Getting the job done for customers on social media
A guest post by Amanda Lester
Over the past nine months of collecting data on the social media activity of more than twenty major U.S. symphony orchestras with the Orchestra Social Media Tracker, I've seen sparks of brilliance and remarkable creativity. I’ve also seen a massive amount of event marketing that all looks and sounds quite similar. There are a few problems with this.
When performing arts organizations rely mostly on event marketing, they narrow their potential audience pool to those who are familiar with and already enjoy their offerings or their specific programming (few) and those who aren't familiar but are willing to spend a night out and a chunk of change on something they may or may not end up enjoying (even fewer).
When the quantity of posts–or breadth of social media coverage–is prioritized over quality and uniqueness, it’s difficult to break through the onslaught of online content and pique the interest of your target audience. And it certainly won’t set your brand apart.
As Jay Baer writes, “If your product isn't talkable, then cost becomes the sole basis of comparison. When you fail to have a meaningful experiential differentiator, you are not only required to pay the tax on unremarkability in the form of increased advertising spending, but you also have a much harder time charging any sort of premium for whatever you offer.”
Our current and near-future paying audiences are bombarded with marketing as they scroll through their social media feeds. They tend to be skeptical of anything that looks and smells like marketing. The standard marketing-ese that most performing arts organizations use to promote events is more turnoff than engagement-inducing.
While event marketing certainly has a role to play, there is a different approach that could break through the noise and differentiate your brand: one that centers the customer.
Three Types of Social Media Content
I have observed three types of content while tracking the social media activity of U.S. orchestras:
Organization-Centric: "What do we need to promote?" is the driving motivation behind a majority of posts, where social media is a check box on the campaign calendar or is called upon as a last-ditch effort to fill seats. These posts are often quick to create and obviously marketing something.
Hybrid: Many organizations are creating organization-centric content that nods to customer needs, for example, by trying to make their programming feel more relatable and familiar. Resource-intensive and definitively on-brand and on-message, this content tends to be highly-produced and formal.
Customer-Centric: I have seen few orchestras dare to take a customer-centric approach, which is often informal and responsive to current events and trends. While not necessarily "on-brand” or selling anything in particular, it is brand-adjacent, giving audiences a glimpse into an organization made up of people like them, as opposed to one that is culturally out of touch. This kind of content generates brand awareness and positive brand associations that lay the groundwork for purchases and loyalty down the line.
While this approach is prevalent in the for-profit world—and has proven very profitable there—it hasn’t yet taken root in the classical music world.
How to Create Customer-Centric Social Media Content
If you’ve been following Ruth Hartt’s work, you may be familiar with Jobs to Be Done theory, a powerful innovation framework which asserts that “people don’t simply buy products or services, they ‘hire’ them to make progress in specific circumstances.”
After 18 years of Facebook, 16 years of Twitter, 12 years of Instagram, not to mention TikTok, Snapchat, Pinterest, and myriad other platforms, social media has become ubiquitous in culture and society. 80% of U.S. adults are using social media platforms and Americans spend about 2 hours a day on social media.
So why do people “hire” social media? At a high level, customers are motivated by the opportunity for staying in touch, meeting others, keeping up-to-date with current events, self expression, and/or distraction. But there’s a deeper, hidden attraction that isn’t often discussed.
Social media works by setting off cascades of dopamine and oxytocin in our brains. "Dopamine is stimulated by unpredictability, small bits of information, and reward cues. Then there's oxytocin, sometimes referred to as 'the cuddle chemical' because it's released when you kiss or hug." This is the underlying reason why people “hire” social media hour after hour, day after day.
As people scroll their feeds, performing arts organizations must be constantly present, ripe for discovery – but presence is only the first step. The second step is to create content that will trigger brain chemistry in specific ways, because that's why audiences are really there.
To create effective social media content that targets this latent customer motivation, I recommend four guidelines:
Understand what your customers really want from you when they are browsing social media. Hint: What your customers want probably isn’t what you want them to want. In other words, don’t assume that audiences know or care as much as you do about the performing arts, or that they’re ready NOW to buy a ticket. Does your content help them with connection, self expression, distraction, or other everyday needs?
Understand the psychology around amplification: why people like, comment, and share. For example, Buffer’s Courtney Seiter writes: “68% of people say they share to give others a better sense of who they are and what they care about.”
Prioritize the concept over the execution. You don’t have to spend a ton of money to attract a ton of attention.
Use a mix of the eight ingredients that I’ve seen work most effectively (doesn’t have to be all of these at once):
Timely: Related to current events, trends, holidays, and pop culture
Informal: Raw, authentic, and down-to-earth. Uses language our target audiences use in their everyday life; pulls in familiar elements from their lives—particularly from pop culture.
Spontaneous: In-the-moment, not overly scripted
Unexpected: Play with people’s expectations and assumptions
Funny: Witty without being overworked, tongue-in-cheek, downright silly
Unifying: Appeal to people’s humanity, solidarity, community pride
Awe-inspiring: Usually imagery that is “finger-stopping”
Momentous: Celebratory or memorializing
In my Orchestra Social Media Tracker, half of the top ten most-interacted-with Facebook posts since the beginning of the year were about the war in Ukraine. These were not highly-planned campaigns or ticketing Hail Mary's. They were timely, responsive to a major world event, called on people’s humanity, and referenced their organizations’ values. Social media gets a bad rap these days for exacerbating divisiveness, but don’t forget: "social media can also unite us."
Here are some other high-performing posts this year and the ingredients they used:
Example 1: Informal + Timely
Example 2: Momentous + Timely + Unifying
Example 3: Informal + Timely + Unexpected + Funny
Example 4: Awe-Inspiring + Unexpected
Example 5: Informal + Timely + Spontaneous + Momentous
Example 6: Informal + Unexpected + Funny
Bonus example from across the pond: Informal + Unexpected + Funny
@lcoorchestra Luna has made some changes to our Season Opening concert…#dvorak#orchestra#maltipoo#classicalmusic #concert ♬ Typing sound (keyboard x 3p) 1 minute(1006556) - LEOPARD
Courtney Seiter, formerly of Buffer, said it best:
Have you ever wondered why animals are so popular on social media? An interviewer asked the Buzzfeed editors who work on these stories why animals go so viral, and they said it’s because these stories are often not really about animals at all. They often show humans at their best — rescuing, fostering, caring. They said, “Our empathy for animals is us at our best."
Social media can gnaw at our insecurities and suck us in, but at its core, it’s about the good in the world: seeing it in ourselves, recognizing it in others, passing it on. It allows us to get a little closer, a little more empathetic, a little nearer to who we truly want to be. Brands have the opportunity to connect with us if they’re willing to be human along with us – with all the messiness, anxieties and joys that comes with that.
Marketing expert Mark Schaefer echoes this sentiment in his book Marketing Rebellion: “The most human company wins.” As we work to rebuild our classical music audiences, let’s commit to going beyond the traditional event marketing approach and just be a little more human. Our audiences’ brains will thank us.
What organizations have you seen nail customer-centric social media content? Share below in the comments. Questions? Reach out to me on LinkedIn or email me at amandalester@soundingpoint.la
