Note – Well, When I first wrote this back in 2008, it appeared completely plausible that this could indeed occur. Then, however, I began doing research for the Griffin Lake project and realized that the economic model may not alone allow for the creation of this sort of strategy. And yet, I’ve decided to re-post based on the idea that someone may find it of some educational use. Good Times!

I was going through the forums at AcaNetwork [Great network, email me to get in], and a topic piqued my interest. There was/is a discussion centering around whether there could ever be a millionaire artist originating in the church of Christ. Well, my first thought was of course, what about Brandy? Okay, seriously, my thought was, there is always that possibility, and then, my immediate thought led me to research [that's just what we do here].

Well, first a quick lesson in Marketing:

The first thing you’re taught in business school, or even high school marketing classes for that matter is the Marketing Mix; Product, Price, Place & Promotion. Now, for the purposes of this article, we’re going to just assume that all things are equal here, that being, the artist is of magnificent quality, that the overall market can bare another music artist, and that there is indeed an audience for said artist.

I previously brought up the idea of the Marketing Mix because there is an inherent lacking in one area that would prohibit the millionaire artist idea; Place. Place, that is, the proper distribution channels necessary to accommodate demand for the product being offered. Once a clear barrier for any artist outside of the industry model, now not so much. But, once again, for the purposes of this posting, I’ll assume that this could be worked out.

So, you want to be a millionaire Christian acappella music artist? Well, let’s play with some semantic ideals first. Let’s assume:

1. This entire journey is going to take place as a mechanism for one album – We’re not counting cumulative success, nor are we looking at the basis of longevity.
2. The Million Dollars is Gross – I think it gets confusing when we start looking at the US Tax Code, or if we look at post expense net capital functions [see, that already sounds drawn out]
3. We’re looking at a single artist – Groups are great, but a little research will uncover the fact that in gospel music the biggest acts are solo artists who generally hire local nightly talent while touring.

There are so many that assume that the road to a million dollars is going to come by selling a million albums. Not Gonna Happen. The reality is that the road to building a million is going to begin with an immaculately planned strategic ground game, meaning, there is going to have to be, somewhere in your organization, an immensely talented marketing strategist working in the background along with a worldclass support team.

Alright, let’s get to it.

Album Sales

More realistic is thinking plan first. There are fifty states in the continental United states, but we’re only going to work with 40 of them. Any 40, you pick. Now, in each state we’re going to concentrate on selling 1000 albums which is going to give us a total sold of 40,000 albums sold. Now, if we look at the going rate in the church of Christ of $15.00, the, let’s look at the numbers:

40,000 albums sold x $15.00 = $600,000.00

Well, we’re already 60% of the way there. This is all assuming that you hit your maximum amount sold in every state. In every state you would have had to have sold 1000 cd’s.

$1,000,000 – $600,000= $400,000 remaining

Gate Revenue

Now, this is where the real work begins. Remember, we’re looking to build this million with this one album campaign, so, we need to create supplemental income around the album. The most likely route is the touring route. The idea here is to be proactive and plan the concerts yourself, controlling the gate and setting your own revenue model.

For this model, we’ll suppose that, of the 1000 in each state who purchased the album, around 56% end up attending the concert.

1000 x 55.56% = 555 attendees

Now, it doesn’t matter how the 555 get broken down, be it 2, 3, or 100 concerts in each state, but, the price must be set at a constant $15.00 rate. At this rate we’ll be looking at a gate of $8,325 in each state.

555 attendees x $15.00 admission= $8325.00

Quantify this in the 40 states and it adds up rather quickly.

$8325.00 (gate) x 40 states = $330,000

Now, if we’ve been good stewards and haven’t been dipping into the cookie jar, you should have a substantial amount of income from album sales and touring.

$600,000 (album sales) + $330,000 (touring)= $933,000.00 gross

Okay, so now we’re at $933,000 with a somewhat modest base (by general standards) of 40,000 fans. Let’s see where we’re at on the road to millionairedom [new word!]

$1,000,000.00 – $933,000.00 = $67,000.00

Merchandise

With $67,000.00 left to accumulate on the road to millionaire status, merchandise is the most viable route and also the one least sought after in the real market of Christian acappella music. Sure, every artist puts out the $15 cd, and everyone goes out on the road, but, how many actually have extension items [souvenirs] ready for distribution? Looking back at our concert formula with 555 attendees in each state, we need only 66 of those to purchase a souvenir t-shirt at the ever modest rate of $15.00 each.

