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- My name's Bonnie with the American Composers Forum.
And yet this is another discussion
about finding one's identity.
I've been at the Composers Forum for two years,
which coincides with the Arts Xchange grant opportunity,
which was wonderful synchronicity
for our organization.
Now, the opera has their large diva,
and when people think about composers,
what do you think they see?
[laughs]
We have the dead white guy.
But as it turns out, as much as we love our classics,
we're not a conservation group.
We're really more about the living composer,
and our constituents really look more like this.
This is Maria Schneider. She is a composer from New York.
And she's also an example of what we're trying to do
around engagement.
Maria was just recently here in St. Paul
for a composer conversation that we co-hosted
with Minnesota Public Radio and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra.
And just to give you a little context
of the situation of the American Composers Forum,
one of our distinct challenges
is that we're a service organization,
which is a wonderful thing.
The artist is at the core of what we do--
so fellowships, grants, contests, residencies,
education programs.
But that also means that we're not a performance group
and we're not a presenter.
So we're a few tiers back away
from what maybe many of you think of in terms of audience,
and that's a fun challenge, I like to think of it.
Our product is really more about the process
than it is about the presentation.
One of the other long-standing challenges
for the organization-- we're 35 years old.
We're a national organization
serving composers all over the country.
We're based in St. Paul.
Many of our communications over the course of that time
has been composer-specific,
which is exactly what our mission is set to do.
But our mission is also set to connect to community,
so many of our communications vehicles
really focused on what the composer needed
in terms of opportunities
and learning about other composers and the process.
And the listener--the curious listener, I always like to say--
or the donor or the patron was really kind of
more of an afterthought in those communications.
I like to say some of the communications
were a little composery geeked out
and maybe not necessarily welcoming enough
for people who just love music
and are interested in the process.
Another aspect of the organization--
and many of you have already gone through all of this
with--everyone, raise their hands--with the new website.
But our traditional marketing thinking
was very print-based.
And our development was very traditional
in terms of looking at those traditional sources of funding,
which, as we know, are continually shrinking.
So the "after."
After two years of what we've done with Arts Xchange
and our branding process,
also synched up with our new strategic plan,
is expanding the idea of audience.
We're trying to figure out active ways
to engage the listener, engage the audience
with this proposition of being a service organization.
We've put the words "engagement" and "discovery" kind of embedded
not just in our positioning language
but in the philosophy of what we do
instead of looking at ourselves internally,
but how do we kind of split that,
kind of crack that egg open and expose that a little bit more?
We also have a new and collaborative team.
As I mentioned, I've been there two years.
My colleague Jessica started at the same time,
so we had some fresh blood, some fresh ideas,
and ready to kind of turn the tide in a new direction.
This is the communication vehicles that we entered into.
Print-based: expensive, timely to produce,
outdated by the time they go out.
A logo that was created, I think, sometime in the '90s:
a little bit more classic and traditional.
And this is our new look,
after a process with GDB of Minneapolis
to talk to constituents and focus groups, composers,
fellow partnering arts organizations,
and listeners to figure out,
"How do we want to expand this and to engage new audiences?"
So we have a screen shot of our new website,
and we have, to the right, kind of an e-newsletter
that drives people back to the website.
But there's also something in the e-newsletter
that's particular for the listener, the patron, the donor
as well as for the artists themselves.
The tagline and kind of the undercurrent,
it doesn't necessarily
present itself in text all the time,
but it's "the heart of musical discovery,"
is what the focus and the core of our brand is.
If I had another slide, I'd also kind of show you
some other tactical things that we've done.
We created an advancement plan, which covers individual giving--
which is a huge focus for us now,
as it is for many of you--
planned giving grants, and also our communications devices.
We created a new prospect management system
with our small little shop of eTapestry.
Who uses eTap?
Nobod--what?
There's no eTapestry people in the room?
Okay, well, that's what we're still working with.
It's a great online product,
but it's been bought by Blackbaud,
so we'll see where that's going now.
But we have--we've done a lot more work
in customizing and personalizing our communications
to donors and specific patrons,
and that's really garnered a lot of wonderful results.
In the last two years,
we've seen 20% increase in our individual giving,
and we're really proud of that,
and we're working harder again at it this year.
So looking ahead, I think we're just--
we're thinking of different ways that we can engage individuals.
And some of the ways that we're creatively doing that
is doing interesting partnerships
where we're bringing composers--
composers that are already in town
for the presentation of their work,
providing kind of--
you know, taking the band away for a second
and learning more about that artist.
We do a lot of home house parties,
particularly ones with pianos,
where we have composers able to interact
with donors and individuals.
And whenever we have a composer working in a setting,
like a school, that provides another opportunity
for donors and individuals
to not just commission, perhaps, that project
and get it firsthand
but to be able to come in and get a firsthand look
and get some energy from those students and those individuals.
So thank you.