I've noticed a marked improvement in my marketing skills throughout the last year. The more I keep doing it, the better I get. I'm sure I can hear a collective "duh" from all of you reading this and, somewhere, Malcom Gladwell's ears are burning. I know it sounds silly, but it always catches me by surprise when I feel like I've actually gotten good at something. This weird little "Huh. When did that happen?" kind of thing.

This week, I finished up my final publicity report for Little Martyrs and I was incredibly pleased with the results:

Our Media Call was the highest attended for any Evolution Theatre production;

We had two television appearances, one of which was an interview;

We had two radio spots - one an interview and one a review;

We had FIVE print preview articles, including the cover of the Ottawa Citizen's Arts & Life section with two large photos and online video (and the Citizen never seems to do theatre previews anymore);

There were a total of 7 reviews of the production, which ranged from good to great for the production.

And this does not include such things as at least 3 weeks on PosterLoop, various community listings, posters and flyers, ect. All in all, I am incredibly proud of the work I did and consider this campaign to be a success!

That said, if you build it, they... might not always come.

Though I don't have any final numbers yet, attendance for the production was not what I would consider to be particularly good. It was, ok at best.

So that makes me wonder, what more could I have done? What kept people away? Was it the themes of the play? The venue? The cost of tickets? The time of year? The fact that is was new work in a town that is always seeking a "sure thing" (and don't tell me that new work does well in town because of Fringe of Undercurrents - both of those festivals come with a certain pedigree)?

What?

Please feel free to discuss in the comment section below.