Making Social Media Work for Arts Nonprofits

Earlier this month, Theatre Bay Area released The Tangled Web: Social Media in the Arts, a survey of 207 international arts organizations on their use of social media. Reviewing the report on his blog New Beans, Clayton Lord makes the following, logical-to-me assessment:

What I find fascinating in these results (and let’s be honest, they’re really top-line, and don’t (by design) go into much depth on the reasoning behind the decisions made by these organizations) is the various spectrums of depth vs. breadth depending on the organization.

Some organizations attempt to juggle up to 9 social networks at any given time, while others focus on one or two. And what seems to be clear from the data is that depth is actually the stronger indicator of success in social media.

These results also reiterate to me the role of social media – it is simply not a direct line to further income. It’s not really a way to directly sell tickets. It’s a way to engage, to have conversations, to make people remember your organization. Over time, at least in theory, that repeat recognition of the company outside of those moments when the patron is not directly buying a ticket leads to more relative value being placed on your organization when the time comes to buy.