Surprisingly, I wasn’t thinking about arts funding this morning when I stumbled on this article by Lauren Story, “The Evolution of Private Label: Assessing Retailers’ Strategic Motives.” But if you participate in your organization’s strategic thinking about program development and outreach, it’s a worthwhile read. Why? Because the big challenge retailers are facing (shoppers are making fewer trips, cutting spending) is identical to the challenge faced by those of us in the arts (participation is down, so is revenue).

As someone who works in community-based art, I’m hesitant to use the word “private” in any way lest it be seen as elitist, inaccessible, unappealing. But “private label” is an industry term which refers to a brand not owned by a producer but rather by a retailer who gets goods from a manufacturer and offers them under its own label. There are some obvious parallels to the arts if you are a presenter, service provider or simply working more and more collaboratively.

In brief, some takeaways from the article:

• Like retailers, many arts organizations attempt to grab sales share by mimicking national trends—e.g. producing last year’s hit Broadway play, exhibiting the same 10-20 up and coming visual artists. In the world of retail, store brands that mimic national trends are considered “reflective” because they depend on national brands to provide customer assurance of the category. What does it mean for the arts industry that our national brands are not providing “customer assurance” to arts participants, let alone voters? What are the reasons for and against reflective programming?
• Comparatively (writes Story), lines [aka "programming"] with branded imagery help organizations build differentiation and build relationships with customers. In this way they become “incandescent” rather than reflective. This gets back to what I call the Ben Cameron questions: “How is my organization unique? How would my community be damaged if my organization were to close its doors?”. What about your programming is unique and who tells that to your stakeholders? Is it key staff members, patrons, artists? How does your organization help them tell that story?
• Community-based programming has enormous potential for the Private Label approach. Like retailers, arts organizations and key stakeholders tend to think of marketing as “necessary evil.” Orgs seek to optimize it, get their benchmarks in order, make it as efficient as possible. Right now, the focus in retail is on finding innovative ways to reach shoppers before they decide to go to the store. In the arts, this might be called the Path to Participation. Nonprofits can do this by putting their resources along with branded imagery into the hands of their collaborators as a way of reaching potential customers on the Path to Participation.
• There are already some great examples of the private label approach to programming in San Francisco although we could improve on the “imagery” part. Everyone is familiar with fiscal sponsorship and many people offer it, but the Intersection Incubator stands out among the crowd. At SOMArts, short-term residencies through the Studio Series provides valuable resources to artists while simultaneously aligning our outreach efforts with the passion and authentic voice of individuals and emerging groups.
• Marketing done through a collaborative, private label approach is inherently messy and hard to measure. A highly-moderated approach to social media does not align well with the private label approach to programming.

I’m not sure what this means for me just yet—still thinking on it. Has anyone tried this approach or something similar within their organization? If so, what did you learn?

The most important goal, in my opinion, is to have the SOMArts web presence feel like an online extension of our physical organization. Since SOMArts is a hub for many cultural communities, more than 100 visual artists, and more than 50 Bay Area nonprofits each year, it makes sense that our website be a hub for these communities to connect and cross over. SOMArts patrons love the fact that in our building you can come for the Mongolian exhibit and stumble upon the Homeless Coalition’s art auction. But the website should also be a home for easy-to-find details such as directions, mission and building hours. Balancing and articulating these priorities has been a challenge.

That is why I was so interested to read Andrew Taylor’s Artful Manager post about the “lifestream.” Individuals (such as SOMArts staffer Rio Yanez) do a great job linking social networking to their personal sites, but I have yet to see an organization nail it.

Who knows … perhaps SOMArts will be one of the first! Here’s hoping.

But a funny thing happened on the way to submitting that grant application. I started getting excited about marketing again. Specifically, the potential for breaking open a tired old myth (Full-Time Marketing Director + Hotshot Publicist=Stellar Attendance) and doing things more efficiently and effectively. I used to scour the newspaper and online listings for interesting things to see and do, but here in San Francisco, that means sifting through 435 listings on a lazy Sunday, and those are by no means comprehensive. The grassroots innovators rarely show up in the newspaper anymore, and the most compelling invitations come from artists, curators and collectives.

I get dozens of Facebook invitations each week and I’m still not sure I know a single person under forty who can entice even fifty people to an arts event where there’s not free booze. How large is the disconnect between new technology and true relationship building when it comes to arts participation? I hope the gap is narrowing, but I fear there is a schism that puts small and mid-size arts organizations at a disadvantage.

