The Arts Council of Ireland

Winning your audience back.

Ambition

The Covid 19 pandemic dealt a cruel blow to the arts sector. Live performance venues up and down the county were the first to close and amongst the last to re-open.

As the booster programme got underway and the country started to re-open the Arts Council’s ambition was to encourage the public, particularly arts lovers and regular attendees, to re-engage with their local arts organisations and book a ticket.

As venues cautiously started to reopen there was some uncertainty amongst this group. Reduced capacity and added precautions contributed to the confusion.

Inspiration

The Arts Council funds a wide range of art organisations from theatre and dance to the visual arts, music and outdoor spectacle so the campaign had to be inclusive. We were targeting a cohort of people who love the arts and pride themselves on their knowledge of it – arts aficionados. This was to be our jumping off point. While the Covid 19 pandemic was disrupting the arts now, we discovered that great artists had survived worse in the past. For example, Shakespeare’s Globe theatre was closed a number of times by the plague. Not only that, during these periods of adversity, he managed to write some of his greatest plays, such as Romeo and Juliet.

“the campaign generated enthusiasm, happiness”

Attention

Using examples of great artists who overcame adversity to produce great art such as Samuel Beckett, the Diceman and Shakespeare our “Art flourishes in spite of adversity” campaign burst into life across the national newspapers of Ireland. Targeting arts lovers who were from all walks of life and all parts of the country we partnered with Newsbrands Ireland to leverage the power of the press titles and their reach in both print and online display and video. This partnership also achieve exceptional media value.We were also able to make use of RTE radio thanks to their Supporting the Arts scheme. Each execution featured a different artist.

So, did we get the attention of the arts aficionados? And more importantly did they book a ticket for an arts event? Absolutely and definitely. Together with Newsbrands Ireland we commissioned RAM to research the campaign. They found that the campaign generated Enthusiasm, Happiness and Excitement about the arts but more importantly it found that 43% of aficionados booked or attended an arts event as direct result of the campaign. Furthermore 63% of them said they were more likely to attend an arts event this year as a direct result of the campaign.

This campaign ran on press, digital display, online video, radio and TV. We also produced a “What’s on this summer” guide with The Irish Independent.