Non-Profit Arts Organization Marketing Case Study

The Nashville Film Festival has been around since 1969. Although it is a year round organization that works with the film industry in Nashville to bring more movies in the area and helps keep the arts in public education it is not very well known. Every year the festival comes and goes and attracts big name actors such as Michael Clark Duncan, Kris Kristopherson, Ashley Judd, Robert Pattinson and Nicole Kidman to name a few but the Nashville locals are nowhere to be found in the audience. The festival is open to the public and there are also memberships to the non-profit organization that garner year round benefits.

The Challenge: Increase overall festival income:

· Ticket sales

· Attendance

· Brand recognition

In 2011 Julie McReynolds Consulting was asked to help with the marketing plan to achieve the goals. Working with the Executive Director and PR team JMC created several grassroots efforts that centered around social media.

1. Utilizing the relationships with the local collegiate professors a college representative program was created. These individuals utilized their social networks to share content about the festival.

2. JMC worked with the box office manager to create a sense of urgency for shows that weren’t selling out or shows where a celebrity was attending.

Results:

Increase in attendance by almost 15%

Increase in sales by almost 10%