$15.00 T-shirt cost x 66 purchasers = $990.00

We can expect to generate $990.00 in each state we tour in, but remember, we’re quantifying this by the 40 states we tour in.

$990.00 shirt revenue x 40 = $39,600.00

After we add these numbers up, we are now even closer to achieving our stated goal.

$933,000.00 gross + $39,600 added revenue= $972,600.00

And then we subtract….

$1,000,000.00 – $972,600.00 = $27,400

27,400! This is where it get’s kind of interesting. Why? simply put, if we were to reverse things and follow the current standard of pressing a thousand albums and selling them at the standard rate of $15, and if we did a concert say, every other weekend, covering costs and taking home a tad less than $500 for each show, then this is the number we’d be looking at come years end, and in truth, this is more realistic than the million dollar number, but, since we’re here to build a model, let’s look at the last component.

With 27k and change left to generate, we look to the time tested tradition of the poster. I mean, when I was a kid I had nothing but Four Christian Stars posters in room, but then again, I got them for free and i generally drew on the back of them. But, for most people, the Poster is a great way to commemorate the experience.

At the current industry rate, we’re going to say that 18% of all concert attendees will purchase a poster, or about 100 in each state. If we set the price at a very marginally sound $6.00, then we can expect about $600 at each location. Once again, we’re looking to quantify here, so..

100 sold x $6.00= $600.00 x 40 (states)= $24,000

Current tally

$972,600.00 current gross + $24,000= $996,600.00

And Furthermore, The remaining amount.//

$1,000,000 – $996,600.00= $3,400.00

Money left on the table

Well, we end with $3,400.00 needing to be accumulated. Why haven’t I build a function to gain this money? I think we should leave a little amount that would most likely be gained through appearance fees or some other function not seen here. One would have to suggest that If you came this close to $1 million dollars in a year, that you would probably end up finding a bevy of ways to accumulate other revenues, be it through the sale of ringtones, of through licensing or publishing, or most likely through extended album sales.

Conclusion

So, what have we learned throughout this whole thing? Well, the question of whether it can happen is an astounding yes. The more realistic question is whether it would happen given the fact that it hasn’t been done. The more appropriate question, even still, is whether there will be an artist who will take the time and effort to actually attempt to build a grassroots effort that would bring any legitimate amount of success?

What Do You Think?

Griffin Lake Ministry Framework

I’ve been looking forward to writing on this topic for some time now, but have only now gotten around to actually sitting down and taking the time to organize my thoughts for this particular post.

The Idea of ministry management has become a major sticking point for me as I’ve come to believe that ministry can and should work a whole lot better in the engagement of the members of any particular congregation. Congregations, for the most part, have come to take on the idea that individuality saves the day. However, what I really wanted to do was simply create a working model that could be used as a possible framework for training and development purposes.

So, A Framework?

Well, I continue to feel like the best way to understand anything is to actually learn by doing, and since I couldn’t go out and become minister of an actually congregation, or lead a brotherhood, I figure the next best thing has to be trying to work on building a systematic model of what a brotherhood would look like, with congregations of various backgrounds and standings. I wanted to build something that was both easily understandable, yet at the same time was built with a sense of reality, that a user could imagine being at any particular congregation within the brotherhood.

Schematics

In developing my faux brotherhood, I took into consideration a few things that I felt were necessary elements in building something that was feasibly understandable. Looking for ways to make this whole project manageable in the long run, I set in place some parameters for my brotherhood.

1. The local brotherhood could have no more than 15 congregations – I actually came in under the allocation of 15 congregations (13), leaving two out for future purposes. I chose the number 15 as a limit because I didn’t want the entire process to become so expansive as to limit functionality. In a very large local brotherhood with every congregation having fully developed, active ministries, I just felt that planning, even fake planning, would become a task too major to handle effectively.
2. I would stick to realistic numbers for the brotherhood – You aren’t going to typically find a brotherhood with massive attendance numbers, so I really wanted to stick to the reality of the actual brotherhood numbers. In writing The Music Ministry Guide, I did a lot of research on the brotherhood-at-large and realized that the total brotherhood is not as large as I thought, and so, my planning reflects that.
3. Financial Numbers should reflect actual trends – I built my own scale using financial data that I found at various congregations. Basically, I looked at membership numbers and total giving, and built a simple formula for individual member giving per week and then simply expanded it forward for an entire year.

