organizations have to adopt social media technologies for involving customers in communicating with the
company (Tvannatter, 2009). For example, the Performing Art Center of Wenatchee considers access to
information in the social web of high importance to keep a particular audience informed and engaged. The
performing art center director at Wenatchee says, “The need to bring your art to where groups naturally
gather and socialize is acknowledged in performing art organizations across the country. Social media
technologies are one way to address this need on an individualized level” (PAC, n.d.).
Devine emphasizes that there is a strong tendency amongst patrons of Performing Arts to be involved in
interaction with other art lovers through social media. They actively participate in blogs, sharing information,
commenting, and downloading. Art lovers practice recording concerts and uploading the videos on YouTube
and other content sharing websites. They are inclined to creating customized Web profiles on MySpace and
Facebook, joining fan groups pages of their favorite concert venues and contribute to the board discussions
expressing both pros and cons regarding a topic. All of these have become possible due to Web 2.0
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technologies empowering both art creators and art lovers to meet each other on the social media platforms for
mutually beneficial and co-creative interaction (Devine, 2009).
Growing usage of Internet platforms to not only purchase tickets but also to socialize with other patrons
is a trigger for PACs to utilize social media tool for marketing. The reasons to visit the web sites vary from
taking information about location, parking, a concert schedule, ticket pricing to engaging into conversation
with other patrons and joining a fan community (Trites, 2010). According to Global Faces and
Networked Places a Nielsen report, social media has overtaken email usage (The Nielson Company, 2009)
This data shows the changing pattern of using Internet. It becomes more information based and community
oriented where word of mouth is the critical venue for update about events and ticket sales. Social media
tools allow customers of the PACs to interact and exchange the information regarding their concert
experiences with other Web users (Tvannattar, 2009).
Technological progress creates new platforms for building communication with patrons. While
development of long-term relationships was limited by mail opportunities to reach people, e.g. sending
booklets, brochures, letters, etc, or organizing live events to get together visitors, Internet technologies
widened this opportunities to develop relationships with the target audience (Tvannattar, 2009).
The usage of Internet is growing incredibly fast. However, in comparison to other sectors, PACs were
slow to adopt new Internet technologies to communicate with the audience. Until 1999, there was almost
zero of Internet usage by PACs. It was even hard to find a webpage of a non-profit with basic information.
Even though some organizations maintained a webpage, it was limited by information depicting offline
activity and totally ignored marketing. The majority of non-profits still use traditional channels to
communicate with their customers (Bree, 2009). The research conducted by Bayer Center for Nonprofit
Management at Robert Morris University in 2008 revealed that the most common communication channels
used by more than 60% of all the non-profits are e-mailing, website, phone, print, fax, voice mail, and
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conference call. As opposed to traditional business communication channels new generation social media
channels are currently not in common use in non-profits (Foster, 2008).
This tendency has gradually been changing. Growing number of PACs become aware of necessity of
Internet platforms. Nowadays PACs realize that they become a subject of the new paradigm of the Internet
economy (Boeder, 2002).
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