Festival Previews Video Blog

A quick blog post today as Gideon Shalwick and Yaro Starak have launched their new jointly written report called, Roadmap to Become a Blogger.  I have found Gideon and Yaro’s work to be well worth reading.  Click the link above if you are interested in downloading a copy for yourselves.  I’m off for a spot of reading…

They say blogs are “word of mouth on steroids!”  Just like conversation it is a two way process albeit with a global audience.

Earlier in the year I signed up to Yaro Starak’s excellent Blog Mastermind course.  Crammed full of superb detail, Yaro skillfully sends out weekly lessons over a period of  six months.  The editorial process was spot on and I learned much about the technical details of SEO and monitisation.

Around this time, joy ‘o  joy, Gideon Shalwick with Yaro Starak set up their superbly timed website called, BecomeaBlogger.com.   Gideon as the creative talent behind this idea, leads you step-by-step through the  technical detail and visually shows you the  simple ABCs of it all.  Like a pig in mud, this was an absolute blessing to me!  I watched each of his 10 superb free video tutorials, from Setting up WordPress to How to use Feedburner for Supercharging your RSS capabilities.  For a technical numptie like myself, this was just awesome!

Haven spoken with Gideon recently, I know he is actively busy preparing for the launch of  Become a Blogger Premium, a membership site, planned for the first week of December.  This will offer customers more video tutorials using Gideon’s very simple style of online teaching.  As a regular customer of Become a Blogger, these video tutorials have been profoundly helpful to me as a blogging newbie.

If you are interested in learning more about blogging, I would highly recommend Gideon’s Become a Blogger Premium membership site and of course, Yaro’s Blog Mastermind Programe.

1. What do you see as your biggest challenge in producing your show?

I am so fortunate having dedicated people around me who help me with the financial stuff and promoting the show. But even with them it’s a hard world out there for creative people. So my biggest challenge is to get money without loosing my integrity. Besides that, when you have people around you all facing the same direction, you can achieve a lot!

2. How do you go about marketing your show (using both traditional marketing and internet marketing strategies)?

For traditional marketing I like to think about nice pictures for the flyers and posters etc. A good design is vital, you need to grab people’s attention.

With regards to internet marketing we spend a lot of time on our website getting the right colours and text and making it search friendly. We also look at all the other internet marketing opportunities out there to help promote our show. It’s part of the flow making the performance.

Only recently I started to like networking; in the past I hated it! Kim Terbrack is my right-hand here and she Googles wonderfully on the internet. I feel blessed with her.

3. How do you time frame this for all the fringes/festivals you plan to attend each year?

Going with the flow is my thing. I have a kind of inner clock which reminds me of just in time deadlines etc. Sometimes I neglect that clock and then I really suffer.

From the Fringe Office we have learned many organising skills. Also by participating at the Holland Dance Festival and other festivals you take on board gathered knowledge and experience to help you. There is a lot of knowledge out there and they share it with grace, especially the British people in my experience. Also the Festival Previews Team are very generous to us with their knowledge and skills!

4. How do you see the internet as assisting you in your profession?

I love the internet! I’m really fitting in with this century because it opens up a whole world of opportunity for every one who can use this technology. I love to travel and to look at different societies and the internet makes this so much more easier to do. Deep down we recognise archetypes all over the world.

5. You are extremely organised in seeking out promotion for your show. With your new show ‘Driven’ how do you approach this task?

This is easy for me, I am familiar with language and words, I like to play with them and put them on paper. It is in a way a refection of myself.

6. How do you go about creating your video preview?

Every time I work in the studio preparing a new performance, Marja van Draanen is there to film my work.

From my mothers inheritance I bought a beautiful professional camcorder (and I daily feel blessed with that.) The quality is great and we can edit our own material. Kim Terbrack did an editing course and we have a professional AVID programme on our computer. All this material is the most expensive equipment I have ever had in my life and it’s worth all the pennies!