Now, all of this really is extensive when you understand the actually scope and focus of this research and modeling, and that is simply to develop a single congregation model. I wanted to develop a single congregation for training and development purposes, but when I began building the framework for Griffin Lake church of Christ, I quickly realized that a congregation can’t stand alone, and must therefore be a part of a larger brotherhood. The more I thought about it, the more the reality of an entire brotherhood being built looked feasible.

Now that I have a simple framework to build the rest of my model on, I’ve looked to start planning out the rest of the project. I figure to begin working on the rest of the project immediately.

Now, I’d imagine that I should have actually titled this post, “Grandiose ideals for a sophisticated brotherhood deployment strategy”, but I just want to get my brotherhood information together before I work out training ideals. Anyway, I’ve worked out all of the individual congregation profiles.

Brotherhood Profile

The Ministry Simulation framework is built on a local brotherhood consisting of 13-congregations in a 3 county system. This local three county local brotherhood is referred to as C.A.R, named for Carter, Amsted, and Renault counties respectively. The 13 congregations that make up the CAR are not the only congregations in the area, as there are 5 other congregations within the reach of the brotherhood, though these 5 congregations do not actively participate in activities with the other 13. The 5 remaining congregations, however, are still in fellowship with the brotherhood and attempts are made by various others of the 13 to engage the delinquent congregations.

Congregation Snapshots

Essentially, I’ve sought to develop a rather complex community of congregations

1. Griffin Lake Church of Christ is located at 7534 Mason Avenue, Dalliance River, 77318. Their minister is William Rogers. Phone number at Griffin Lake Church of Christ is 555-732-1982. Currently, Griffin Lake Church of Christ has 110 members, of which, 75 provide giving information in the form of an envelope. They currently have 20 youth at the congregation. Sunday school begins at 9:00:00 AM, morning worship begins at 10:00:00 AM, and evening service is at 6:00:00 PM.
2. Navis Street Church of Christ is located at 1700 Navis Street, Dalliance River, 77315. Their minister is Paul Smith. Phone number at Navis Street Church of Christ is 555-235-5900. Currently, Navis Street Church of Christ has 180 members, of which, 140 provide giving information in the form of an envelope. They currently have 45 youth at the congregation. Sunday school begins at 10:00:00 AM, morning worship begins at 11:00:00 AM, and evening service is at 5:30:00 PM.
3. 19th Ave Church of Christ is located at 5200 Northwest 19th Avenue, Dalliance River, 77310. Their minister is Jerry Williams. Phone number at 19th Ave Church of Christ is 555-727-8300. Currently, 19th Ave Church of Christ has 175 members, of which, 125 provide giving information in the form of an envelope. They currently have 30 youth at the congregation. Sunday school begins at 8:45:00 AM, morning worship begins at 10:00:00 AM, and evening service is at 6:00:00 PM.
4. South Cochoran Church of Christ is located at 5300 Weston Avenue, Cochoran, 76310. Their minister is Randy Phillips. Phone number at South Cochoran Church of Christ is 555-393-2344. Currently, South Cochoran Church of Christ has 420 members, of which, 310 provide giving information in the form of an envelope. They currently have 100 youth at the congregation. Sunday school begins at 9:00:00 AM, morning worship begins at 10:00:00 AM, and evening service is at 5:00:00 PM.
5. West Cochoran Church of Christ is located at 2900 Ashton Carter Road, Cochoran, 76299. Their minister is Terry Solomon. Phone number at West Cochoran Church of Christ is 555-923-1400. Currently, West Cochoran Church of Christ has 230 members, of which, 170 provide giving information in the form of an envelope. They currently have 50 youth at the congregation. Sunday school begins at 9:30:00 AM, morning worship begins at 10:30:00 AM, and evening service is at 6:00:00 PM.
6. Northside Church of Christ is located at 2359 Leeds Boulevard, Jasmine, 74501. Their minister is Andrew Hall. Phone number at Northside Church of Christ is 555-877-9221. Currently, Northside Church of Christ has 523 members, of which, 375 provide giving information in the form of an envelope. They currently have 145 youth at the congregation. Sunday school begins at 10:00:00 AM, morning worship begins at 11:15:00 AM, and evening service is at 6:00:00 PM.
7. Eastside Church of Christ is located at 374 Colonial Park Road, Jasmine, 74510. Their minister is Jack Wilson. Phone number at Eastside Church of Christ is 555-783-1990. Currently, Eastside Church of Christ has 235 members, of which, 175 provide giving information in the form of an envelope. They currently have 65 youth at the congregation. Sunday school begins at 9:00:00 AM, morning worship begins at 10:30:00 AM, and evening service is at 6:00:00 PM.
8. Davis Blvd. Church of Christ is located at 7210 North Davis Blvd., Neeland Ridge, 72345. Their minister is Martin Jones. Phone number at Davis Blvd. Church of Christ is 555-293-2332. Currently, Davis Blvd. Church of Christ has 92 members, of which, 70 provide giving information in the form of an envelope. They currently have 13 youth at the congregation. Sunday school begins at 9:00:00 AM, morning worship begins at 10:00:00 AM, and evening service is at 6:00:00 PM.
9. Neeland Ridge Church of Christ is located at 4400 West Michigan Avenue, Neeland Ridge, 72344. Their minister is Stephen Harper. Phone number at Neeland Ridge Church of Christ is 555-923-1300. Currently, Neeland Ridge Church of Christ has 117 members, of which, 80 provide giving information in the form of an envelope. They currently have 45 youth at the congregation. Sunday school begins at 10:00:00 AM, morning worship begins at 11:00:00 AM, and evening service is at 6:00:00 PM.
10. Spicer Avenue Church of Christ is located at 3450 Spicer Avenue, Morton, 71044. Their minister is Willard Adams. Phone number at Spicer Avenue Church of Christ is 555-769-3455. Currently, Spicer Avenue Church of Christ has 210 members, of which, 150 provide giving information in the form of an envelope. They currently have 45 youth at the congregation. Sunday school begins at 9:30:00 AM, morning worship begins at 10:45:00 AM, and evening service is at 5:00:00 PM.
11. Johnsonville Church of Christ is located at 8950 East Courtview, Johnsonville, 71054. Their minister is Albert Jackson. Phone number at Johnsonville Church of Christ is 555-823-3455. Currently, Johnsonville Church of Christ has 150 members, of which, 108 provide giving information in the form of an envelope. They currently have 35 youth at the congregation. Sunday school begins at 9:30:00 AM, morning worship begins at 10:30:00 AM, and evening service is at 6:00:00 PM.
12. Amber Lake Church of Christ is located at 1950 N.W. 89th Way, Amber Lake, 77298. Their minister is Horatio Carter. Phone number at Amber Lake Church of Christ is 555-922-8954. Currently, Amber Lake Church of Christ has 200 members, of which, 160 provide giving information in the form of an envelope. They currently have 33 youth at the congregation. Sunday school begins at 9:00:00 AM, morning worship begins at 10:00:00 AM, and evening service is at 6:00:00 PM.
13. Walton Edge Church of Christ is located at 6250 Simicourt Lane, Walter Edge, 77290. Their minister is Neal Campbell. Phone number at Walton Edge Church of Christ is 555-455-5687. Currently, Walton Edge Church of Christ has 75 members, of which, 70 provide giving information in the form of an envelope. They currently have 8 youth at the congregation. Sunday school begins at 8:30:00 AM, morning worship begins at 10:00:00 AM, and evening service is at 6:00:00 PM.

