering strategy, assessment, executive search, and leadership coaching services to organizations across the US—all with a focus on audiences and revenue outcomes. Tom has spent over 15 years working in the cultural sector, is on the faculty of the graduate Theater Management program at the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale, and received his MSW in Clinical Social Work from Fordham University.