It can be hard to invite people to your thing. For a lot of different reasons.
I start several months before the Aces Concert each year (it’s tomorrow, May 26 at 7pm – free admission!) letting my students know that the best way for them to get an audience to their concert is to personally invite them.
Here’s how I rank types of promotion by success rate:
- Personal invitation
- Group in-person invitation (stand up in class)
- Group online invitation (Facebook event)
- Online promotions (Facebook page/group instagram)
- Physical posters
- Invitation/announcements by the director
So why are students – why are people! – so reticent to do direct invitations, if they understand these are the most effective?
- They are nervous. It takes guts to talk to people about your thing. Especially, unfortunately, when the arts aren’t necessarily as appreciated as other activities in school.
- They don’t think they deserve it. Maybe they don’t think they’ve earned a big audience, or are afraid of failing in front of a bigger crowd.
- They don’t realize the difference it makes. Performing in front of a big audience is better, but they might not realize how big a difference it makes.
- They don’t want to be told no. An absent audience member who wasn’t invited is disappointing, but an absent audience member who got a personal invitation feels personal. It feels safer to avoid the risk by just not asking people.
There are a lot of reasons why we might not invite people. It takes a lot of work to overcome those reasons, but it’s worth it when you have an audience full of people supporting you.
Invite people to your thing!