I’m very glad you commented, because this proves the point of my article. Advertising, at least alone, largely doesn’t work. In this case, you didn’t pay to take out an ad (so at least you used guerilla techniques!), but fliers and e-mail/Facebook invites were largely ineffective. Which means you need to expand your concept of marketing and how to engage an audience.

Yes, it can take time to build a following. But many groups take years and still don’t build their fan base.

It’s also possible to immediately generate a large interest. But to do this takes creative marketing efforts and a compelling, “purple” product.

We found it a real struggle. We sent emails, created Facebook invitations, left flyers in a bunch of likely places, and in the end we had around 60 people attend the concert… which isn’t bad, but it’s hard to know what makes the difference between 60 and 100, or 100 and 200.

There’s obviously more we could have done (for example, we could have tried to make a story of the fact that we had a premiere on the program), but this whole area still feels very much like a black art.

Part of me says that it just takes time to build an audience, to develop a relationship with a group of people that means they’re interested in your music and want to hear it – but I’d definitely be interested to hear your thoughts on this, and whether there are any short cuts.