Making Your Community Festivals Better
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MAKING YOUR COMMUNITY FESTIVALS BETTER Vern Biaett, PhD, CFEE Faculty Associate School of Community Resources & Development
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Making Your Community Festivals Better. Vern Biaett, PhD, CFEE Faculty Associate School of Community Resources & Development. Who Are You …. and what do you do?. What Do You Want …. to make better at your community events?. Organize Your Thought Process. - PowerPoint PPT Presentation
Transcript of Making Your Community Festivals Better
MAKING YOUR COMMUNITY FESTIVALS
BETTER
Vern Biaett, PhD, CFEEFaculty Associate
School of Community Resources & Development
WHO ARE YOU …
and what do you do?
WHAT DO YOU WANT …
to make better at your community events?
ORGANIZE YOUR THOUGHT PROCESS
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venuestaff
activity
THE 1ST STEP IN MAKING THINGS BETTER …
knowing what you already have.
THE 2ND STEP IN MAKING THINGS BETTER IS …
knowing what you are really trying to accomplish.
OK, NOW THAT YOU HAVE …
some basic structure to what you’re doing let’s talk about your stakeholders.
Who are they?
MAKE THINGS BETTER BY …
making things better for every one of your stakeholders.
MAKE THINGS BETTER BY BEING …
a better communicator.
What is Marketing & Promotion?
What is your plan … do you even have a plan?
PROMOTION
There are 5 basic forms of promotion Advertising Publicity Sales Promotions Selling/Personal Contact Non-Media
HOW TO CREATE A BETTER POSTER …
in only 10 minutes.
ONE LAST THOUGHT ON PROMOTION
7 images
Less is better and more powerful
TO MAKE THINGS BETTER …
you have to be better at financial things.
Revenue GenerationSponsorship
Financial Controls
“With money in your pocket, you are wise, you are handsome, and you sing well too.”
Old Jewish Proverb
WHAT IS THE NUMBER ONE SOURCE …
of revenue for festivals and events?
THERE IS MORE THAN ONE …
type of admission fee.
THERE ARE 1,000’S OF OTHER WAYS …
to generate revenue for a community event.
On-siteOff-site
Day ofYear round
SPONSORSHIP
The old way of thinking
GoldSilverBronze
Basically just begging
SPONSORSHIP
New way of thinking … Asset Benefit Exchange
Sponsor assets
Event benefits
SPONSORSHIP
What can a sponsor give you?
What do you have that a sponsor wants?
Tangibles and Intangibles
SPONSORSHIP
And there is so much more
CategoriesLeverage
Values - IEGSales People
and on and on and on
BOTTOM LINE – TO MAKE SPONSORSHIP BETTER …
Have a planKnow what you want / need
Know what you have to exchange
Sponsor > Partner > Friend
WHAT IS THE #1 REASON EVENTS …
TO MAKE YOUR EVENTS BETTER …
understand what your financial goals are.
Make a Profit
Break Even
Lost Leader
TO MAKE YOUR EVENTS BETTER …
Use a Cost – Revenue financial system
Revenues are highly unpredictableExpenses must be controlled to maximize
successBudgets cannot be made in stone
TO MAKE YOUR EVENT BETTER …
make your staff and volunteers better.
Leadership
vision
tasks
WHAT MOTIVATES STAFF & VOLUNTEERS?
MARKETING, CHECK – SPONSORSHIP, CHECK FESTIVITY … WHAT WAS THAT AGAIN?
What is the most important thing you do for an
event?
I WOULD SUGGEST THAT …
the most important thing you should be doing is creating the BEST possible experience for
each and everyone of your stakeholders
LET’S REDIRECT OUR FOCUS TO …
creating great experiences for those stakeholders we call attendees, guests,
participants, visitors
BUT YOU ASK …
what is the BEST possible experience?How do I go about making that happen?
TO BEGIN TO UNDERSTAND …
let’s first use the word festivity to describe experiences that might take place at
festivals and events and take a quick journey through history
THE EVOLUTION OF FESTIVITY
From Paleolithic (20,000-8,000 BCE) hunter-gathers, through the Neolithic (8,000-4,000 BCE) first farmers, and into the first civilizations (4,000-800 BCE) festivity was ORGANIC Communal Spontaneous Amalgamated with Mythos in celebrating
celestial seasons and regeneration of life A state of being meaningful only unto itself
SIDEBAR
Goebekli Tepe Oldest religious structure in Turkey – predates
Stonehenge Roaming clans of hunter-gathers came together
for festivity and cooperatively evolved into the first agricultural societies
THE EVOLUTION OF FESTIVITY
As civilization progressed through the Axial (800-200 BCE) and Post-Axial (200 BCE – 1500 CE) Mythos and its deep emotional participation
was surpassed by Logos Festivity evolved into an activity with a sense of
purpose and reason and then …
THE EVOLUTION OF FESTIVITY
With the Enlightenment (1500 CE) festivity became very spatially very temporal and culminated during the industrial revolution
as a method to manage and control urban masses
Festivity became ORGANIZED
THE EVOLUTION OF FESTIVITY
Following World War II and for the past 6 decades with a general emphasis on public relations, materialism, and technology festivity morphed into mercantile activity with focus on Financial gain Efforts to gain public attention
Festivity became a COMMERCIAL ORGANISM
THE EVOLUTION OF FESTIVITY
Has the time come to return to a more organic form of festivity?
Is a more organic form of festivity the key to producing truly great experiences at today’s festivals and events?
Can festivals and events once again be about having fun for the sake of fun … like play?
SO, HOW DO WE NOW …
go back to the ancient roots of festivity and create those BEST experiences for those
who attend our festivals and events?
A KEY TO ANCIENT FESTIVITY
Collaboratively Creative Social Activity
Loud music with deep bass and heavy drum beats
Performing arts … dance, drama
Visual arts … masks, costumes
Wild abandonment … joyfulness
A KEY TO ANCIENT FESTIVITY
NO Spectators
MAN’S USE OF LEISURE TIME
SECOND - FLIP THE PYRAMID
SO, WHY DO WE WANT TO DO THIS?
Substantive Theory from researchSocial capital bonding is strongly evident and easily
recognizable within friend and family groups at community festivals. This heuristic phenomenological type of bonding spreads to peers with shared similarities outside the friend and family group as levels of festivity increase.
Social capital bridging exists between attendees at community festivals, but primarily as a sense of generic communitas at a subconscious hermeneutic phenomenological level which intensifies as levels of festivity increase.
Event manages possessing both the aspiration and knowledge to program quality festive experience have the ability to accentuate the development of both bonding and bridging social capital at community festivals.
OR, IN SIMPLER TERMS
Increased levels of festivity at events raises the sense of community among attendees
NOW …
get ready to experience what a high level of festivity is really all about
Being a Spectatorhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfdjoovzn2w
Being Physicalhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zfCkR5Fp-A
Being Collaboratively Creativehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_q8L8Tksd8
WANT TO HAVE THE BEST FESTIVALS?
NO Spectators
Oh, the places you go
LET’S RECAP WHAT WE TALKED ABOUT TODAY
You have got to know who you are and what you’re about
Create a basic plan to organize every event Know your stakeholders and create a great
experience for each and every one of them Marketing & promotion requires a plan 7 images is powerful #1 reason events fail is financial reasons Sponsorship is about Benefit-Asset exchange
S-P-F Use a Cost – Revenue financial system Leadership requires visionaries and task
masters Understand what motivates staff and
volunteers
AND OF COURSE …
To build community you need to program activity with higher levels of Festivity
JUST SAY NO TO SPECTATORS