The first foray into full-fledged Infographic development.

Okay, I’ve finally got around to putting together the 2nd infographic on the Church of Christ in the United States of America. As I continue with my independent study, I’ll post more graphics and finally, my reports by the end of August.

The Church of Christ In the US

    2001 – 3000 congregations
    1001 – 2000 congregations
    501 – 1000 congregations
    301 – 500 congregations
    201 – 300 congregations
    101 – 200 congregations
    1 – 100 congregations

Finally rounding myself into shape in terms of redeveloping my website, I’ve decided to develop a few infographics. First up, The Church of Christ In the United States. I have an entire set of releases, but for now, I’ll start off simple. Just a little showing of where the Church is prevalent and where it is not.

The Church of Christ In the US

    101 or more congregations
    1 – 100 congregations

I wanted to write a post on the idea of congregational branding. Now, the idea of Branding, even as it is with marketing, a congregation is one that many people object to on the basis of misunderstanding. They look at the word marketing and automatically think in terms of people who are trying to pilfer and sell bills of goods to members; likewise, people look at the word Branding and feel that the product must be inorganic if it can’t sell itself, which is completely understanding. The exact opposite, however, is the case here. In branding, a very strategic subset of marketing, the local congregation has an opportunity to have their message at the forefront of their audiences mind. With the plurality of congregations who basically look the same on the outside, the proper exposure is important for congregations who want to present the truth.

Now, the concept of congregational strategic marketing involves defining the resources that are available to you and building a strong set of practices around those resources that will greatly enhance the perceived profile of your congregation.

