Tag Archives: marketing

8 Instagram Post Ideas For Your Dance Studio

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Is your dance studio or company on Instagram?  Scared to take the leap? (dance pun intended) Here’s a few tips on how to get started and what to post.

Don’t worry about posting daily – in fact, if you post too many times a day, you may annoy your followers.  It seems like the sweet spot is once a day to a few times a week.  For my studio, I end up posting on average 3-4 times a week unless I’m running a contest or it’s a big event for the studio (recital or competition weekend, for example).

Ok, so now you’ve made an Instagram account… what do you post?

8 Instagram posts ideas for your dance studio or company

1. Your dancers:  The most obvious is to post images and videos of your students dancing!  Be sure to mix it up – some of the cute babies in class mixed in with your best students along with some great action shots from performances.

2. Behind the scenes:  Making costumes?  Folding programs?  Hanging the backdrop for the show?  My students and parents love to see the “behind the scenes” photos.

  

3. Class videos:  This is a great way to expose potential students to the different class types.  Post a short clip of your newest class offering to show students what that class might be like.

4. Hold a contest or photo challenge:  I like to hold contests during school breaks because it gives the kids something to do and keeps them thinking about dance.  Our most recent one was “Spring Break Photo Contest” and dancers had to post a photo of themselves dancing on Spring Break.  We got a lot of fun pictures back that we shared in-studio and on Facebook.  Make sure to use a hashtag for your contest (#ABCstudio).

  • Leap / Jump Contest – followers have to post their best leap or jump
  • Favorite Costume – post a photo of their favorite costume
  • First Year Dancing – any photos from their first year of dancing
  • Dance Everywhere – post a photo of them dancing in an unusual location

5. Dance education:  Post a photo of a famous dancer and have your followers guess who it is.  Share photos of famous ballets and dance companies.

6. Motivation & inspirational quotes:  I like to post these every so often.  I find a lot of them on Pinterest.  Instagram Etiquette Tip: If you borrow someone’s quote, play nice and credit them.

7.  Hashtags:  (Or should I say #hashtags)  Hashtags are a fun way to make your post accessible to more people and are good for when you’re looking for an idea to post something.  My favorite dance-related hashtags are:

  • #TutuTuesday – anything ballet!
  • #TiltTuesday – just what it sounds like
  • #TBT or #FBF – (Throwback Thursday & Flashback Friday) – post an older photo from months or years ago.  These posts usually get the most “likes” on our studio Instagram.
  • Make up your own! What about #musicmonday and post some songs from the upcoming performance?  Or #flexibilityfridays and showcase some tips on how to get more flexible.  Check out this great idea from Maria’s Movers on creating a hashtag for your performances.  Some more hashtag ideas from Dance Spirit.

8. Integrate your posts with Facebook and Twitter:  Instagram makes it easy to connect your account to your Twitter and Facebook accounts and you can share the same posts on all three social media sites at one time.

Have fun!

Further Reading: http://schoolempower.com/blog/posts/20…

Follow The Dance Buzz on Instagram!

Do you use Instagram?  What tips can you share about posting photos and videos? What are your favorite photos to see?  What gets the most likes?

Marketing for New Season

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I can't believe that our studio's opening day is less than four weeks away!  Our last summer intensive starts this Monday and then we have a break before starting up in September.

This is a list of what I do to market my studio, including the failed ad attempts – hopefully it will help someone!

FREE – The best advertising is free in my opinion!

  • Internet Presence:  Make sure your studio shows up when you search "dance near ZIP CODE" on Google! Update or add your studio to Google Places, Bing, Yahoo, etc.  Check out this post for a way to see if your business is visible.
  • Facebook:  If you don't have a Facebook page yet, get one!  Post on your studio's facebook wall at least once a week if not multiple times.  For extra credit, mix up your posts between photos, videos and regular "Classes start soon – not too late to register!"
  • Twitter:  If you have a large Twitter following, that may be the way to go.
  • Email:  Keep an email list of everyone who has ever asked for information for classes.  Send email blasts once a month or so.
  • Demo Classes: Offer free demonstration classes and see if you can get them listed in local community calendars or websites.

Continued after the jump…
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SOBuzz: Online Dance Directories

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As a business owner, your online presence is essential.  In addition to your business showing up in Google searches, here are a few online directories that will make your studio even more accessible.  Most of these sites are free or have a free option. 

GENERIC
http://www.superpages.com/ – the online Yellow Pages
http://theusaexplorer.com/ – a huge directory listing businesses by town and city
http://local.yahoo.com/ – city guide
http://phones.whitepages.com/ – the online White Pages
http://citysearch.com/ – city guide
http://www.yellowusa.com/

DANCE-SPECIFIC
http://dancestudiosusa.com/ – dance directory
http://www.getyourkidsoffthecouch.com/ – collection of kids activities
http://www.dancedirectory.com/ – ballroom dance directory
http://www.dancedirectoryplus.com/

You might also want to do some research and see if your city or town has its own online directory.  My city has an online kid’s directory that lists dance studios, gymnastics facilities, karate, etc.  Also check your local newspaper, radio and TV station websites for business listings. If you offer birthday parties, there might be an online directory for kids parties – make sure your studio is on the list!

Also, many of these are specific to the United States – for other countries, you might need to do a bit of googling to find directories specific to your country.

Anything others you can think of?

Studio Owner Buzz: Facebook Marketing Tips

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Four Fantastic and Free marketing ideas using your Facebook fan page to hold a contest!

1) Picture Match
Make a status on your fan page say something like:

“One Week Only! Change your profile picture to match ours and be entered to win a $20 gift certificate to the studio. One entry per day, per family.”

Within minutes you will see your logo EVERYWHERE!

2) Instant Testimonials. Ask your fans to leave a comment about “why they joined” or “their favorite memory of last year was” to get entered in for a drawing.

Your fan page will be covered with fabulous testimonials!

3) Recruit Fans!
Another type of contest results in your page getting more fans. Your fans must try to refer new people and the new fans must post a comment and say who their friend was that linked them.

At the end of the time period, the person with the most referrals wins the prize.

4) Fan Photos.
Ask your fans to upload a photo of their child to your fan page and have all of their families and friends “like” the page & their child’s photo. The student with the most likes wins.

Prize Ideas: a free week of classes, or free month, free costume, free dance bag or simply a dollar amount gift certificate. Don’t have the money to give away – give “parent of the month” or “student of the month” or post the winning comment / picture somewhere prominent in the studio or year-end program.

——-Find Us on Facebook!————