as Director of Marketing & Public Relations

 

Enhanced the Convention Attendee Experience and Awareness

 

• Executive producer of Sacred Gold, a concert in Salt Lake City, featuring the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, the a 600-voice men’s chorus comprised of past barbershop gold medal chorus and quartet winners from around the world, plus three International Champion quartets. The finale featured almost 1000 singers and the event drew attendance of 14,000 and was broadcast around the world by Bonneville Broadcasting. Three tracks from the concert are now distributed online via iTunes.
  

 

• Initiated the All-Star Chorus program at the last two midwinter conventions with guest directors Jim Clancy and Dr. Greg Lyne and made many dreams come  true in the process. The most recent event survey showed that 15.9% of attendees indicated their primary reason for attending the convention was to sing in the All-Star chorus.

 

• Organized one of the biggest massed sings in Society history at the 2008 convention in Nashville, with appearances by Nashville Mayor Karl Dean and a representative from the Tennessee Governor’s office. July 3 was declared Barbershop Harmony Day in the State of Tennessee. The media covered the event extensively and a chorus of some 4,000 people.

 

• Secured performances of two past champion quartets, Realtime and Max Q, on the Grand Ole Opry during the international convention.

 

• Secured a opening performance slot for one of our past champion quartets, Max Q at Let Freedom Sing in front of 100,000 attendees in downtown Nashville’;

 

• Secured a 30-second video greeting from music legend Charlie Daniels to greet the attendees of the convention; 

 

• Partnered with the Nashville CVB to get barbershop music playing on every street corner in downtown Nashville during the 2008 convention.

 

• Utilized street team marketing to the playing of barbershop music on hotel speakers and videos on TV monitors, and tent cards promoting our event in downtown restaurants. Over 10,000 logo key cards were also created and distributed to all downtown hotels. The key cards invited those visiting Nashville on business or vacation to attend concerts and contest sessions;

 

• Provided assistance to the show producer of the Association of International Champions to secure a performance by Dick Van Dyke and his quartet the Vantastix on the 2009 AIC annual show. Worked with Merchandising Manager to secure a meet and greet/autograph session with Dick Van Dyke in the Harmony Marketplace to enhance exhibitor and merchandising traffic.

 

• Partnered with Disneyland to host a Barbershopper’s Day at Disneyland on June 30, 2009;

 

Honored People Making Great Contributions to Vocal Music

 

• Approached Bill Gaither to allow the Barbershop Harmony Society to induct him as an honorary member. I later interviewed him. Watch Bill's acceptance presentation by clicking here or on the media players shown below to listen to my interview with him Bill.

• Produced multimedia presentations to honoring incoming members of the Barbershop Harmony Society's Hall of Fame from 2005-2008 These presentations were shown on the Jumbotrons in the arena where the International Conventions were held. Click on the media players shown below to hear the audio beds for just a few of these presentations.

• Partnered with marketing consultant Katie Gillon to induct the Oak Ridge Boys as honorary members of the Barbershop Harmony Society. Scheduled an Oak Ridge Boys photo session at the Society's headquarters building. Photos were published in local and national media;

 

• Partnered with Disneyland to allow the Barbershop Harmony Society to present a Lifetime Achievement Award to the Dapper Dan’s quartet, celebrating 50 years in show business;

 

Increased Non-Dues Revenue/Increased the Reach of Barbershop Harmony

 

• Opened up our contest sessions and shows at our international convention to the public for the first time. Since the summer of 2005, some 16,000 event tickets have been purchased by the public in four cities generating over $300,000 in much-needed non-dues revenue.

 

• Partnered with Naked Voice Records to secure online distribution of barbershop music on iTunes and 50 other major download platforms in 21 countries around the world. Some 3500 tracks are now available, leading to over 200,000 music downloads or audio streams have been purchased, yielding over $15,000 in non-dues revenue in the first 28 months of the project.

• Negotiated an affinity marketing agreement with Hertz to increase member benefits and non-dues revenue;

Introduced Social Networking into the Marketing Mix

 

• Produced and distributed video promos on YouTube and the Society’s website to promote Society events and membership;

• Promoted Society events, merchandising and programs via social networking, including Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin. A Pasadena area Facebook ad promoting the Society’s Midwinter convention was seen online some 550,000 times, brought 180 people to our ticket ordering page and resulted in ticket revenue of $9000. Total ad budget was approximately $350. A Facebook ad is running in Anaheim. So far, the ad has been seen online well over 4 million times, resulting in almost 1400 “click throughs” to the ticket ordering page. The total cost to date is approximately $650. Almost 50 tweets have been distributed to over 400 media and other contacts via Twitter;

 

Membership Program Development & Implementation

 

• Conducted the Society’s first ever national advertising campaign via the USA Today and Canada’s Globe & Mail during the You Can Sing Too campaign. The effort drew 3000 guests/potential singers to chapters across North America

 

• Developed and implemented the 100% Club membership recruitment program

 

• Personally recruited five new members in 2008

 

Helped to Position the Society’s New Headquarters Building As a Downtown Landmark

 

• Saw my dream of having Norman Rockwell’s barbershop quartet adorn the side of our headquarters building in Nashville come true. Thank you to Roger Lewis for (financially) making this dream a reality.