There are a few necessities that every congregation should have in building this strategy;

1. Identity system – For the local congregation, an identity system is essential as its components are basically the first things that people will see when looking at your brand. A standard identity system consists of a coordinated letterhead, envelope and business card. In expanding upon this idea, a visitors card, usher name tags, and weekly bulletin shell can all fall in the category of identity system.
2. Brand Logo – In addition to the identity system, the congregation may decide to build for themselves a logo – nothing elaborate, simply a stylized spelling of the congregations name or otherwise.

3. Website – A web address is essential to todays congregation as many people look for congregations on the web. Consider looking into building a web presence, and notice the word presence, for the congregation. There are many open-source website platforms that are free to use and hosting is very reasonable for congregations.

   WordPress, Joomla, Google sites, Blogger – all are good platforms to get started with, and best of all, all are free to use.

4. Dedicated E-Mail system – There was once a time when getting your own hosted e-mail was cost prohibitive for most people. The same can not be said in 2008. With services like dreamhost for hosting, and Google Apps, every congregation can have their own top level domain e-mail address. Which means… No more congregation email going through a Yahoo address. The systems that are in place now are so advanced that they allow you to set up many users instantly. Simply put, all of the leaders at your congregation can have their own e-mail address at your congregations domain.
5. Use the Bulletin as a source of ministering – There is no reason that a bulletin can’t be used as a tool for ministering to lost souls. If designed right, a Sunday morning bulletin can house all of the announcements, as well as a message from the minister and even steps to becoming a member. If there is a monthly bulletin it’s even better.

Identity System

In today’s environment, any great marketing system has to first address the overall identity of the congregation, and what better way than to have an identity system as the cornerstone. Now, an Identity system, at its core, is simply a stationary set that provides identification for your congregation. In most instances an identity system consists of a coordinated letterhead and envelope set and a business card. In more substantial cases, there are various labels and note cards and other collateral pieces that are used. The key, however, is the seemless transition from one piece of stationary to the next. This is achieved through 2 specific factors; The Logo and the color scheme.

The Logo – The logo, while important, is as simple to create as utilizing a stylized font in spelling out your congregations name. The key is consistency in usage, the fact that every time people see your name at your congregation it is always neatly displayed with the same characteristics, be it the same color and font, or any other way that generally sets your logo apart. At the Magnolia Park Church of Christ, there is both a primary logo and a secondary one. The Primary logo consists of a stylized spelling of “The Park”, the congregations name, with the title Magnolia Park Church of Christ directly underneath. This is done with the specific purpose of people associating the both the nickname and the congregation name. The nickname presents a friendly feel and is, in a sense, welcoming when seen and disarming, but at the heart is always the congregations name as to always remind people that The Park is a church. The Primary Logo is used mainly in-house for the members on all publications and there are plans to utilize it more on information that goes out to visitors and others.

The secondary logo is a much simpler logo that is just a styled capitalized M & P that appears on everything from the church bulletin to announcements and visitors cards.

The Color Scheme – It’s important to have a set of colors you work with when designing congregation materials. For one, with a defined color scheme, you’ll be able to always achieve a level of familiarity with those that receive your materials. Also, as an added bonus, you’ll not have to spend a lot of time with colors that may not work well. One of the prime points of creating a color scheme is great color usage. Think about it; on your bulletin board, which bulletins stand out? And which announcements wash out with their bland black and whites. Even if you’re pressed for money, a pre-designed letterhead with spot color will achieve both recognition and consistency in presentation.

Keep this in mind – The more time and effort that is spent on creating a smooth and consistent image for your congregation in print, the more likely it is that people will respond positively when your name is presented to them.

Good Times

I’d been planning on developing a single page dedicated to the Christian Acappella Music Awards for some time, and perhaps now I’ll finally get around to preparing that page as a followup to this particular post. Having recently decided that my main desire for the Christian Acappella Music Awards is to be a program that is self-managed, I’ve been looking for solutions that will allow such a thing to occur; that is to say, all of the pre-planning that is done in the non-CAMA years lends itself to smooth sailing in the year of each CAMA program. So, while I understand that situations arise that are out of the control of the planners and those who execute those plans, to this point, we’ve been blessed to be able to handle chaos pretty well; and not even chaos, but rather the minor occurrence here or there along the way.

For the Christian Acappella Music Awards, the most important aspect of the operation is the marketing of the program. For a show that moves around for every show, the reality is that we have to run as tight a marketing operation as possible to see that the show will be a success from an attendance standpoint. From there, everything else would flow smoothly as long as the numbers were there.

