I have been very good at writing regularly for the past year. I did decide to go from thrice weekly to twice weekly in 2021, and I’ve kept to that. Till this week. I missed Tuesday. And I forgot to write out a schedule for my April blogposts, which I usually do on the first of the month (but it was Holy Thursday, and I had a lot going on that day).
It’s been a rough couple of weeks.
After an initial burst of enthusiasm at the launch of World Voice Weekend on March 1, sales dropped off shortly afterwards, and despite some pretty intensive social media and email marketing (I really hate email marketing), and a few incentives, they never picked up to where I hoped they’d be at this point, with only 4 days left for registration.
It’s not that no one is coming, it’s just not as many as I’d hoped.
My vision was that I was providing an event to unite the community of voice users. That we’d all join together for two days of incredible content, going from one fantastic workshop/concert/masterclass to the next. And people told me that what I’ve planned was amazing, valuable, and important. And I believe that too.
I wanted to do more than just offer masterclasses and charge per session. Anyone can do that. And they do. I wanted to offer an experience.
And I’m still going to do so. And the price for the whole thing only went up to $250 from my early bird pricing. You can still get that through Monday.
But I’m also recognizing that either my marketing was not enough or on target (did I mention that I hate email marketing?), or that the timing was off, or that I haven’t developed the KLT (know/like/trust) in order to get enough people to sign up for this. The last part feeds into that little voice in my head that whispers, “people don’t like you.” (Why that voice has an Estonian accent, I don’t know…) I really hope that part isn’t why. (Not fishing.)
I also didn’t get a Creativity Grant from the state which would have paid for all my clinicians and made me less anxious. I missed it by one point.
Also I had skin cancer surgery. I’m fine, but it was just one more thing that I didn’t really want to have to deal with. And it probably impacted my marketing progress.
So I’m changing my vision a little bit to offer some audit spots for the Christian Borle and Adrianna Hicks masterclasses. Since these are being offered in separate Zoom rooms anyway, I can do that, and still keep the rest of the weekend events for those people who paid for them.
Christian Borle’s masterclass will be at 3pm on Saturday, April 17. I will offer up to 25 auditor seats at $35.00 each. Six singers are scheduled to sing. You may register for Mr. Borle’s masterclass here.
Adrianna Hicks’ masterclass will be at 3pm on Sunday, April 18. I will offer up to 25 auditor seats at $25.00 each. Six singers are scheduled to sing, four of whom are scholarship recipients from Morgan State University and Baltimore School of the Arts. I was able provide these scholarships due to a generous donation from MDDC NATS and an anonymous benefactor. You may register for Ms. Hicks’ masterclass here.
I know that there were people who only wanted to audit these in the first place, and I didn’t want to go these, but the market has told me otherwise. For now. But only for now.
Purchase of either of these appointments only gives you to access to the masterclass itself
and to no other session in World Voice Weekend.
Contact MVS if you have any questions.