{"id":487,"date":"2010-07-01T18:22:47","date_gmt":"2010-07-01T18:22:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp\/?p=487"},"modified":"2010-07-01T18:22:47","modified_gmt":"2010-07-01T18:22:47","slug":"no_this_isnt_a_seo_technique","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/2010\/07\/no_this_isnt_a_seo_technique\/","title":{"rendered":"No, this isn’t a SEO technique"},"content":{"rendered":"

…but yes, I am going to talk about Twilight: Eclipse<\/i> the day after it was released. Twilight: Eclipse, Twilight: Eclipse. “Twilight: Eclipse.”<\/i> And while we’re on the topic of search engine optimization, I learned this week via Sitemeter that you get to this blog when you Google “hot sex.” Right, so, anyone who’s here looking for hot sex, welcome, enjoy your stay, and I’m sorry – I’m going to talk about classical music PR now. <\/p>\n

Last Friday, a friend slash colleague and I were at Nick and Toni’s discussing marketing geeky things to geeky folks and how, when you do that, some wormhole looping effect occurs and you end up in Coolville anyway. Of course, for example, Hilary’s Schoenberg CD<\/a> was The One to be featured in Time<\/i> magazine, despite our best efforts to rally Nerdz Only. My friend then asked if I knew about Geek Squad<\/a>, because they had apparently come to her apartment for a $100 consulting fee that was later put toward the TV she bought, and had everything she needed waiting at Best Buy the next day. She couldn’t say enough about the Geek Squad’s customer service, and I recounted three items of rare customer service glory moments I’ve experienced recently. The first was at The Carlyle<\/a>, where a friend took me to see Sutton Foster. I was waiting in the lobby for him, and watched the host greet everyone who approached him with equal grace–a man who asked if children were allowed, women who had clearly been coming for…decades–no one was given anything less than VIP treatment. When I finally went in by myself, saying that my friend wasn’t here yet, the host said, “We’re so happy to have you at The Carlyle,” as if he really was. Randomly, I had a great customer service experience at a Starbucks in Chelsea last week as well: when I went to pick up my medium iced coffee with milk and hazelnut syrup, the woman making the drinks said, “Let me know how it is.” How amazing is that? Even if it wasn’t delicious, I would have told her it was delicious because she was so nice about it. Lastly, the broker who helped me find the apartment I moved into a month ago recently e mailed me on my birthday! Her name is Kathryn Swift and she’s at kathryn at barakny dot com if you live in the city and are looking to move. <\/p>\n

And now, back to Twilight<\/i>. My sister has, apparently, spent a ridiculous amount of money at Best Buy for her job, so she’s a “Best Buy Rewards Zone Premier Silver member.” One of the perks of Premier Silver membership is free screenings of movies before they come out, so we got to–and I use “got” loosely, here–see the new Twilight<\/i> movie the night before it was released. Smartly, they had all the membership perks flashing through while we were waiting for the movie to start:<\/p>\n

\"BestBuyRewards1.jpg\"\"BestBuyRewards2.jpg\"\"BestBuy3.jpg\"\"BestBuy4.jpg\"…and back to Twilight <\/i>[cue screaming tweens]:<\/p>\n

\"BestBuyRewards5.jpg\"A few thoughts. First, and I’ve blogged about this before<\/a>, why don’t performing arts organization use the time we’re all sitting around waiting for concerts to start to advertise subscriber and donor benefits, as well as upcoming performances? We’re stuck there! Sell us on something! <\/p>\n

Second, when was the last time you had a great customer service experience at a classical music concert? The ushers can barely crack smiles (and God-forbid you ask them a question about the repertoire, venue, or performer), tickets are usually impossible to pick-up in any sort of organized manner, and the other audience members<\/a>…well, the venues can’t be responsible for that. Imagine if we were all greeted by the Carlyle host: “Welcome to the NY Philharmonic. We’re so glad you’re here.”<\/p>\n

Third, do you know of any concert presenters with rewards programs? Not subscription or donor benefits, but actual points to accumulated for dollars spent. <\/p>\n

Does anyone have any great customer service experiences to report? I’m happy to give credit to presenters where credit is due. Comment here<\/a>. Oh, and if you came for hot sex and\/or chaste teenage vampires, please comment as well. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

…but yes, I am going to talk about Twilight: Eclipse the day after it was released. Twilight: Eclipse, Twilight: Eclipse. “Twilight: Eclipse.” And while we’re on the topic of search engine optimization, I learned this week via Sitemeter that you get to this blog when you Google “hot sex.” Right, so, anyone who’s here looking […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-487","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-main","7":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=487"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=487"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=487"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/lifesapitch\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=487"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}