Artists' attitudes to marketing: a cross-cultural perspective

• Although the music industry is dominated by a few global players, the vast majority of musical performances are by nonprofit organisations, self-employed musicians or small and medium enterprises (SMEs). But, while a great deal has been written about the marketing of music—distribution, branding, audience development, etc.—comparatively little is known about the attitudes of musicians themselves to marketing, despite the fact their role as both product and producer is so central to the musical experience.
• The research sets out to gain an understanding of this neglected topic by undertaking a cross-cultural analysis of musicians from two different cultures: it compares the attitudes of artists in a mature, post-industrial economy (UK) with those in a post-communist, emerging democracy (Poland). The research finds that society, culture and the economic environment appear to shape attitudes far less than art itself. Across both cultures the research discovers at best an ambivalence towards marketing, and at worst a general antipathy towards the whole notion of art-as-business.
• The implications of these findings, if replicated across other countries, other musical genres and across the arts as a whole, could be worrying. Historically, the arts have been dominated by nonprofit organisations funded at least in part by public and private subsidies, funds which are being substantially eroded in both mature economies and in developing nations. The challenge for nonprofits and SMEs in the arts, then, is about achieving some sort of engagement with business and marketing, without losing their artistic integrity in the process.

Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Can relationship marketing enhance strategic thinking in the public sector? A study of the perceived relationship between subsidised theatres and their government funders/regulators

This paper reports on the findings of research into the perceived relationships between publicly funded theatres and their key funders/regulators. This is part of a wider study into whether successful publicly funded arts organisations are more likely to apply a relationship marketing approach. Relationship marketing may help to remove a short‐term tactical focus that tends to exist in public sector organisations generally and publicly funded arts organisations particularly. Three UK producing theatres' relationships with the Arts Council and their respective local authorities are analysed and findings suggest that building relationships with this stakeholder type may well produce more strategically focused and successful theatres. Copyright © 2004 Henry Stewart Publications     

Indigenous innovators: the role of web marketing for cultural micro-enterprises

• The Indigenous cultural sector is a dynamic and highly valuable to the Australian economy, returning an estimated $100 million annually. The majority of Indigenous cultural producers are micro-enterprises—businesses consisting of fewer than five employees. Many of these struggle to market their products, some from extremely remote and isolated locations; others with few resources in urban areas.
• This paper initially approaches a conceptual orientation to Web marketing as a potential signifier of innovation and entrepreneurship. The paper draws on previous literature and a current exploratory study of Indigenous Cultural Micro-Enterprises (ICMEs), focussing on two case studies for deeper analysis. The two exemplary cases outlined are Maningrida Arts Centre, and the performing arts organisation Kooemba Jdarra. Specifically, their innovative use of recent technology (multimedia websites) will be assessed to answer the question: What are the attributes of effective ICME Web marketing?

Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Understanding the decision-making processes for arts sponsorship

• Corporate support is a significant revenue stream for non-profit organisations, yet little is known of the actual decision paths companies take when making these decisions and what characterises these paths. This study seeks to develop a greater understanding of decision processes for companies considering sponsorship of the arts. A multiple-case study approach was taken, with participants from arts organisations and paired sponsoring companies, resulting in the finding of three decision paths: one characterised as high-level and intuitive, one as driven at a lower-level, and a third initially instigated by a third party. Analysis of these paths highlights the importance of existing relationships as well as a ‘fit’ between both parties. In addition, the company's orientation towards more commercial or philanthropic goals is found to be a key element determining the path taken, and the role of individual informed intuition is highlighted as crucial in moving decisions forward. This study extends knowledge in sponsorship and corporate philanthropy, into a decision making and arts sponsorship context. The findings also offer a useful perspective for non-profit arts managers as they pitch their event to the business sector.

Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The impact of creativity on performance in non-profits

• This article examines how creative climate affects learning orientation and its relationship to organizational performance. The study also assesses creativity's link with market orientation, entrepreneurial orientation, and organizational flexibility. Past research on creativity climate has explored areas such as the arts, high-tech, information technology, media, and the sciences. The focus of this study is to assess creativity's role in managerial decision-making in the non-profit sector. Sound use of creativity can improve planning, implementation, and control by non-profit organization executives.

Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Creating customer value in the not‐for‐profit sector: a case study of the British Library

• Public sector organisations are being increasingly subjected to both legislative and competitive pressures forcing them to reconsider their relationships with users and customers (Chapman and Cowdell, 1998 ) in order to develop a more overt marketing orientation (defined as focusing on customer needs as the primary drivers of organisational performance (Jobber, 2004 )). The creation of customer value underlies the development of a meaningful marketing orientation, and is a nettle that more public sector and not‐for‐profit organisations will have to grasp. This article considers how a more marketing‐oriented approach was adopted by the British Library in order to clarify and communicate its value proposition to its identified target markets, and in doing so, hopefully achieving a sustainable competitive advantage on an ongoing basis.

Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Engaging consumers in esthetic offerings: conceptualizing and developing a measure for arts engagement

• As the arts face a number of challenges, including changing audience tastes and inconsistent ticket purchasing behavior, there have been calls for innovative approaches to marketing. Experts in the field have suggested that “engaging experiences” in the arts be cultivated to aid in audience development efforts. However, in the literature, little attention has been devoted to defining what encompasses an “engaging experience” in the arts. This research addresses this gap by exploring the concept of “engagement in the arts” and developing a measurement tool, which accesses overall “arts engagement.” It applies emerging theories from the customer engagement and brand experience literatures to conceptualize “arts engagement.” In four studies, an arts engagement scale is tested for its validity, reliability, and its relationship with important outcomes in the consumption experience. Implications are discussed for marketing the arts as well as other consumption contexts that incorporate performance and artistic‐based elements, including service delivery and experiential marketing.

Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Internal competition in a nonprofit museum context: development of a scale

• External competition and marketing have been extensively researched in the for-profit environment and to a lesser extent in the nonprofit environment. However, the concept of competition within a nonprofit organization is indicative of another type of competition, that of ‘internal competition’. Internal competition, operating in the nonprofit's endemic environment of scarce resources, takes place between departments, between individuals, and even within individuals in terms of time and energy spent on differing objectives. Internal competition manifests itself as internal conflicts over not only objectives but also the means for achieving the objectives. This research examines the construct of ‘internal competition’ in the museum portion of the nonprofit sector where marketing is often seen as a ‘necessary but evil’ tool essential for survival. Museum retailing, which has taken on an increasingly vital role in the financial support of museums, offers an opportunity to analyze the nature of internal competition and for developing a scale for measuring internal competition.

Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Rethinking arts marketing in a changing cultural policy context

This paper investigates recent changes in British cultural policy and their implications for arts marketing. It first points out the decisive role of the policy in shaping the environment of the nonprofit arts and argues that arts marketing developed as an organisational strategy within the context of marketisation policy since the 1980s. This is followed by an analysis of the current cultural policy, where ‘social impacts’ of the arts are highly emphasised and state intervention intensifies. Through a case study, it is demonstrated that nonprofit arts organisations are adapting to the new environment by rapidly expanding programmes for educational and social purposes while implicitly resisting top‐down political pressure. The paper raises the question of whether the arts marketing framework can reflect the new reality of arts management. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Creative marketing and the art organisation: what can the artist offer?

The poem ‘My Paintings’, written in a deliberate, uncorrected dyslexic style offers an insight into the mind of a present day avant garde bad boy of British art, Billy Childish. Constantly challenging the art establishment through public demonstrations of distaste against the annual Turner Prize,[Button, V. (1999) ‘The Turner Prize’, Tate Gallery Publishing, London.] Childish and his cohorts launched an alternative, Stuck‐ist, art manifesto,[Alberge, D. (1999) ‘Rebels Get Stuck into the Brit Artists’, The Times, Thursday 26th August, p. 7.] in the belief that it would assist in a shift in public perception of what good art is, as well as influence the creative practice of those artists concerned with more traditional, authentic forms of art. Childish's ex‐girlfriend Tracey Emin, however, has had other ideas. She has revelled in mass media exposure and now dismisses the concept of traditional painting as a valid art from.[Brown, N. (1998) ‘Tracey Emin’, Art Data, UK.] These are two examples of contrasting creative, artistic behaviour. Their creativity has resulted in varying levels of commercial success. By examining the role that creativity plays in determining how the idea for a creative product is first identified, through to its commercial exploitation, there are valuable lessons contained in such a process for both profit‐oriented and nonprofit art organisations alike. Instead of constantly fighting the conflicting philosophies of art for art's sake versus art for business sake, following the market and consumer demand, there is a much more effective method for establishing longer‐term success, which mirrors the creative practice of the artist. The existing literature on arts marketing is examined. A critique of the usefulness of current thinking is presented, with the recommendation that the formal models of marketing offered in arts marketing literatures can only ever hope to offer general advice on marketing. What is called for is a much more in‐depth analysis of how creative entrepreneurial marketers as artists can offer alternative visualisations of more appropriate models of marketing for the industry. This in turn should result in the stimulation of creative research methodologies that can inform both theory and practice within arts marketing in particular, and the wider remit of marketing in general. The use of the metaphor and the examination of published biographies of creative individuals are used to construct a manifesto of marketing artistry. Copyright © 2002 Henry Stewart Publications     

