Case Study: The Neo-Futurists

Sector: Nonprofit / Arts   Project: Workshops and Consulting
Sarah Best Strategy taught a series of workshops on branding, social media advertising, and social media planning to an experimental theater ensemble, borrowing the unique collaborative approach that the group uses in their art-making. The ensemble’s Instagram following doubled in the span of two months.

The Challenge

The Neo-Futurists are an experimental Chicago theater company responsible for one of the city’s longest-running late-night shows—an energetic, rowdy, immediate experience in which ensemble members attempt to perform 30 short personal and topical plays in 60 minutes. The company reached out to Sarah Best Strategy to help them more effectively use social media platforms. Goals included:
  • Developing brand awareness and tapping into audience loyalty
  • Elevating the brand and presenting it in a more consistent way
  • Learning how social media can complement fundraising efforts and ticket sales
  • Creating effective social media content and marketing strategies that remain authentic to the ensemble’s high-energy, offbeat, collaborative aesthetic
  • Strategizing about how to reach the company’s younger audiences through social media (their natural mode of communication)

The Idea
We wanted ensemble members to learn to use social media in way that reflected their collaborative, fast-paced, creative process. By utilizing their ability to create funny, pointed, brief artworks, they could simultaneously meet their marketing goals. Our workshops borrowed elements from the ensemble’s process, including improvisational warm-ups and interactive, collaborative exercises. In our workshop on great social media content, we emphasized the generation of Instagram posts that
  • had a clear point of focus
  • featured clever videos or photos from the company’s archive
  • focused on the ensemble members, as audiences relate strongly to the individuals within the group and their personal, approachable storytelling
  • visually reflected the company’s appealing DIY, handmade aesthetic

The Results

  • The company’s Instagram following doubled in the two months following the workshop. This was achieved organically, without an ad spend.
  • The content generated can easily be cross-posted to Facebook and Twitter, extending the company’s social media reach.

The company's Instagram following doubled in the two months following our workshop

We can help you reach your social media goals.