7. What would you say is your top marketing tip?

Follow your own feelings and instinct of beauty and check with people (you know) who have good taste around you. Don’t think too much about the audience, because in the end you don’t know anymore about who you are yourself and you can lose your artistic direction here. That’s the danger of this profession.

I conquer that monster every day.

8. Being a performer draws on many learned skills aside from your natural talent to perform. What are the most important skills you feel performers should acquire to produce and market a successful show?

Persistence is one of the most important skill in succeeding. Also being able to bear a lot of frustration. How do you deal with failure? Can you handle the dark side of life with grace? That’s my daily aim! Living with this process instead of looking for success. Of course, I am very happy when success happens, but it may not be an aim on its own.

9. Have you taken any educational courses that have helped you in your professional performing career?

I have followed the Theatre School in Maastricht; The Dancing School in London; classical singing; and African dance for many years with lots of spiritual work and several therapists to help me with my artistic struggles. I have worked my guts out to achieve where I am now.

10. What is your top motivational tip?

Live your own nature!

11. Where do you stand on a work/life balance? And, how would you express this as a percentage?

Creating is for me like eating and drinking, it gives meaning to what I do and what I am. Without that I feel a little bit lost in this world. Making beauty is my solution to almost everything. I am an individualist and I need to create if there is an audience or not.

12. What do you believe are your 3 career milestones to-date?

Seeing myself on video gave me a freedom to view and analyze my skills and talents. Going to the Edinburgh Fringe and being recognised in reviews by The Herald and by a preview in the List Magazine. And overcoming my fear for other people.

13. Of all the things you have done in your career, what are you most proud of?

I am very proud of the fact that I stick to the core beliefs of my soul. That’s not easy in this profession, not even in life - I think!

14. Where do you want to be professionally in 5 years time?

Travelling around the world performing with people I trust and like.

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Do check out Neel’s website for more information about her.

With the 2nd Tokyo Fringe Festival concluding after a very successful run we are now targeting the Brighton Festival Fringe which commences on the 3rd May.

In order to help you with a part of your overall mixed-media marketing strategy do check out our article on Marketing your Virtual Flyer. It covers topics such as using all the virtual platforms out there to make your presence in the virtual world; using linking strategies where LINKING IS QUEEN, and CONTENT IS KING, writing online press releases, ideas on creating your video, rotating photo images, audio tracks etc. All great tips to help you get out there.

The internet is one of the greatest platforms out there to help you gain a presence in this vast world. Your demographic reach is local…and national…and global, 24/7. The more web pages you create about your show and yourself the more virtual headlines you create for search engines to find.

Who: Oliver Lansley

What: Performer, Writer, Producer, Director

Where: England, UK

1. What do you see as your biggest challenge in producing your show?

The first and most boring challenge is always financial. As a company we don’t receive any official funding. Plus for me it’s always important when producing a show that the money ins match the outs - This may sound like an obvious thing but the funding system in the UK means that so many shows are put on at a huge deficit, which will be impossible to re-coup. This is why with all the recent Arts Council cuts so many companies have gone out of business. The fact that we as a company are financially independent is something I’m very proud of, however it does mean we have to make a lot of sacrifices - chiefly on peoples wages! But unfortunately it’s the only way we can get by.

The other main challenges are the creative ones but that’s the fun bit!

2. How do you go about marketing your show (using both traditional marketing and internet marketing strategies)?

Marketing is always an essential part of making a show work - particularly in somewhere like Edinburgh and you have to really compete for people’s attention so it is important to cater your marketing strategy to suit where the show will be on - what may work for Edinburgh may be totally different for a run in London or an International tour. The obvious routes are advertising, flyers, posters etc but if budget is a concern you should try to utilise less conventional methods as much as possible. Emails, websites and networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace are all ways of getting information about your show out to a wide audience at little or no cost. It is also an opportunity to share images, music, reviews, even videos/trailers of your shows to encourage people to see your show. Marketing is all about standing out, getting your ideas across and giving people a reason to come and see your show above anyone else’s. Because of this it is extremely important to create professional looking publicity for the show as that is what people will use to make the decision as to whether they will see your show or not. Sometimes bad publicity is worse than no publicity! So the more professional your artwork appears the more professional people will think your show is. Even if you don’t have any money to spend on your publicity with a bit of inventiveness and work you can still produce professional results.

