Publicity Report

Webmaster Report - John Lamb

The website continues to chug along on its own with only occasional maintenance needed. I have coordinated some work with Allan Kugel that I hope will result in the Minstrel Gram being moved over to Constant Contact sometime in the month of April. I also assisted in getting the entry for the upcoming guitar workshop and house concert into shape and with a couple of minor issues in Festival registration. I hope to have more time in April to pursue allowing membership sign-ups through Constant Contact as well. Thanks to Robin Schaffer for work she has done for the Festival section of the website and to Allan and Lori for their continued support. As always, send those questions, suggestions and comments to webmaster@folkproject.org.

Facebook Report - Pam Robinson

The Folk Project’s Facebook page has 533 "likes". Our Posts to the Wall are reaching on average over 125 Facebook users.

Trivia 1: Of our Facebook users, 50% have listed their gender as Female and 47% have listed their gender as male.

Trivia 2: If all the people who "liked" our page got all their friends on Facebook to "like" our page, we would have over 200,000 "likes". That's a lot of eyeballs seeing our calendar of events.

Publicity Report - Nancy Kelner, Chairman

Karen Justin has agreed to take over the task of emailing information to our major outlets, starting in April. Welcome to the committee, Karen!

We have had some more publicity since my last report - March 16 Minstrel was in the 3/15 Morristown Green; March 16 Minstrel was in the 3/13 Daily Record; March 16 Minstrel was in Princeton On Line’s March email newsletter; March 30 Minstrel was in the 3/25 Star-Ledger online. This last listing did not make it clear that the concert was being sponsored by the Folk Project, nor that the name of the venue was The Minstrel; I emailed the reporter and asked if the article could be revised; it was; he put in the “Folk Project” part but left out the “Minstrel” part. Decided to let it go. All four April Minstrel concerts were in the 3/30/12 Cranford Chronicle with one small error – there’s no opener on April 20. Will ask our contact to revise the listing if they print it again this month.

Reporter Bill Nutt of the Daily Record emailed me; he wants to do a story about the April 20 Minstrel. Will keep an eye out for it.

I offered to proofread Doug Heacock’s Swingin’ Tern flyers (both the 2- and 4-month versions). Doug also suggested sending Swingin’ Tern flyers to college students; I told him to give us accurate names and addresses and we’ll send them.

Asked Bucks County Folk Song Society to change Minstrel Coffeehouse to The Minstrel on their website. No reply to my first email. Emailed webmaster again today and also asked if they would add Swingin’ Tern as a venue. Will let you know what happens. (There is a link to the Folk Project website.)

NJ Monthly did indeed print the April 20 Minstrel in its April issue. They got Craig Bickhardt’s first name wrong, though (Greg instead of Craig). I let our contact there know.

After they told me specifically they wanted smaller flyers, which I have been creating, printing and then cutting on our paper cutter for many months, the Morris County Tourism Bureau decided they want full-size Minstrel and Swingin’ Tern flyers; starting in April, I will send these. This will certainly make the task easier.

Went to a concert at the Rahway Library on March 26th; was pleasantly surprised when the librarian acknowledged the Folk Project as the organization where she got many of their upcoming performers; she mentioned that Folk Project flyers were available and that a Folk Project member was in audience (me) who could answer questions. Some flyers and cards were taken.

A couple of errors (again) on ACMA calendar for March and April, ranging from the wrong day to the wrong show. Emailed Lynn Siebert and asked if they could be fixed and they were.