A bunch of branding stories...

Marketing to the 5 senses

For my recent presentation, I made this postcard with some marketing exercises on the back. The focus was on the five senses - since belly dance and any kind of art is a 'sensual' experience. You can Google all kinds of fancy marketing articles about 'experiential marketing to the five senses' to read more academic studies on it. Or, you can putz around with my exercise below, and fall into an EXPERIENTIAL Pinterest rabbit hole.

Applied to artist marketing and branding - let's think about what appeals to our *own* artistic senses first, and then build a brand to effectively tell our artistic story. Really, what do you want people to do with that story you tell? Take a dance class? Buy your art? Encourage the performing arts? Give earth tones another chance?

This process happened FOR REAL when I asked my students what smells they liked, because I was making them bath salts for the holidays. Then it spun off into this whole sensory Pinterest board thing. Since making a board or collage is so visually stimulating, it helped refine my artistic direction. Here's the Sepia Pinterest board: http://pin.it/gF28LoY

​Keep reading below and give it a try! PLEASE share your Pinterest 'brand board' results with me! I love seeing everyone's process unfold.

Sepia Tribal

Some posters I made to demonstrate how the Pinterest board would work. Multiple stimulants for each sense works, nothing is right or wrong when you start out with this.  Just pin stuff you like...and then see the patterns and stories they tell.  How might some of these inspire your art?  Save the ones that apply.

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There was a time I tried to name my creative works with snappy names, but they were either impossible for other people to pronounce/understand, or it sounded like it should be a restaurant or tv show.  Don't do that.  Ask other people (who know less about your plans) before you decide on a name or a brand, or even a font to use for your logo.  Their initial feedback will save you some re-branding efforts.  I dodged a bullet from having a very sci-fi looking logo.  Because...I asked my students, and then they showed logos to their husbands to check for legibility.

I finally got to this Sepia name because I have been into sepia toned everything for the longest time, and all the earthy toned type elements associated with it. Oh, and worn antiques.  Bling that is too shiny hurts my eyes.  No wonder I am into this tribal jewelry...

The ATS® side of me.  Sure, there might be some citrus going on in the background.  But, the minimalist, dark, earthy, and sometimes gritty textures are what get me going.

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The tribal fusion soloist side of me. It's a new thing for me and it feels vulnerable and empowering at once. And, I said I liked gritty...it's in there for some realistic texture. Texture can be anything from the textiles themselves, or the movement of my head, the music, or the layering of movements that usually don't hang out together. (Hence the fusion.) And the costuming is still streamlined/minimalist and dark. I got that dress from some young people catalog. I can't believe it fit, and it is machine washable!

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Amaranth

This is my ATS® troupe.  We are loving our machine washable costuming A LOT this year, especially with all the travel.  The troupe did more of an adjective/celebrity inspiration exercise when we first started.  Our celebrities chosen were Lauren Bacall, Eartha Kitt, Baby from Dirty Dancing, and the Lorax. Also, not surprising that the items in those 5 senses images above...also appeal to this group.  We make all our music, costuming, theme, movement dialect choices on the brand we established.   If we can't see Eartha or Lauren digging the vibe, we don't do it.  

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Wild Oats Cartel

This is a side project with my Amaranth sister, Grace. We are hosting super small workshops, and Technique for Teachers is our first one! We had to identify ourselves with a name somewhat relevant to our own brands and other projects. Her brand is Eastern Fire, symbolizing the warm spices of the Eastern cultures. I'm Sepia Tribal, all brown and earthy. We are in this grain/flower troupe together.

​The goal of a cartel (in a legal sense) is a combination of political forces for common action. We want tiny workshops in cool venues so people can get the most out of their learning. I thought Grace was nuts for wanting to host workshops, but I secretly wanted to host small ones. So we're sowing our wild oats and we'll see if it gets out of our system. We almost chose Wild Oats Project - which was a book about some woman's affairs. Google your potential names just to check, folks! Oh yeah, and oats are a cereal grain like amaranth is. It's kinda weird, but that is us.

Fun Secret: The above picture was taken 2 buildings down from my office job, so no one could see what I was doing on my lunch break. Carrie took a nice picture of me next to the dumpster, no one would ever know...