Dreamcatcher is participating in a 3-part course funded by the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation. The course is all about harnessing so-called Web 2.0 technologies to help us meet our goals.
This week's homework task was to search for our organization on a number of different search sites and report what is being said about us online.
The primary finding is that while our site ranks very highly for named searches (i.e., people searching for us by name), we rank poorly for unnamed relevant searches (e.g., "Theaters in South Orange NJ".)
A secondary finding is that most of our named search results are for entries in calendars of events, lists of local theaters, and occasional professional reviews of performances. Very few nonprofessional people are blogging about us.
Here are the results by search site: (search = "Dreamcatcher Repertory Theatre")
o http://www.google.com/
--- (2,350 results) primarily listings in calendars and lists of arts orgs, occasional old reviews, occasional links or mentions in actors' bios
--- Interestingly, we get 15,000 results if we change the spelling of theatre to theater
o http://www.yahoo.com
--- (23,000) most of top 10 results are listings on volunteer networks (e.g., United Way & idealist.org), although some entries are old
--- njtheater.com comes up a few times, but with incomplete season + old rep members
o http://blogsearch.google.com/
--- (25) primarily show postings and theater newsfeed sites
o http://technorati.com/ --- 0
o http://www.icerocket.com/ --- 0
o http://youtube.com/ --- 0
o http://flickr.com/ --- 0
o http://www.digg.com --- 0
GOOGLE ALERTS = nothing meaningful has turned up, possibly because we're in between shows and we haven't had an event since early December.
Thoughts? Any ideas for how we can improve our online presence? LEAVE COMMENTS below. Thanks!
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Monday, January 12, 2009
Non-profits have no... profit!
As a non-profit theater whose ticket sales only cover a fraction of operating costs, Dreamcatcher is always seeking new funding sources. Here's a photo of fellow board member, Terri Tauber, and myself at Dreamcatcher's 2008 Halloween party fundraiser.
Welcome to Dreamcatcher's Blog
Welcome to the blog for Dreamcatcher Repertory Theatre.
Dreamcatcher Rep is a small not-for-profit professional theater whose mission is to tell stories with an intimacy that allows artists and audiences to connect. We pick stories that reflect our lives, relationships and our world today.
I'm Steve McIntyre, the Dreamcatcher board member in charge of marketing. And now blogging.
I'm aware of many so-called Web 2.0 technologies, and I'm interested in harnessing one or more of them to ultimately help our theater achieve its mission. With so many new Web technologies to choose from, I hope to learn how to assess the potential effectiveness of them so that I can direct our limited resources in the most promising direction.
Our web site is undergoing a major redesign. To see it in its current state, visit:
http://www.dreamcatcherrep.org
Dreamcatcher Rep is a small not-for-profit professional theater whose mission is to tell stories with an intimacy that allows artists and audiences to connect. We pick stories that reflect our lives, relationships and our world today.
I'm Steve McIntyre, the Dreamcatcher board member in charge of marketing. And now blogging.
I'm aware of many so-called Web 2.0 technologies, and I'm interested in harnessing one or more of them to ultimately help our theater achieve its mission. With so many new Web technologies to choose from, I hope to learn how to assess the potential effectiveness of them so that I can direct our limited resources in the most promising direction.
Our web site is undergoing a major redesign. To see it in its current state, visit:
http://www.dreamcatcherrep.org
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