Regional voices talk theatre: audience development for the performing arts

• Audience development is somewhat of a ‘buzz word’ within the Australian performing arts sector at present. However, rather than actually engaging with audiences and with non‐attenders to discover how to best serve the community, most of the performing arts organisations approach audience development from a product‐centred viewpoint.
• In direct contrast to this, the Talking Theatre project (2004–2006) was implemented in regional Queensland and in the Northern Territory in Australia as an audience development initiative focused on the consumer. The project sought to assist performing arts centres (PACs) to better engage with their local communities and to build new audiences for the future. In particular, the research aimed to understand non‐attenders, their reasons for non‐attendance and their reactions to a range of live performances they experienced under study conditions.
• The Talking Theatre project provided the vehicle for introduction, communication and relationship building to occur to assist in attitudinal and behavioural change. The non‐attenders enjoyed their experiences at the PACs and have begun attending performances outside of study conditions. Limited awareness of the performing arts' relevance to their lives combined with a lack of positive peer influence to attend, were the chief deterrents to attendance for the participants in the study.

Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Marketing social missions—adopting social marketing for social entrepreneurship? A conceptual analysis and case study

• In aiming for voluntary behavioral change, social marketing may be particularly attractive for social entrepreneurs, but conversely, they may not have the resources or knowledge for conducting full-blown social marketing campaigns. In response to the growing importance and role of social entrepreneurship in tackling social problems and the lack of research concerning how social marketing may play a role in such organizations, the purpose of this paper is to develop a deeper conceptual understanding of how social marketing may be of use to social entrepreneurial organizations. The research reports on a case analysis of One Drop and its Aqua expo and the utilization of social marketing in pursuit of its goal to achieve water conservation in the Northern Hemisphere. The research shows the adoption of elements of social marketing but not a conscious adoption of social marketing as a strategy.

Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Perceived value of corporate donations: an empirical investigation

• There is current recognition that value is the fundamental basis for all marketing activities. The present research provides an empirical examination of perceptions of value within the voluntary sector and specifically donations made by organisations towards the funding of charitable projects. The impact of a number of charity and project‐related variables on the formation of value and the corresponding effect of value on satisfaction and behavioural variables are examined.
• The results support claims that past experience with and information about a charity as well as information about a specific project are significant determinants of value. However, the impact of these constructs is differential between the two components of value (i.e. get/benefits and give/sacrifices). We confirm the significant effect of value on satisfaction and indicate that satisfaction and benefits derived from a donation have a direct impact on behavioural intention.

Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An investigation into the values dimensions of branding: implications for the charity sector

• Branding is being adopted by charities and written about in academic and practitioner charity literature with increasing frequency. There is also growing concern, however, about the over-commercialistion of the sector and the misappropriation of techniques developed specifically for the commercial environment. Literature supporting the claim that charities are values-based organisations is reviewed and the proposition is made that it is in fact the non-negotiability of charity values that differentiate them from commercial organisations. Given the significance of values in the charity sector, the paper argues that a clearer understanding of how values are conceptualised in branding is necessary in order to establish whether branding is an appropriate and effective tool in the charity context. To achieve this, the paper reviews relevant branding literature focusing in particular upon the delineation of the values dimensions identified in for-profit branding models. To aid further understanding of these values dimensions in the non-profit context and their applicability (or otherwise) to it, the metaphors of brand as ‘mirror’, ‘lamp’ and ‘lens’ are introduced.
• It is argued that in the corporate sector the brand concept has been utilised to ‘mirror’ those values that underpin the needs and desires of consumers. In contrast to the passive mirror, when operationalised as ‘lamp’, it is claimed that the brand aims to influence both the values of the organisation and the values of its target audience. It is postulated that neither of these approaches is appropriate for values-led organisations and that it is only as a metaphorical ‘lens’, projecting the values of the organisation itself that branding offers an applicable and effective model in the charity context.

Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Applying the marketing concept to cultural organisations: an empirical study of the relationship between market orientation and performance

A recent trend in nonprofit organisations is an emphasis on business management and concepts. This paper examines the application of the marketing concept to nonprofit arts organisations through an analysis of the relationship between market orientation and organisational performance. Data were collected from arts organisations in two large Canadian cities, and a structural equations model was developed to test the impact of marketing activities and culture on three performance variables (customer satisfaction, peer reputation and resource attraction). The analysis shows that the model fits the data well and that six hypotheses pertaining to the relationship between market orientation and organisational performance were supported. The study concludes that those organisations that implemented more market‐driven activities into their marketing plans were more likely to develop a market‐oriented internal culture. A market‐oriented culture not only predicted a growth in resources and higher levels of customer satisfaction, but also a growth in reputation among peers. Copyright © 2002 Henry Stewart Publications     

Performative entrepreneurship: identity,behaviour and place in adventure sports Enterprise

This research explores entrepreneurial identity and place in adventure sports within the emerging field of sports entrepreneurship. A growing body of literature has established the broad parameters of sports entrepreneurs mainly within the fitness sector. This study applies a performative entrepreneurship lens to explore the embedded nature of identity, behaviour and place amongst mountain bike (MTB) trainers and guides. This qualitative study is based around interviews with six trainers/guides conducted via online forums as well as participatory observations made on a group ride and of a communal response to the natural environment through trail building. Findings illustrate that unlike the fitness sector where there is a more established market and where entrepreneurs often move from employment to self-employment within the sector, the MTB adventure sports entrepreneur operates in a less formalised market resulting in less formal strategic planning. ‘Place’ is an important factor in the performative nature of enterprise in this study and it is clear that it is through lifestyle entrepreneurship that the individuals are ‘performing’ identity.

     

A conceptual model of public sector corporate entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurship has been conceptualized as a process that can occur in organizations of all sizes and types (Burgelman, Academy of Management Review, 8, 32–47, 1983; Miller, Management Science, 29, 770–791, 1983; Gartner, Academy of Management Review, 10, 696–706, 1985; Kao, Entrepreneurship, creativity and organization, 1989). This paper develops a conceptual model of public sector corporate entrepreneurship. The proposed model is intended to depict the main antecedents that relate to corporate entrepreneurship within the public sector and the impact of corporate entrepreneurship on public sector organizational performance (growth, development and productivity), as well as factors influencing its continuous performance. Following discussion of the model’s contents, the potential value for researchers and those engaging in public sector corporate entrepreneurship are described.     

An intellectual capital perspective of competitive advantage in nonprofit organisations

• Very little systematic research has focused on applying the concept of intellectual capital (IC) within the nonprofit context; particularly in the highly competitive nonprofit environment. Based on a review of the existing literature, this paper firstly contributes to filling this gap by building an argument that IC can be utilised as a competitive tool in nonprofit organisations (NPOs). Secondly, an IC conceptual framework is proposed that explicitly links the attainment of competitive advantage with positive outcomes for NPOs. Finally, the paper discusses how the IC conceptual framework can be effectively utilised to foster competitive advantage in the nonprofit sector.

Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The marketing/creativity interface: a case study of a visual artist

• This paper aims to contribute to an understanding of the marketing/creativity interface in the visual arts at the level of the individual artist. Proceeding, broadly speaking, from a constructivist perspective and using a qualitative case study approach, it examines a visual artist's personal construction of her creative and business work. The analysis highlights the significance of emotional, cognitive, spiritual and physical processes for the artist's positioning, process, and products, as well as her difficulties with promotion and pricing issues. It was seen, following Fillis (2004), that, at the level of an individual artist, her work may be not only product-oriented but self-oriented. It therefore behoves artists and their agents to be able to offer appropriately distinguishing promotional accounts of the artist's artistic identity, process and work based on a deep self-reflexive awareness and understanding by the artist of her own creative practice.

Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.