Singapore Arts Festival 2012- Our Lost Poems
1) Introduction
Singapore arts festival was started in 1977 to introduce local arts to the community. Over the years, this event was organised by the National Arts Council and have a diverse range of arts such as music, drama, films and dance. Singapore Arts Festival plays a significance role of the development and improvement of the cultural life of Singapore. Moreover, it has been very successful and popular over the last 3 decades. This year, the event was organised at esplanade park, a 2 weeks event show from 18th May to 2nd June.
This year SAF’s theme is ‘ Our lost poems’ which will be concentrating on myths, stories and thoughts. Similar to last year, SAF will be held at Esplanade Park, an open space event which involve various programmes, performers from around the world taking the main stage in Singapore and not to forget artists like Vanessa Fernandez and Claressa Monteiro performing on SAF itself.
2) Marketing Mix
2.1) Price
The Singapore Arts Festival( SAF) offers a wide range of pricing to cater the different needs and income group of visitors. The entrance to the festival village is free of charge. However, concerts required tickets could cost from $20 to $110.
SAF uses discriminatory pricing. Discriminatory pricing refers to segmentation of the market and pricing differences based on price elasticity characteristics of these segments. SAF give different prices to different segments. one of the examples are they provide an early bird special which offers a 20% discount off tickets o 2 or more performances. SAF also offer an age-based price discriminatory which give 20% off tickets for full-time students, national service men and senior citizens.
SAF also uses discount pricing. They give discount based on volume which offer 20% discount off tickets with 1 complimentary tickets for school groups of 20.
2.2) Promotion
SAF offer various kind of promotion like giving out flyers, , banners that leads visitors to the arts festival and E-marketing promotion to inform consumers about their event. SAF has E-marketing promotion as it has its own official website. In its official website, it has all facts about themselves, including tickets information, location and happenings. Furthermore, SAF has a Facebook event page and an official twitter account which have more than ten thousands of followers and members altogether.
SAF also offer tickets promotion such as 30% promotion off tickets to 2 or more performances and 10% discount off tickets for NTUC U card, VISA Card members, Kinokuniya Privilege Card and many more.
2.3) Place
This year, festival village is held at esplanade park, which was located in the centre-business district of Singapore. Surrounding esplanade park are many skyscrapers, high-end hotels like The Fullerton, The Oriental, famous attractions such as The esplanade and Merlion. It is a great location to be held at and it will attract tourists to make a trip to this event as it is surround by many tourist attractions.
The huge open area of the Esplanade Park is turned into a festival park. All the booth are set and spread out along the park that are not custered together, which allow visitors to roam freely around. Furthermore, a ticketing and a information counter are set at the entrance of the event, so that visitors can ask more about the event when they enter the festival.
2.4) Product
A product is divided into 4 product level; core, facilitating, supporting and augmented.
Core product are the focus of the business. Core product for SAF is to appreciate and enjoy arts and get to know more about the event.
Facilitating product are goods and services that must be present for the quest to use the core product. Facilitating products for SAF are brouchers, , event planners, host, performers, concert halls and stages for the performances and audiences.
Supporting products are extra products offered to add value to the core product. They are not important to have but good to be present as it differentiate it from other product and competitors. Supporting product for SAF are brouchers, information counters, cafes, directory and map to guide visitors around.
Here are some supporting products i took during my field trip.
The cafe offers Tully’s coffee, Cold Stone’s ice cream and Quiznos subs!!
For lost visitors to guide them around.
My friend took one of their broucher which is very informative.
Augmented product includes accessibility, atmosphere, customer interaction with the service. The location for SAF is highly accessible as it can be reached by MRT. Some of the nearest stations include esplanade and promenade stations(circle line) and city hall station. For those who drove by car, they can parked their cars at the nearest car park, eg. Esplanade, which is just a 5 minutes walk to festival village. Festival village is an open space event which allow visitors to walk freely around, encourage communication and interaction among themselves.
Branding is very important as it helps to differentiate themselves from competitors.
Bright yellow as their background capture the eye of visitor, and a unique logo helps to differentiate themselves from other products
2.5) People
In every event, it is crucial to have people to run the event, regardless of event planners, staffs and volunteers. I went to SAF few days ago and at the entrance of the event, i saw volunteers greeting visitors and give them a guide book. Besides thta, the volunteers also explain the overall of the event, such as the different programmes take place in the afternoon and at night. There are also staff at the ticketing and information counter which are there to meet the needs of visitors. After observing the event for quite awhile, i can say that most of the staff ad volunteers are approachable. This friendly and reassurance thye give to the visitors will allow visitors to have a new and memorable experience.
2.6) Partnership
It is important for SAF to have sponsors so that it will be more trustworthy to the audiences and recieve some good benfits from its partnership. Some of the partners by governmental agencies are Singapore Touism Board and Media by SMRT. The venue of the SAF( Esplanade Park) is also sponsor by government( National Park Board). More sponsorship lead to organisations and companies being more supportive toward SAF, which will in turn uphold a better image to its competitors and audiences. Therefore, sponsor is very important for the growth of an event, will be either popular to auidence, or remain unattractive in a long run.
