2020 Marketing for Performers
MARKETING:
We want to help you get bums in seats! Fringe marketing is different and the same from marketing other types of shows. The Fringe will market the festival as a whole, but the marketing of your individual show is up to you. We don't want to pick favorites, we love all our shows!
Reserve some money in your budget for marketing your show. Ideas include:
There are plenty of low cost marketing options. We also highly suggest figuring out which niche audiences might be attracted to your show, and then find facebook groups, or organizations, or publications that are part of that niche group and let them directly know about your show. We also know you are a highly creative group, so you will think of some amazing cool ideas for marketing.
Reserve some money in your budget for marketing your show. Ideas include:
- Placing an ad in the printed Fringe Guide
- Place an ad on the Fringe website
- Print flyers and posters to distribute yourself, or you can hire a distribution company
- Buy ads on social media
There are plenty of low cost marketing options. We also highly suggest figuring out which niche audiences might be attracted to your show, and then find facebook groups, or organizations, or publications that are part of that niche group and let them directly know about your show. We also know you are a highly creative group, so you will think of some amazing cool ideas for marketing.
Logos for your publicity
Feel free to use our logo in your publicity. Keep the colors and dimensions as close as you can. Below are a few different types of files of the logo. If you need something else, or have a question, please email us.
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Pittsburgh Fringe Program Guide Listing:
Every registration includes a 40 word blurb and a little picture in the program guide. Many tickets can be sold from just your blurb and picture. So don't just rush to get something in. Pick the right 40 words (or less) to entice your audience. If your show is a new work, use relatable references like shows or authors they already know that you are similar to. You may have already written this once. Just cut and paste it from online. You may have already put your picture up, but put the exact one you want in this application, so we are all on the same page.
For the Final Program Brochure:
For the Final Program Brochure:
- 40 word description
- 3x3 in. 300 dpi image (this does not guarantee the final image will be this size, this is to make sure we have a enough resolution, and in case we can use it elsewhere in advertising)
- Age restrictions and other applicable information (if changed from your original application)
- Venue you are in
- Dates and Times of your performances
- Run time for your show
Make sure you've paid your registration fee before sending us brochure information! Here is a quick link to that form: REGISTER FOR THE FRINGE
Placing an ad in the printed Fringe Guide (also called program or brochure):
Program Advertisements:
These are not required. This is additional advertising you may choose to buy, but only if you want. To help our performers, we offer very large discounts, and additional discounts for reserving pages early. (We've kept prices the same low prices as last year!)
These are not required. This is additional advertising you may choose to buy, but only if you want. To help our performers, we offer very large discounts, and additional discounts for reserving pages early. (We've kept prices the same low prices as last year!)
- Early Bird Fringer Rate: Confirm and Pay by Jan. 15th, and design due by Feb. 10th.
- Regular Fringer Rate: Confirm and Pay by Feb. 2nd, and design due by Feb. 14th. (We may need to limit number of ads sold after the first deadline for space constraints. So try to buy your advert as soon as possible. There is no guarantee after February 2nd that we'll have room for you. We'll of course go first come first serve, and will refund anyone that we can't fit.)
- Full page, 5x8 in. - $120 Early Bird Fringer Rate; $240 Fringer Rate (Orig. $480 - Represents a 60% discount on the ⅛ page size)
- ½ Page, 5x4 in. - $90 Early Bird Fringer Rate; $180 Fringer Rate (Orig. $360 - Represents a 40% discount on the ⅛ page size)
- ¼ Page, 2.5x4 in. -$60 Early Bird Fringer Rate; $120 Fringer Rate (Orig. $240 - Represents a 20% discount on the ⅛ page size)
- ¼ Page, 5x2 in. - $60 Early Bird Fringer Rate; $120 Fringer Rate (Orig. $240 - Represents a 20% discount on the ⅛ page size)
- ⅛ Page, 2.5x2 in. - $40 Early Bird Fringer Rate; $75 Fringer Rate (Orig. $150 - Represents a 0% discount on the ⅛ page size)
First Buy Your Ad:
Buy your advert through this button. You do NOT need the designed advertisement immediately. There is another form for when you are ready for that. (see next button down)
Design Your Ad and then Upload:
Once your ad is done and ready to go, just go here and upload it for us.
Need Help?
We are experimenting with a new service to help performers who are not very good at creating ads to help them make the ads. We are using students, so the fees are very low. But they are students, so this isn't professional quality. But if it is better than what you can do, maybe this will help. In this form you'll fill out all the text you want in the advertisement and any images you want. You can even upload a sketch or idea you have, but don't have the skills to carry it out. We do need to charge a bit for this extra service (prices at the bottom of the form). TIP: You should seek out and find design friends to get design work free or awesome friend prices. :)
Place an Ad on the Website:
Hopefully we'll be able to offer this option this year. Stay tuned.
Print Posters and/or Flyers:
Some shows do well by flyering, and putting up posters of their shows. Hand to hand personal flyering can be very effective in a Fringe environment. And this year Friday will also be the big Art Gallery crawl on Friday night called "Unblurred." We think this will be a particularly effective night for flyering, since everyone on the streets is already an art lover of sorts. Always check locally, and online for the best prices. We are fans of Fireball Printing. We love their poster special (and use them ourselves), and we aren't getting any kickback for saying this. (We should probably figure out how to do that right?) Anyways, check out this poster special link:
fireballprinting.com/products/poster-special/
fireballprinting.com/products/poster-special/
Poster and Flyer Distribution:
We use Pin Up Couriers ourselves. All distribution is a bit pricey, but if you're from out of town and need help, this is a good option. Even if you have them do it, save some posters for Penn Ave, your venue, and other places you know your audience frequents. It should be a combination of using a distributor and some of your own efforts (plus putting it up starts conversations about your show!). (Again, we get no kickbacks for giving you their information.)
www.pinupcouriers.com/
www.pinupcouriers.com/
PROMOTION AND PROGRAM INFORMATION
We want to help you market your show. While the marketing of the show is ultimately your responsibility, we do a number things festival wide to help you market your show. But we need you to help us. We need information for the website, brochure, and press releases about your show. We have detailed the information that we need below. If you have any questions, or need help creating an image - please let us know.
