Tea and Posting in Las Vegas

Shamefully, I have not yet had the opportunity of mentioning what an awesome time I had last month on my trip as one of the three Community Manager of the Year award finalists at the Oracle Social Media Summit in 'Fabulous' Las Vegas. I can honestly say that the Wynn was the fanciest hotel I have personally blighted in my entire life, and spent an entire five minutes trying to wrench open the curtains in my palatial suite before working out that they were remote-controlled. (I'll stick the managing the communities, I think.)

When I wasn't attempting to destroy expensive furnishings, I finally had the pleasure of meeting my fellow finalists in person, the lovely Stacey Acevero and Jeff Esposito, as well as hearing from a wide range of speakers about their use of social media. I also had the fortune to be part of a panel on best Facebook practices, in which I spoke about the anatomy of a successful post.

Me with my fellow finalists Stacey and Jeff. I love this photo for two reasons: 1) I clearly can't smile appropriately, and 2) I have managed to photobomb myself via Twitter.

One recurrent theme in the panel discussions was the increasing dominance of the 'pay to play' model regarding paid advertising on social media, which as a representative of the arts gave me pause for thought. After all, it's not like it's even an option for many arts organizations, and even those who can afford to make room in their budgets for sponsored ads and promoted social content aren't even close to working with the kind of numbers their private sector counterparts can muster.

However, I suppose this just reinforces the importance of capitalizing on the kind of inherently interesting content we're blessed with in the arts. For us, the content is the brand, rather than a tactically-developed strategy with which to promote the brand. The big names work very, very hard to come up with the kind of appealing content that our fellow organizations generate simply by being. It's the music, the artworks, the dance footage, the photography that depicts the artistic process: it's just what we do. It can never compensate for our lack of financial muscle—which will always be an undeniable fact of life in the marketing departments of non-profits—but I think that it's still a cheering message in the face of a social media playing-field that could be becoming increasingly uneven.

In a nutshell: we may not always have the means to pay for our reach, but ultimately, earning it organically is what the arts have always done; and we'll continue to do it. We just might have to work a little harder, that's all.