Growing your group and audiences

About the event:

Running your group is a rewarding but challenging role. Our regular meetups are a chance for you to meet and share learning and ideas with other Wales groups facing similar challenges, explore specific issues affecting leisure-time music making in Wales and consider how we can work collaboratively to find solutions and advocate for the sector. 

Miranda Glen, Wales manager, will be leading this session.

In this meetup we'll:

About the event:

Running your group is a rewarding but challenging role. Our regular meetups are a chance for you to meet and share learning and ideas with other Scotland groups facing similar challenges, explore specific issues affecting leisure-time music making in Scotland and consider how we can work collaboratively to find solutions and advocate for the sector. 

Alison Reeves, Scotland manager, will be leading this session.

In this meetup we'll:

Has your group ever considered commissioning a new piece of music?

Are you a composer that has always wanted to write for community music groups?

Maybe you have even thought about applying to our flagship project, Adopt a Music Creator?

Commissioning a new piece of music can be a daunting process for an amateur music group, and it can be equally daunting for a music creator to approach a group to discuss collaborating.

Making Music are thrilled to be partnering with one of our corporate members, Rayburn Tours, to host an online webinar, aimed at music leaders who wish to take that brilliant, brave and rewarding step into the world of touring! 

Whether it be performing in sacred cathedrals or embracing local culture, concert tours present choirs, bands and orchestras with fantastic opportunities to develop and perform to international audiences. But for many volunteer committee members the practical and logistical aspects of organising the experience may seem overwhelming and confusing!

Often we think of income ‘only’ in terms of funding, subscriptions or ticket sales. There definitely is a lot to delve into on those three topics, but is there more we could be exploring? Are we thinking about the whole financial picture?

70% of Making Music performing groups and 58% of volunteer promoters break even every year; but 15% and 23% respectively regularly make a loss. So finances are always a topic groups are thinking about, to maintain that balancing act of breaking even, yet remaining accessible to participants and audiences in their community.

The first of our marketing events in 2025 will discuss how social media has become a key component in many organisation’s marketing strategy. But how does it differ from ‘traditional’ marketing, what should you use it for, and how can you manage your time when there are so many different platforms available? 

In this session, we’ll look at how a social media strategy can help you define your goals in line with your overall marketing plans, manage your time more effectively, and create content to target the people you most want to engage. 

Audience development and participant recruitment is a top priority for many groups, but often we get stuck using the same messaging, marketing and engagement ideas. How do you reach people in your community who are not part of your normal audience and participant demographic? And what do you need to do when someone new comes through the door so they want to keep coming back?