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Welcome to our April Monthly Update.
This month's Client Feature focuses on The Architectural League of New
York which is marking its 125th anniversary this year. Read on to find
out how e-mail is boosting the celebrations...
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Client Feature: The Architectural League of New York
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Gregory Wessner, Special Projects Manager for The Architectural League NY
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PMail Client Since: 2005
Starting e-list size: 2,500
Current e-list size: 3,200
The Architectural League of New York
was founded in 1881 by a group of young architects as a forum for new
work and ideas in contemporary architecture. Celebrating its 125th
anniversary, the League continues to fulfill this mission today,
organizing lectures, exhibitions and other programs on contemporary
architecture and urbanism. Governed by a board of prominent
architects, artists and designers (with a full-time staff of five), the
League serves as an important forum for the discussion of new work and
ideas in architecture.
As Special Projects Manager (a position
created, in part, in anticipation of the League's 125th anniversary),
Gregory Wessner is responsible for integrating the League's history
into the anniversary year programming. He also oversees any projects
that fall outside of regular ongoing programming such as the expansion
of the League's digital programming.
Currently in his third
"tour-of-duty", Gregory first worked with the League from 1992 - 1996
as the Admin Assistant / Development Associate. He returned in
1998 for 3 years as Development Director then again in 2004 as Special
Projects Manager. In between, Gregory has worked in development
and administration at several museums and organizations including the
Parrish Art Museum, White Columns, and the National Academy of
Design. He is also in the Ph.D. program in architectural history
at the Graduate Center, City University of New York.
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Q & A with Gregory Wessner, Special Projects Manager
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To begin, Gregory, give us a sense of how you market / promote the League's mission and programming.
I
imagine like most small organizations, the League should have a formal
marketing strategy but doesn't. Our programs and events are
promoted consistently but somewhat informally through regular postal
mailings (limited to members, press, and vips, a list of probably about
1,500-1,750), listings in professional and mainstream periodicals, and
on relevant Web sites.
We started @theLeague, our weekly
e-mail newsletter, in the late 1990s with a listserv firm that only did
text e-mails. In 2005, we switched over to PatronMail because the
obvious advances in technology that allowed for images (but which our
original listserv provider wouldn't accommodate). Since then, the
weekly e-mails have become a major element in our promotional strategy.
The
main purpose of our e-newsletters is to announce and/or remind our
audience about upcoming lectures and programs; links within the e-mail
allow recipients to reserve directly from the e-mail. The list is
open to anyone who wants to join so while our members receive
announcements and program calendars periodically through postal mail,
e-mail is the only way many people know about our programs. Our
e-list now has about 3,200 people (compared to our membership base
which is about 1,000).
You're pretty active about getting
people to sign-up for your e-list. What methods are you using to build
your list and why is it so important to the League to grow these
numbers?
From the beginning, we've always been pretty
dedicated about promoting the e-mail sign-ups. People can sign-up
through our Web site; we have a sign-up sheet at every lecture (and
announce at the beginning of the lecture that it's available); and
there's a space on our new membership forms and renewals.
Additionally,
once a year we do a regular postal mailing to our complete list
(members, vips etc.) encouraging them to sign-up. There's also a
listing in our print newsletter (published 2-3 times a year) asking
people to submit their e-mail addresses. Our main point in
attracting new sign-ups is to stress that more and more of our programs
are being announced only via e-mail, which has proved to be a strong
motivation to get people to sign-up.
The League is celebrating a big anniversary this year. Tell us how e-mail is fitting into this.
The
League is celebrating its 125th anniversary this year and the weekly
e-mail is figuring prominently in marking the occasion. Beginning
the week of January 18 (the actual day of the League's founding) and
continuing throughout 2006, the featured article of each week's e-mail
highlights an important moment in the League's history (the header
image changes each week to illustrate the history feature).
The
newsletters have been a really important part of our anniversary
marketing strategy because while the League is well known in the
U.S. architecture community, very few people are aware of the League's
rich and significant history and the important role it has played as a
forum for the evolution of American architecture. Each e-mail has
a teaser excerpted from a news source or archival document, selected to
be as provocative as possible, with a link back to a special "From the
Archives" section on our Web site that has a complete description and a
full-size image.
You've launched some other interesting programs using e-mail exclusively. Tell us about your Group Tours and the great results you've seen.
As
well as promoting upcoming programs and the 125th anniversary, we
realized that we could use our e-mail list to organize smaller, more
informal programs that would have been prohibitive before because of
printing and postage costs. For instance, we started a new series
a few months ago called Group Tour, which is open only to League members.
About
once a month, we choose an architecturally-relevant exhibition or film
and arrange for a private tour or screening, followed by drinks at a
nearby bar. We limit the group size to between 20 and 30 people
to allow for conversation; we charge only the basic cost of
museum/gallery admission and one drink. The event is announced
only via e-mail.
We've organized two events so far and they've been hugely successful. The
first one was a film screening with a limit of 30 people and literally
10 minutes after the e-mail was delivered the event was full and there
were another 30 or 40 people on the waiting list!
Furthermore, about 30%-40% of the attendees joined or renewed a lapsed membership just to participate, bringing in about $1000. In
the big picture that's a relatively small number, but it's income we
wouldn't have had otherwise. Additionally, the program lets us add
another membership benefit to the list of benefits for existing members. AND, we regularly let our members know that the only way the Group Tour programs are announced is via e-mail, further emphasizing the importance of being on the list.
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National Arts Marketing Project Conference
April 29 - May 2, 2006 ** Los Angeles, California
Millennium Biltmore Hotel
_________________________________________________________
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_________________________________________________________
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Please watch for our next Monthly Update, coming May 23, 2006.
Our mailing address is: 850 Seventh Avenue, New York, NY 10019
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