3. How do you time frame this for all the fringes/festivals you plan to attend each year?

We start thinking about marketing as soon as we start planning the show. Picking the right image to represent your show is extremely important. So as soon as you know what your show is and how you want people to view it you need to start planning your campaign, making sure you give yourself you plenty of time to get this information out to press, promoters and punters etc well in advance of the performances. this will allow reviewers etc to make a decision on whether they wish to see your show and to book it into their busy schedules.

4. How do you see the internet as assisting you in your profession?

The internet is an excellent networking tool and an essential way of getting information to a large number of people. It can also save you a significant amount of money on your marketing campaign. Emails, websites etc are all low cost, convenient ways of getting your marketing seen.

5. You are extremely organised in producing different Virtual Flyers for your show, The Terrible Infants, how do you approach this task?

The main thing to focus on is what you want to get across. The first thing to focus on is the information you need to impart. Then the best way in which to sell your show - images, reviews etc and finally the style in which it is put together. We are so used to marketing campaigns, trailers and adverts for films and TV that you need to make sure your flyers are stylish, well put together and convey a certain amount of production value.

6. How do you go about creating your video preview?

We usually produce short video slide-shows, which can be made very simply on basic home editing software. Video footage of theatre is very hard to get right and can often seem amateurish so we often simply use strong still images from the show as well as any relevant information or reviews.

7. What would you say is your top marketing tip?

Pick the right images to represent your show and make sure they look good. Question whether or not you would see the show based on your marketing, look at movie posters, trailers, ads, figure out what works, look at the way they are laid out and think about what would work for your show and represent it well. Then focus on making a professional job of it. Also don’t over do it, simplicity is often a very effective tool.

8. Being a performer draws on many learned skills aside from your natural talent to perform. What are the most important skills you feel performers should acquire to produce and market a successful show?

It is exceptionally important, particularly when coming from a performers point of view to be prepared to put in all the hard work required. Producing can be a hard and thankless task and it is always tempting to spend the most time on the more fun aspects of your work and neglect the rest. As a performer it is natural to focus purely on the show and performances etc and to neglect the more boring tasks such as marketing, contacting press and administration. However there is absolutely no point in having a really great show if no one gets to see it. So many people are under the impression that if you have a great show people will find you, though this is often not the case - a well marketed ‘bad’ show will almost always get better audiences than a poorly marketed ‘great’ show.

9. Have you taken any educational courses that have helped you in your professional performing career?

Not really, I personally have always been very much of the school of learning from doing. To me there is no better way of learning, particularly as a performer, than being in front of an audience. However this is a personal choice.

10. What is your top motivational tip?

Keep going and make sure you believe in what your doing. That is the most important thing.

11. Where do you stand on a work/life balance? And, how would you express this as a percentage?

I’m a bit of a workaholic so my work/life balance probably isn’t great! This profession can be quite consuming, fortunately it’s also quite a social profession so the lines between life and work tend to merge. My work sort of is my life so it would be hard to split them up into separate percentages!

12. What do you believe are your 3 career milestones to-date?

Playing the lead in Steven Berkoff’s ‘Greek’ at the Riverside Studios in London.
My first play being published - ‘Immaculate‘ by Nick Hern books.
My first original TV writing work - ‘FM’ a comedy lab for Channel 4

13. Of all the things you have done in your career, what are you most proud of?

There are lot’s of things I’m very proud of, for different reasons so it would be hard to say one thing but I’m very proud of our current show ‘The Terrible Infants‘.

14. Where do you want to be professionally in 5 years time?

Happy, successful and working on projects I believe in.