 

Developed Leaders

 

• Facilitated dozens of Leadership Roundtable meetings in 11 states to conduct a gap analysis and to share best practices and tools with dozens of chapters and hundreds of chapter leaders; Click on any of the media players below to hear some feedback from my April 2009 road trip to 21 chapters in five states.

 Improved the Content and Quality of The Harmonizer

 

• Convinced Lorin May to come back to his former position as magazine editor. He telecommuted from his home in Utah until his recent relocation to Nashville. The quality of the publication is at an all-time high.


• Met Mike Rowe (of Dirty Jobs fame) at Freddie King’s funeral and asked him to tell his personal story to Lorin May for The Harmonizer. Many readers have stated that Mike’s story about how barbershop harmony impacted his life is considered to be one of the greatest feature stories our magazine has ever published;

• Updated The Harmonizer Media Kit;

Created Tools for Chapters

 

• Updated the Society's Radio Toolkit with new (audio) radio spots to promote membership and chapter concerts, as well as PSAs to increase organizational awareness, and a community service project called the Singing for Life North American Blood Drive and Donor Recruitment program.

 

• Created the first-ever EPK (electronic press kit) for use by the Society and our chapters.

 

• Created 15/30/60-second (video) PSAs for chapters to use to attract members

 

• Developed the curriculum and presented marketing & strategic planning classes at Harmony University;

 

• Developed two different “You Can Sing Too” themed brochures that chapters can customize with their local contact information.

 

Built Alliances

 

• Hosted a gathering of music association and industry leaders at Barbershop Harmony Society headquarters;

 

• Saw my proposal to create a category for barbershop in the Grammy awards make it all the way to the agenda of a meeting of the NARAS board of governor’s.

 

• Exhibited for the first time at the National Quartet Convention;

 

• Exhibited for the first time at the AARP national convention;

 

• Exhibited for the first time at the Gospel Music Association national convention;

 

Enhanced Web Presence

 

• Re-launched the Society’s content site; Added a Google language translator feature offering content in 35 different languages; Added portals to the world’s most popular business and social networking sites; Added a portal to the Society’s official YouTube channel.

 

• Re-launched the Society’s Singing Valentines group registration and quartet finder website;

 

• Enhanced webcast offering of the international convention; Introduced new user options including delayed viewing, polling, and surveys as well as rotating banner advertising;

Enhanced Webcast

• Enhanced webcast offering of the international convention; Introduced new user options including delayed viewing, polling, and surveys as well as rotating banner advertising;

• Convinced Society leadership to add Debbie Connelly to the 2008 webcast commentator team; A post-convention survey of subscribers revealed that Debbie was the viewer's favorite for 2008;

   

Contributed to and Promoted American Harmony

 

• Worked with independent film producer Aengus James to provide interviews, content and direction for the award-winning documentary film www.americanharmonythemovie.com. Secured and hosted a screening of the film at the 40^th Annual Nashville Film Festival. Promoted the screening of the movie across North America. Secured 100 chapters interested in screening the film in their communities.

 

Public Relations

 

• With the help of marketing consultant, Michelle Schwantes, secured an interview on CNN to be filmed on May 28 to promote the Anaheim Convention and the webcast. The program segment will air on June 7.

 

• Interviewed by Kevin Roose, a reporter/writer for Spin Magazine which led to a six-feature story profiling the current International Champion quartet OC Times in the February issue.

• Following the installation of the Norman Rockwell scrim on our HQ building and with the assistance of former PR manager Michelle Nikolai, convinced the Saturday Evening Post to do a feature story about barbershop music in their magazine. To view the story online, click here.

 

• Worked with author Gary McKechnie to include the barbershop quartet as an American icon in his new book, USA 101, A Guide to America’s Iconic Places, Events and Festivals;

 

• Interviewed by Country Music Hall of Famer Bill Mack on his national show on XM Satellite Radio to promote the international convention.

 

• Produced a media event to celebrate the Barbershop Harmony Society’s 70^th Anniversary and the grand opening of the Harmony Marketplace gift shop. Nashville Mayor Karl Dean was secured as a guest speaker. Nine (radio, TV, print) media outlets covered the event. April 11 was declared Barbershop Harmony Day in Nashville.

Preserved History

 

• Captured a one hour interview with Dick Grapes, baritone of the legendary Buffalo Bills;

 

Current Unfinished Business

 

• Supervised the designed of a brochure for visitors at our HQ. The brochure was never printed due to cuts in funding

 

• Started the process of working with a new media platform (Drum Corps International) to allow people around the world to be able to subscribe to an online video channel and watch videos of some of their favorite barbershop groups on demand.

 

• Secured a quote for the creation of a barbershop application for Apple’s iPhone, allowing users to find chapters and quartets in their area, listen to barbershop, watch video content and eventually have a “members only” portal from their smart phone. Funding was not available for the program.

• Re-named the program and began the process of re-branding the Society’s leadership development offering from the old name, COTS to Leadership Academy;

 

• With the assistance of a firm specializing in this field, developed a plan to evaluate the Society’s assets to help leverage these assets to secure corporate sponsorships. Funding was cut for the program.

 

• Negotiated a contract with Member Centric Solutions to call lapsed members and entice them to renew their membership. Awaiting the capability to sign up new members online from our IT system.

 

• Began the process of re-positioning the Barbershop Harmony Society in the minds of others from an old, dying art form to the ultimate singing experience.