Customer: Cookham Festival

Project: Cookham Festival social media campaign

Putting social at the heart of a popular community festival

The organisers of the biennial two-week Cookham Festival are very different from our clients, inasmuch as they sell tickets for dance, theatre, comedy and music shows — not exactly IT. But their marketing challenges are familiar. Like many of our clients, they talk to a specific audience. And like some of our clients, they were a little unsure about where to begin with social media marketing. So when the marketing manager for the festival asked if we would be willing to donate our time to help them with their Twitter and Facebook efforts, we were happy to help.

Months before the festival began we created a calendar to promote the various acts at the festival, focusing on key milestones such as the box-office opening and the countdown to the festival itself. We also supported other volunteers in their efforts to interact and engage with the public on Twitter and Facebook about the festival. Throughout, we kept in touch with the volunteers selling tickets, and adjusted our strategy to promote those events that still had tickets left.

In the end, the festival pulled in more than 15,000 visitors, and finished with the now-famous ‘Rock the Moor’ weekend event featuring, among others, Hot Chip and Rick Astley. It was fantastic fun to be involved in such a vibrant local event, and given the growth of their Twitter and Facebook pages — 56% and 59% respectively — we have high hopes that the 2017 festival will be even bigger and better.

The thanks must really go to you and your Team. We have for the first time, with your team’s considerable assistance, managed to harness the power of social media, which is something that we have never been able to do before. And it can only get bigger and more important for events like ours, which do not have big budgets, and want to communicate with a large audience swiftly and effectively.

Malcolm Stork, Chairman, Cookham Festival