How does broadway advertise

She's prodded on by a sly Serino Coyne producer, who reacts to Paula Glogau's praise with, "So you didn't like her very much. My husband works in this area. A TV spot made on a shoestring budget that true Broadway fans still talk about almost 30 years later. I grew up in New York and New Jersey in the days of just three major networks, so Broadway commercials were a constant presence.

On daytime TV after school, the Sweeney Todd spot leapt out—even, or maybe especially , to this high school student—for its combination of humor, creepiness and go-to-hell gore and gusto.

Somehow it just seemed cool. It sent my friends and me first to the record store for the album to hear just what the hell this show was, and then to the show on twofers , where, of course, it clobbered us in every way the spot had promised, and more. It's still my No. Get daily coverage on the latest ad campaigns and insights from the creative community delivered straight to your inbox.

Live Entertainment. The theater community picks its Serino Coyne faves. Porgy and Bess Jawan M. Serino Coyne. Erik Piepenburg is the features editor at Serino Coyne, a live entertainment marketing and advertising agency. More from Erik Piepenburg. Related Stories. Editor's Picks. Art of the Album. Webinars Get valuable information about marketing from our awesome webinars.

See Upcoming. Submit your article. Pin It on Pinterest. It's still a special occasion in a world where there are no more special occasions. How much to spend on advertising The rule of thumb for what a Broadway show should spend each week on advertising is about 10 percent of a production's weekly potential gross.

Coyne suggested the billboard approach, he says, because "Wicked" is "such a powerful title and image. Serino Coyne, a joint venture with business partner Matthew Serino, was born in the late s, when the advertising of Broadway shows was much more conservative. It was only earlier in the same decade that TV ads first became a reality — when Bob Fosse created a TV spot for "Pippin" and extended the life of the show by several years.

A new way of selling shows had arrived. So she has to be careful about where she places ads — print, TV, radio, billboards. For example, she explains, a show in a 1,seat theater with eight performances a week can only sell 8, tickets for that week's performances, regardless of demand.

As many as possible. But there are only 1, seats in the theater. Shows become brands Still, certain shows, buoyed by their success and creative ads, have become brands. These shows have a national awareness, according to Coyne, so that when you say the title of a show — for example "Wicked" — certain attributes immediately click in.

However, research has shown that as people are bombarded with so much advertising nowadays, little of this traditional approach sticks. In fact, when the League of American Theatres and Producers now called The Broadway League made a big move to establish Broadway as a brand with their Live Broadway campaign, many Broadway marketers resisted the approach, preferring to concentrate on selling each show as an individual product.

It has become clear that the marketing pitch needs to be immediate and compelling -- if you don't grab them at the "elevator pitch" opportunity, the chances are that you won't grab them at all.

And Broadway marketing agencies have found that newer forms of marketing for Broadway shows, such as direct mail and online marketing, have been highly successful in helping to sell tickets -- which is, after all, what matters most. Direct mail is an excellent marketing tool because it brings a Broadway show's campaign right to the ticket buyer's mailbox. Attractive ad pieces with the show's artwork and logo make a pitch to the consumer directly, and provide all the information they need to buy tickets right away.

Extra incentive is often added in the form of a special discount code that can be used to get a discount price on tickets. Sometimes a special mailer with a CD containing a few songs from a Broadway musical will be sent out via direct mail to generate additional interest.

Broadway advertisers are armed with extensive data about who the Broadway audience is, and direct mail allows them to focus their limited budget dollars on the people most likely to actually buy Broadway show tickets. Once very popular, print advertising has lost favor ever since the internet took hold. More and more money is now spent on online advertising, which is thought to be a better way of reaching the Broadway ticket buying consumer. Web marketing is an exciting new frontier in Broadway advertising because there are so many ways to reach the consumer, whether it's through e-mail blasts that land directly in the person's inbox, or an advertisement embedded in an article that she is reading on the web.

The e-mails, which are sent out by a variety of companies that have gathered extensive mailing lists full of people interested in Broadway discounts, are usually used as a way of distributing discount codes.

The consumer then uses the discount codes to purchase her Broadway tickets at a discounted price. Print advertising is hardly obsolete, though. Advertising a Broadway show in the New York Times is still considered absolutely vital because that newspaper holds so much influence over well-to-do, upwardly mobile, and artsy New Yorkers and tri-staters who are the most dependable Broadway ticket buyers.

Tourists may account for a large part of the Broadway box office, but it is the locals who can be classed as "regular" theatergoers, and these are also the people who are more likely to see plays and under-the-radar shows.

At the beginning of any Broadway show campaign, the marketing agencies put special effort into advertising to these people. An especially creative new specialty.