2.7) Programming
SAF have various programmes during its 2 weeks event, to reach out to different targeted visitors. For example, there will be musical concert held in Esplanade, which mainly attract visitor who are fan of musical show. Some programmes also reach out the children like ‘The Young One!’ performance showcase and ‘Spash Art and Crafts’. Different types of programmes provide to the different target market of SAF, which will enhance the image of SAF and also increase the visitorship of the event.
2.8) Packaging & Distribution
SAF provide package to benefit some visitors. Some of the packages include 20% off tickets when you purchase a minimum of 4 tickets per show (Friends & Family Package) which offer under Early bird sales and general sales. In this way, families and friendly are able to achieve some tangible benefits and at the same time, it will increase the number of visitors arrival.
3) Changes of SAF, 2011 and 2012
3.1) Theme
The theme for SAF this year is different from the one last year. The theme for SAF 2011 is ‘ I Want To Remember’ whereas the theme for SAF 2012 is ‘ Our Lost Poems”.
SAF 2011 focus on all about memory, showing the happy and painful memory of the past, and to change the views of how we perceive present and future. Some of the most popular shows include ‘Out Of Context’ , ‘ Crack’ and ‘ A Throw Of Dice’. ‘Out of context’ is a dance which used the human body as the fundamental component to perform, ‘Crack’ is performed by professional dancers from Cambodia and ‘ a throw of dice’ performed touching and romantic soundtrack.
This year SAF will be focused on hidden stories, myths and reflections. This year includes traditions an myths from many countries such an India, China, Japan, France and many more.Some highlights of the performances this year are ‘ Flux’ and ‘ The Bridge Cafe Project’. ‘Flux’ is a performance art piece which involve performers from Israel that will be performing dance moves. ‘ The Bridge Cafe Project’ uses older Singaporean volunteers with youngsters from Cold Stone to dance in the cafe while visitors are enjoying their coffee and ice cream.
3.2) Sponsors
SAF being a major event in Singapore, it require sponsors to help to bring up it image and make its market more attractive to visitors. Every year, there will be different sponsorship which can help them to boost profit and establish goodwill. SAF 2012 has more sponsors compared to last, which include major sponsor like Cold Stone, Media by SMART and Kitchen Language. Their principle partner which remained the same is Singapore Tourism Board.
4) Target the unavailable market
4.1) Young Couples
One of the unavailable markets that SAF should look into will be Young Couples. There are programmes that cater to kids such as the kid’s arts village and tangle, tourist as the venue is surrounded by tourist attractions. More effort should put into the ‘Young Couple’ market. Normally, there will be a number of young couples hanging around the Esplanade area. More events like having a similar ‘ Romeo and Juliet’ role play at the main stage will attract young couples to the event. Other shows or even musical shows that related to romance can also be taken into consideration.
4.2) People who are a fan of magic
Magic is also a type of arts. There also a lot of audience who like to see magician perform majic tricks, although it is just illusion and everything is unreal. Magic required knowledge, practice and experiences to perform tricks on stage. SAF should create a magic show at Esplanade theatre to attract the people who are fans of magic. Some of the most common effects such as teleportation, vanish, escape and transformation sure also be include in the magical show. In addition, they can also charge a certain fees. Therefore, they can not only attract more visitors to the event, they can also increase revenue at the same time.
To successfully target this unavailable market, they should use Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC). It is a promotional tool to help market a certain product. Messages are covey through advertising, partnership promotions. With the advancement of technology, Internet plays an crucial role in distributing the information online like Internet communications. All these tools able to share out to the consumers within minutes.
5) My opinion
i went to th SAF on Sunday and i think they did a great job in organising the event. Based on the internal resource analysis of the SAF, they have enough human resources and physical resources. Even though it was a weekend, there are sufficient numbers of staff and volunteers in managing the traffic flow of the people, for example, visitors are queuing for tickets and games. it was such a peaceful sight to see a wonderful coordination among them.
On the other hand, the timing of the shows and activities still need room for imrovenment. The event start at 4pm everyday, however, most of the shows and activities will start after 5.30pm. Many of the visitors would entered the event at 4pm sharp are wondering around ando not know where to head to. My friend and i experienced the same problem and we have no choice but to come back in the night.
Me at the Singapore Arts Festival event 2012 🙂
6) Conclusion
This is the first time i have been to SAF event and i’m able to witness so many amazing events by all those talented artists and performers from around the world. It is its 35th year and they done a fantastic job on marketing their product, with enough tangible products to gain the trust and reassurance of the vistors and a consistent service provided by the service providers. It also gave pomotion to attract more visitors and packages for families and friends. SAF also make some changes from the previous years, with more exciting activities, a new theme and attact some new target market. In the sense, it encourage more visitors to support them this year.
References:
http://superadrianme.com/2012/04/13/singapore-arts-festival-2012/
http://www.singaporeartsfest.com/
http://www.timeoutsingapore.com/aroundtown/festivals/singapore-arts-festival-2011-i-want-to-remember
http://blogs.wsj.com/searealtime/2012/05/17/horses-dancing-uncles-at-singapore-arts-festival/
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