Image Policy:
For the Website:Don't forget to put your pictures and clean up your website information. What you see on the website on your picture page will eventually be what the audience sees.
For the Final Program Brochure Guide:
Image Policy:
- All published materials must be PG rated.
- Unless your image is just your logo, please avoid putting text on your images. Some social media outlets reject images with text, as they prefer the text in the posts so robots can read the text to the blind. So it is best to avoid text on your images.
For the Website:Don't forget to put your pictures and clean up your website information. What you see on the website on your picture page will eventually be what the audience sees.
For the Final Program Brochure Guide:
- 60 word description
- 3x3 in. 300 dpi image (this does not guarantee the final image will be this size)
- Age restrictions and other applicable information (if changed from your original application)
- See above for the button link. Or here: https://form.jotform.com/90307954163155
PR - Press Information
For Press Releases and other PR:
We will do general PR for the festival, including a press release to local press. Please go through our PR guy to make sure we are not bombarding the large papers. Because of this we have had great coverage in the past. He covers the large papers (Trib, Post-Gazette, and City Paper), and some radio. But there are plenty of smaller neighborhood papers and university papers that we welcome you to reach out to!
We need the following for our PR efforts:
We will do general PR for the festival, including a press release to local press. Please go through our PR guy to make sure we are not bombarding the large papers. Because of this we have had great coverage in the past. He covers the large papers (Trib, Post-Gazette, and City Paper), and some radio. But there are plenty of smaller neighborhood papers and university papers that we welcome you to reach out to!
We need the following for our PR efforts:
- 60 word description (use brochure show description here to be consistent).
- Photo Requirements: .jpg format files that are approximately 10mb file size when open. That’s roughly 200 dpi+ at 9 inches x 12 inches for the image dimensions.
- URL and any social media tags or addresses
- NOTE: The media selects the images they want to use. If you give us amazing images, you are much more likely to see your image in a paper.
Social Media and other Publicity
While you are ultimately responsible for marketing your show, we do as much total festival publicity as we can. The better the material you give us, the more coverage you will get. Great pictures we can use on Instagram? We will be more likely to post. A great high resolution picture can also get you print and online media in major news channels. Don't scrimp on great photographs!
Make sure to tell us any weird or awesome things about your show. You can also give us links for us to put on our website, or anything else that could be useful for us to use for publicity. It may be an interesting tidbit that we can use for a tweet, or a link to a video marketing your show. Or you just made a new Instagram account, and you now want us to link to it. Feel free to give us as much information as possible so we can do our best to publicise the whole festival (and maybe with your show's image!).
For Social media:
We try to get every show some sort of Social Media mention without bombarding folks with too much. Please share with us your posts, and feel free to give us any social media images you want. Otherwise, we'll work with brochure images, and PR images. If your images aren't very good we may not use them at all. So the better your images, the better we can help.
Use the button before if you want to notify us of any Social Media campaigns, or ideas you have for social media posts we can do for you. Only use this if you have new ideas, or want to alert us to something that night be shareable.
Make sure to tell us any weird or awesome things about your show. You can also give us links for us to put on our website, or anything else that could be useful for us to use for publicity. It may be an interesting tidbit that we can use for a tweet, or a link to a video marketing your show. Or you just made a new Instagram account, and you now want us to link to it. Feel free to give us as much information as possible so we can do our best to publicise the whole festival (and maybe with your show's image!).
For Social media:
We try to get every show some sort of Social Media mention without bombarding folks with too much. Please share with us your posts, and feel free to give us any social media images you want. Otherwise, we'll work with brochure images, and PR images. If your images aren't very good we may not use them at all. So the better your images, the better we can help.
Use the button before if you want to notify us of any Social Media campaigns, or ideas you have for social media posts we can do for you. Only use this if you have new ideas, or want to alert us to something that night be shareable.
Brochure Proof Link
We'll be emailing you proofs as we get them done. There will be instructions in the proof on how to give us changes.
Sub-groups or Niche Groups
Subgroups - Are there certain groups or organizations that are likely to enjoy your show? List your ideas, and let us know. We can work together to try to market to corresponding groups.
Idea: Is your show about surviving cancer? Then you might want to contact a cancer survivor network. There are a lot of different social groups organized locally for all sorts of different things. Show about knitting? Let's find knitting organizations to tell about your show. Look on Meetup.com or facebook for these corresponding groups. But let us know too, in case we know of something specific!
Idea: Is your show about surviving cancer? Then you might want to contact a cancer survivor network. There are a lot of different social groups organized locally for all sorts of different things. Show about knitting? Let's find knitting organizations to tell about your show. Look on Meetup.com or facebook for these corresponding groups. But let us know too, in case we know of something specific!
Other things...
Rehearsal Schedule
Work this out with your venue when you apply, or closer to the time. At least get a commitment about how long your rehearsal time will be. Most fringe venues can only give you 1.5 hours total for get in, get out, and rehearsal. Usually fringe shows just get used to the space, and do a cue to cue. If you need true rehearsal space, talk to us. We might have some ideas.
Tech Questions
Work out your tech questions with your venue before you accept. You may even want specifics in your venue deal. As your show may change closer to the festival, make sure to revisit this information with your venue also closer to the time.
