Generate Excitement, Revenue During Live Streamed Concerts With Contests Using Texts

Engaging your fans in a market as saturated as the live streaming one has become is no small challenge. Thankfully, things like contests have emerged to become a valuable tool for both capturing the interest of viewers, and bringing in some much-needed revenue.

Guest post by Jack Kelly of Adva Mobile

Reading another excellent article on Hypebot about the Music Community dealing with the pandemic and how to stay engaged with Fans through streamed Online Concerts, the topic of INTERACTION was resonant. Key to a successful streamed online concert is the need to generate energy to keep the fan engaged, and this can be a challenge compared to the feedback Artists receive at live shows. Contests have been a popular experience during live concerts to engage audiences and capture Fan data (for later remarketing) and Contests are also an excellent tool to engage and energize viewing Fans during streamed online Concerts.

Fans understand that a streamed concert does not compare to the live experience, however they still yearn for something close to that emotion. Running a Contest is a communication between you and your Fans that bridges the experiences between live and online concerts with energy and excitement. There are number of ways to run a concert online, including services from the leading text marketing platforms. Using mobile phone and text technologies to deliver a Contest for Fans viewing your streamed online Concert is a terrific tool because the Fans always have their phones with them.  It grows your Fan base and collects contact information, and Fans are energized by their participation in an INTERACTIVE experience during the concert.

One way to make this exciting and interactive is to set up a Contest to run during online Shows. When using text to communicate with Fans, the key is to set up the Contest so it ends in the middle of your live concert stream. During the first part of the show, Artists announce that there’s a Contest going on, and Fans can win cool merch from the band by texting in to join the Contest. To enter the Contest, the Fan texts ENTER to your own text number. They are sent a text telling them they have been entered into the Contest. What makes live streamed concerts so perfect for text based Contests is that you can put your Artist Text number (provided by your Text provider) up on the screen where everyone can see it, and keep it up long enough for Fans to Text in.

You set the time for the end of the Contest to occur before the concert ends. When that happens, all the Fans that entered the Contest get a text with a link to their results. Fans that didn’t win get a “thank you message” (and you can reward them with a digital gift) and Fans that won get instruction on how to claim their prize.

Meanwhile, your Fan Database has increased as you have captured their contact information, and you can reach out to them with additional campaigns.

Contests are popular with Fans, and Artists can use Contests to add excitement to streamed Online Shows, energize Fans, and build their Fan Database. 

Here’s an idea generated from another excellent Hypebot article which promotes the concept that even with a small Fan base, playing a streamed concert can be rewarding, and that one key to success is promotion. And here is where Contest AND Texting your Fans can help. By promoting the Contest as part of the show, you’ll motivate more Fans to attend the Concert. After your first few shows you will have increased your Fan base and can alert your growing Fan base by sending them texts notifying them of your next streamed concert, Contests and Text become a rewarding circle of engage à reward à build Fan base à notify.

The pandemic has made the Artist – Fan relationship more challenging, however resourceful Artists are discovering new ways to find new Fans and engage them. There are technologies out there, including streamed online concerts, Contests, and Text Communications that can be used and combined in innovative ways to approach the excitement of a live concert experience.