I think marketing is the biggest area that off-off Broadway could be improved upon. It just isn't done very well at this level, and I can tell you right now, if your entire campaign revolves around Facebook and inviting your friends – then you're probably in some trouble.
That’s not to say you shouldn’t use Facebook. It’s totally free, and it’s a great way to let friends and family know about the show. At the end of the day though, that’s not the primary group you want to be selling tickets to. I can illustrate this better with the following example:
A friend of mine is a comedian. Every time I see him, he gives me a post card for his latest comedy show. They’re really nice postcards. I imagine they cost around $1 each. He’s given me about ten or so. That’s $10 worth of marketing materials. And do you know how many times I’ve seen his show? Once. And it was a free ticket. $10 of marketing material for a zero dollar return. That’s a failed marketing campaign if I ever saw one. Now, my friend is actually a really good comedian. I can’t stop laughing when I’m around him. So why did this fail? He was marketing to the wrong person. As much as I like him, I'm just not interested in a comedy show. It’s just not my thing. If someone doesn’t like comedy shows, don’t spend money trying to convince them otherwise.
The same applies to theater. The reality is most of your friends simply aren’t interested in theater. If they show up it’s because they like you and want to show their support. So while you should use free things like Facebook (and email) to market to your friends, don’t waste money on expensive postcards. They're either going to support you or they're not. So that leaves us with two questions. Who should you market to, and how do you go about finding them?
One of the great things about New York City is that we have a built in community of millions who love theater, and are willing to buy tickets on a regular basis. THAT is who you should market to. Most of these people want to see your show, you just have to let them know about it. Market to people who require minimal effort and spending to convince.
So where do you find these people? Well… where do you think? What sort of publications/blogs to these people read? The NY Times is the obvious answer, but if you're producing an off-off Broadway show you probably don’t have it in your budget to advertise there. And while you may not be able to afford expensive print ads, you have no reason not to invite the critics of those publications to your show. Right now, we have a list of 60+ critics who write/blog/etc about theater in NYC. We’re inviting them all.
Inviting critics is great, but it's an indirect way to contact your audience, and it's always better to reach them directly. So, again, where do find people who are interested in theater? Well… they’re at the theater seeing shows of course! Think about it. If you’re going to give out postcards, wouldn’t it make more sense to hand them out as people exit an off-Broadway show? If you don’t want to be that intrusive, you could just leave some cards in the lobby. You could take it a step further, and be selective about the shows you hand these out at. If you’re producing a musical, it would make more sense to market to people who’ve seen Wicked as opposed to Summer and Smoke. Furthermore, you can contact the ticketing companies, and they will provide you with a large list of people who want to hear about new shows.
What I’ve described in the above paragraph is called “direct marketing,” and it’s one of the best ways to market an off-off Broadway show. There are several good books on the subject, and you should take a look at them if you want to produce.
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