off-stage right

Twitter brought to my attention today two interesting tactics of Broadway musicals marketing.  The first being the following Tweet:

FelaMusical Curious about FELA! on Broadway? Check out our youtube channel for rehearsals, footage from the show, more: http://bit.ly/KDyXy Thu, Jul 09 10:48:38 from web

I retweeted the message and then hopped over to the YouTube channel and watched several of the videos, they were all very engaging.  The first was a “commercial” for the show – touting it’s awards and highlighted the visual imagery of the show, but it didn’t really get to the core premise of the show.  Now I didn’t read any of the side bar information until after looking a bit further because frankly I rarely read the sidebar information on a channel.   The older interviews get more into the show.  I don’t know if the average theatre-goer would be inclined to dig deeper.

Now Fela has 179 followers.  So who knows if anyone other than me will really click-thru to see what’s on the channel.   Arguably this is a new show that has to build it’s momentum, but when I have twice as many followers with a show that has that big of a company I have to wonder about the tweets they are sending.  I will check back over the next few days to see if this latest combo of digital presence ups that number.

The other Twitter stat I learned from the new Wall Street Journal Culture Blog – Speakeasy.  Their posting about Next To Normal on Twitter is really interesting.

Next to Normal on Twitter caught my attention back in May when they started to tweet an entire performance of the show that I posted about here.

They have since moved on to a twitter talk-back that I have complemented them on many times.  What I hadn’t done was realized the number of followers they had amassed.  In fact I hadn’t really looked to much as the number of followers any shows had amassed until now.   It was Speakeasy that brought this to my attention with an emphasis on what a contrast this is to other Broadway show’s efforts :

What does the small and slightly obscure Broadway musical “Next to Normal” have over Paris Hilton and MTV?

Twitter fans, for one thing. The show’s online feed reached more than 355,000 followers Wednesday afternoon. That’s about 45,000 more than Ms. Hilton’s, and 121,000 more than MTV’s.

Lots of Broadway producers try to gin up interest via Twitter, MySpace and Facebook to market their shows and build fan communities (something even more crucial in the tough summer months as Broadway shows start to close). While online marketing isn’t unusual, the followings don’t normally hit six figures. The Twitter feed for the Broadway hit “Billy Elliot: The Musical,” for example, lists around 1,800 followers.

THAT IS RIGHT 355,000+ FOLLOWERS.

The rest of the article dissects what the actors are asked and their responses – often not the most serious of things, but anyone who has attended an audience talk-back won’t be surprised by the questions asked.  What is important is that Next to Normal has used the artists – whether to answer questions, provide deeper insight into the characters, or to literally post the script one tweet at a time for almost a month to engage the Twitterverse in a way that no one else is.

A recent Mashable post (the more or less accepted leaders in commentary on social media) explored how commercial theater is using social media, and although the article noted some of the efforts, on further examination the communities others are creating are on average 1% of what Next to Normal has accomplished.  A quick survey showed Rock of Ages at 4600+ followers, Hair at 3700+ and pretty much everyone else under 1000.   A quick look at New York nonprofit theaters showed with the exception of my old stomping grounds MCC Theater (who have 3500+ followers) that most of the institutional theaters are around 1000 followers as well.  With the exception of Jane Fonda (37K+) the actors tweeting from Broadway basically have 2000 or less followers (most less).  This was a quick sample so if I missed someone let me know.

I guess we could just write off all of this to the idea that Next to Normal fans are just huge Twitter users compared to well everyone else, but that seems like well BS.  The only answer really can be content is king.  Next to Normal is giving unprecedented access to It is not really surprising that content matters this much

Now a lot of cynics would say well what does any of it matter unless it is having a huge impact on ticket sales.  Certainly a glance at last week’s Broadway grosses illustrates that Next to Normal is one of the lowest grossing musicals. BUT it is playing at a high capacity, is in a much smaller house than the others, and undoubtedly has much lower running costs based on cast and band size, single set, and simple costumes, etc.  It also had a much smaller drop off during the holiday week than other shows.   I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that it’s profit margin was similar to some of the shows with much higher grosses.

And let’s face it there are a lot of other ways this community of 350K+ is having a financial impact.  Most of the tweets and tweet-back questions make it VERY clear that almost everyone of the active tweeters have heard the soundtrack (numerous times I would imagine).  A lot of folks tweet about how excited they are to come and see the show – almost in equal amount to those tweeting that they just saw it.  A good handful even talk about seeing the show multiple times.   The Next to Normal fans seem to be as rabid in their fandom as the fabled “Rent-heads.”   Over at i-Tunes the soundtrack is the second highest Broadway show on the Top Albums for Soundtracks (behind the unstoppable Wicked).

What it all comes down to is we have to stop ignoring Twitter as a community audience development tool and a lot of other professionals better join the Twitter party – you know who you are.  But it is all about what you tweet not how often.  It also about generating word of mouth and relationships – not just announcing discount tickets.   As Guest Blogger Samantha Kindler wrote in her post on Social Media

Twitter is one form of web 2.0 that constantly intrigues me. Not being a habitual Twitterer myself*, I am very curious if Twittering about shows really helps to market that show. For example, some of these shows Twitter out discounts multiple times a day. Is this overload? If someone sees a variation on the same Tweet from a show over and over again, won’t they just start ignoring it? Also, don’t most people who follow a certain show follow it because they have already seen the show and are not necessarily looking to buy tickets again?

*I will also note – that in a few short weeks since writing that post, Samantha has become a habitual and regular member of the twitterverse.  She has even started a twitter account for the student producing program at her university.

Other posts about Twitter in Theater

Twitter effect on how we experience events

Great Twitter Contest – great customer service

Failed Fundraising Tweet

Related posts:

1. Good Tweet, Bad Tweet
2. Fundraising Tweet from Dallas Theater Center. Nice idea bad execution. :(
3. NYTW – Great Twitter contest, even better customer service response.
4. Quick theater folks, steal this Twitter idea!
5. No more waiting in line for rush tickets!