Pricing the Weekend

One of the biggest elements of the marketing process for CAMA is the pricing strategy for all events and subsequent revenue sources [i.e. souvenir booklets, vendor space]. Now, before we can look at the pricing of the 2010 Christian Acappella Music Awards, there are a couple of things that are important to understand in the management of events. First, you never want to have a price set so as to need to reduce it later on after setting it in response to a lack of sales. It is important that we price the show so that we can live with the result from the time tickets go on sale in Mid-August to show night in Late-November.

We ended on a price point of $67.50 for the entire weekend which basically breaks down into the following:

1. The 2010 Christian Acappella Music Awards // $35.50
2. CAMA Friday Night Live // $9.00
3. CAMA Saturday Matinee, presented by Trinity One Studio // $7.00
4. The CAMA Pre-Show // $6.00
5. CAMA Friday Matinee Concert // $5.00
6. CAMA Thursday Kickoff Concert // 5.00

In terms of ticket prices, our plan is always to run campaigns throughout the year that will allow people to purchase tickets at reduced rates right up to the release of the nominees in Late-August, when our ticket price will officially stand at $67.50. In addition to the reduced ticket prices throughout the first half of the year, we also run group sales for both performing artists and attending parties of 10 or more people.

Campaign Management

For 2010, we wanted to try to better understand where sales were coming from. In 2008, we were able to move tickets based on our various ad campaigns that dictated the price of tickets at any given time. For 2010, we wanted to further build upon that strategy by utilizing our ability to marketing to certain segments and distributing discount codes that would allow the customer a reduced rate, while also allowing us to see exactly where our ticket purchases were coming from.

1. Campaign 01 // February – Our kickoff campaign. We asked people to input the code “february” at checkout to receive a discount of 40% on their tickets to the 2010 Christian Acappella Music Awards. This campaign lasted from February 5-28.
2. Campaign 02 // Spring – Our March campaign. After the
3. Campaign 03 // Previous Purchasers – Utilizing our database of past year ticket purchasers, we produced an e-mail campaign that would allow them to purchase their tickets at a flat rate of $40.00 for the month of March.
4. Campaign 04 // Ladies Retreat – The code of “ladies” brought a 35% discount at checkout. We printed 500 postcards with this promotional code for the 2010 Ladies Retreat
5. Campaign 05 // Rogersville Homecoming – The code of “rogersville” brought a 35% discount at checkout. We printed 500 postcards with this promotional code for the 2010 Southside Church of Christ Homecoming in Rogersville
6. Campaign 06 // Summer – Our Summer campaign that we are currently running through the month of August. A discount of 30% on tickets purchased with the code “summer” through the online store. This is the most far-reaching of the all the campaigns as we have advertised this particular code in all of the souvenir booklets for events taking place during the months of June-August.

Early-Year Marketing

Marketing is a huge part of any program, but especially so with a program that moves around to different locations, while only occurring every two years. I have been privileged over the past few years to handle much of the marketing of the event and much of it has involved finding ways to develop a report with people, while striking the correct chord that will allow us to accomplish our set sales goals.

In January, we created a campaign to kickoff our marketing efforts in Los Angeles for an Acappella music workshop. We created postcards, as well as a promotional poster for the occasion. The Los Angeles afforded us a unique opportunity to begin marketing the program to a new audience in a new location. I had done some marketing work in Los Angeles in 2004 at the National Singles Lectureship, but the scope was rather small, and we hadn’t geared the campaign towards them. The promotional materials weren’t printed specifically with LA in mind, but rather as a beginning point in our overall marketing program. At the same time we produced the printed collateral, our early-year website was created and an online store was opened for ticket sales.

Part 1a – Our Internet Marketing Strategy

// Website – nacama.com

A rather large part of our marketing strategy is our internet strategy, consisting of our website, our online store, as well as a small social networking strategy to coincide with the website. The website is a static site that houses the archived information of past recipients, audio and video from select shows, as well as information concerning the 2010 weekend.

Campaign Management // Redux

In March we began planning for both the Ladies Retreat and the Homecoming in Rogersville, Alabama. We produced postcards, as well as supplied the promotional video that was played at all events.

There is a whole lot more to be said about CAMA Marketing, so i’ll probably produce another article, but in the mean time, I hope this provided at least a little insight into the marketing practices of the National Academy of Christian Acappella Music Artists