How to make yourself a marketing toolkit

1.

A brief description about your project

Write a brief description about your project that can be used across various marketing collateral such as media releases, on your website and social media posts. This should be your ‘elevator pitch’ about your project. A quick snapshot that sums it up in a concise way. Include all the key aspects, such as the project name, the artist(s) involved, key dates, and where they can find further information such as your website or social media pages.

Be sure that your description includes any required acknowledgements of project partners, funding bodies, etc, such as, ‘This project has been supported by…’

It is helpful to create a number of versions of your description in varying word lengths to suit a range of potential uses. For example, a short (1 line), medium (2-3 sentences/1 paragraph) and long description (multiple paragraphs).

2.

Logos and acknowledgements

If your project involves support from partners and/or funding organisations, you may be required to include their logos in promotional material. If this is the case, we suggest creating an image file that combines all of the logos in a single image block. You can then insert this single image file into your promotional material. This saves time trying to format a range of logos in varying shapes and sizes each time you create new material!

When you do this, we suggest creating a horizontal version and a vertical version set of logos. It’s best to save it as a .PNG with a transparent background. That way you’ll have an image logo block to suit most design requirements.

3.

Imagery (one of your strongest assets!)

We’ve all heard the line ‘images speak a thousand words’, and it’s true! One of the strongest tools available for any kind of marketing or publicity is dynamic, clear and strong imagery. This can be photographs, illustrations, or video. Anything visual.

We encourage you to think outside the box. If your project hasn’t been completed yet, include ‘behind the scenes’ photos or sketches that you’re working on. People love to understand the artistic process, as well as seeing the final work! These kinds of images personalise your project.

At the beginning, we suggest having at least two great images that represent your project. It’s good to pick ones which can work in different aspect ratios e.g. square, landscape or portrait. As your project progresses, keep adding images to your image library. It’s best to use a sharing platform for images such as Google Drive or Dropbox.

4.

Cheat-sheet for interviews / public speaking

It is important to ensure that all public mentions of your project are consistent and professional. In order to ensure consistency, we suggest that you nominate a spokesperson/s who will be the public face of the project. Ensure that only the allocated spokesperson/s speak on the project’s behalf.

In order to assist these representatives, we suggest you create a cheat-sheet document based on the brief description and acknowledgement documents you’ve already created (see the first two points of this resource).

5.

Where should this Marketing Toolkit live?

We suggest you create a Marketing Toolkit folder within your project documentation. Once you have created the relevant documents, make sure all key members on your project team have a copy of them so that you’re all on the same page!