As a friend reminded me this weekend, going to the theater (or any arts event) is an adventure that requires effort and risk … and in an era of empty pockets and full schedules, the best publicist in the world can’t compete with word of mouth when it comes to filling a room. Logic would say that facts and accuracy count for more than opinion, but science is proving that wrong.

So … whether or not I attend Boot Camp, I am left with a few questions:

• Can relationship building with technology be taught? Who should do the teaching?
• How can Institutions (defined as: more formal organizations, often with more formal relationships and more liveable compensation to artists) blur the lines between marketing and art-making without sucking up all of the time + energy of artists, aka making them “jump through more hoops” just to have a show?
• What are the intergenerational  aspects of new technologies in marketing (positives and negatives)?

And, on a very micro-level … what does this all mean for my organization’s database, website, budget, et cetera?

Any answers out there? Advice, links, book/study recommendations welcomed.

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WordPress 2.7: Actually, Dan upgraded my blog to the new version. So far, so good. Haven’t had much time to check it out yet, but if installing widgets is easier, I may give it a try and mess up the design (!). WordPress also has an iphone app. Still trying to convince Dan to use his superior talents to design a blog for SOMArts.

RSS Readers: I am surprised that many of my contemporaries and older colleagues still don’t use an rss reader. For me, it saves a lot of time that used to be spent navigating from site to site looking for updates.

I still use Netvibes as a home for all my rss feeds, but am no longer sure this is the best option for me. In Connecticut, I was trying to “keep tabs” on arts activity and friends’ blogs around the state. Now that I am in San Francisco my internet habits involve more “search & explore” activity. I am trying Delicious as a way to categorize things until I figure out what updates and blogs are truly of use.

Plug-ins: When I had an academic discount through Wesleyan, I splurged on the photo editing and organizing software Aperture, then didn’t use it because Green Street had lots of wonderful volunteers who took great photos. Now that I am at SOMArts I am again taking photos, and have discovered a few plug-ins that make the process of uploading and emailing them WAY more efficient.

Plug-ins literally plug in to your existing applications to increase their usefulness and efficiency. The first plug-in I installed referred to a folder in my library that didn’t exist, but I simply created a new folder and it worked fine. Here are a few pics and pans:

-Flickr Uploadr: The first uploader I tried. Uploads large batches of photos to Flickr. Warning to arts organizations—there is a defect in this program which marks the photos as private no matter what public option you try to select. This means people cannot see your photos without logging on to Flickr. Very annoying.

-Aperture2Gmail & FlickrExport. Self-explanatory plug-ins which allow the user to export photos directly from Aperture to flickr and gmail. No doubt similar plug-ins are available for other photo editing programs … but until I had these I had to export my photos to the desktop then email them or upload them, then create all new sets and descriptions. Redundant, not to mention time consuming.

-Since I am not an IT person or particularly tech savvy, I am not sure if the Flickr app for Facebook or Amazon’s Universal Wish List are technically plug-ins. But I am all for uploading SOMArts photos once (to Flickr) and then linking them to the SOMArts Facebook page (rather than uploading photos twice). Also … I can see the Amazon wishlist becoming a helpful budgeting tool, allowing organizations to easily compare and contrast prices from many websites for, say, office equipment, with more info at their fingertips than there would be on a spreadsheet.

Of course, all my saved time will be wasted if I then use it to blog about saving time. It is very hard to get a sense of what is new and what’s already outdated. If you have any suggestions to share, please do.

It’s officially July, which means it is officially almost time for 4th of July weekend. Yay. Dan and I will be heading north over 4th to see Beth Orton at Mass MoCA, and then south to see Jason Grote’s new play, Box Americana, at the O’Neill Theater Center.

Sidenote: When I used to work at The O’Neill, I would walk down to Waterford Beach and, often, see August Wilson looking out at the bay. Sigh …

Just in time for the O’Neill theater-beach trip, I was alerted to a new beach tote, brought to you by the Minnesota Fringe Festival (pictured above). Seems appropriate!

Not one to be outdone, the Walker Art Center has also released a cute, new, eco-conscious bag. The 100% organic cotton tote is printed on one side with black eco-choice ink, which is non-pthalite and non-pvc.

Decisions, decisions.