This article is about creativity. Not really business at all but innovation and creativeness. All business depends on the quality of their contact points in order to sell their products or services. Everyday, we are bombarded by about 3000 adverts trying to convince us to act in a certain way (i.e. go out and buy their product). The internet is plastered with advertising banners and the radio and TV bring strangers into our living room, who then proceeds to tell us why we should buy some product or another. It is these contact points that often inform the consumer of the choices available and it is these contact points that highlight the benefits of the products or services to the customer, making it irresistible not to make a purchase.

As a musician you need to do the same. It is a cruel world that all musicians live in. This is due to the fact that, almost always, impressions, opinions and judgments will be made about the quality of a musician without the consumer every actually seeing or hearing the musician under scrutiny. Agents will decide that they don't want to represent an artist based, often exclusively, on the printed material they receive from that artist. Concert promoters will, likewise, often dismiss the notion of booking a musician for a concert based on non-auditory stimuli. An audience will decide to attend or not attend a concert often based on the flyer they receive in the post and job applications for orchestras are usually screened using a two-page printed document devoid of any sound or musical content (i.e. a Curriculum Vitae).

However, this is the world in which we live and, therefore, have to not only make the best of it but also use the system to our advantage. And this is where creativity comes into it. One of the major contact points that a musician uses is the brochure: a document that outlines the nature of the musical product together with its main features and consumer benefits. However, without innovation or creativity, this document will fail to achieve what it is meant. A statistic for you: there are approximately 600 music clubs and societies within the UK and, on average, each music club and society hold six concerts per year. That is a total of 3600 concerts each year. On average, each music club and society receives 1000 brochures through the mail and via the internet each year. This means that, just to music clubs and societies within the UK, 600,000 brochures are being sent to fill 3600 concerts (approximately 166 brochures per concert)!! So how do you make your brochure stand out from the rest?

The most important element to remember about a brochure is that it is not a Curriculum Vitae (CV). A CV is, in general, a reactive "advertising" tool that is sent to "customers" in response to a specific need. In addition, a CVs purpose is to provide an answer to a specific question. For example, the customer may be an orchestral fixer and the question may be are you a cellist who has Mahler symphonies in your repertoire? Your CV will then provide the detail that will answer these questions. Therefore it is a reactive marketing tool i.e. sent in reaction to a specific need.

A brochure, on the other hand, also provides answers but not in relation to any specific questions. Instead, it is an advertising tool that is used more as a "cold-call" tool i.e. the brochure has not been requested, you don't know if there is any requirement for your product/service and there is no specific question to answer. So, like all forms of advertising your brochure must create product awareness, encourage loyalty or encourage change. In addition, it must follow the rules of AIDA (create attention, interest, desire and provide a mechanism for action) that will make the reader hold onto your brochure for a little longer than holding onto the competition's adverting material. In addition, where the CV provides information as a statement of fact, a brochure must be emotive and make the reader want to read on. Therefore it is a proactive marketing tool.

The most important thing to remember is that a brochure is used to tell your "customers" (fixers, agents, managers, concert organisers, festival directors, the press, etc.) about who and what you are, and what you do. Unlike a Curriculum Vitae, a brochure is used more to "sell" yourself and your products/services rather than just inform people about your particular and relevant experience and skills. In that regard, a brochure needs to be emotive, it needs to tell a story and it needs to sell. The language used must "excite" the reader and create a desire in them in order to seek further information or make a purchasing decision. As an example: BMW's advertising slogan is not "a really good car that works well". This does not really create a tremendous amount of excitement or desire. Instead, BMW states, quite categorically, that their cars are "the ultimate driving machine". This is emotive and makes the reader sit up and take notice.

Before we get down to the detail of what should be contained within the pages of a brochure, there are a few elements of design and style that need to be examined. Brochures can be any size, shape or colour. In fact, the more different they are from all the others, the better. Therefore, you must think about the shape of the brochure. Don't just settle for a simple A4 folder because (a) it is easy and (b) everyone else does. Try and be creative and see if you can find triangular, circular or even textured paper that will make the reader hold your brochure in their hands for those few seconds longer than the competition. As for colour, think about what colours mean. Extremely briefly: red is excitement and passion while blue is control and tradition. Green is calm and growth while orange is ambition and youth. The idea is to choose a colour scheme that matches the musical personality you are trying to portray.

Colour can also be useful in another way: if you are sending a brochure to a music club or society, bear in mind that your brochure will be, approximately, one in a thousand sent to that society during that season. When you conduct your follow-up phone call undoubtedly the fixer or musical society director you are calling will not be able to recall your name or details. If you simply state that you sent them your brochure, they are likely to reply, "what did it look like"? If your brochure was a simple black & white affair, then it will most likely be drowning a sea of monochromatic pieces of paper and card. However, if you reply, "it's the bright yellow one" then it is more likely that your literature will be seen as a bright oasis in the endless desert of brochure uniformity spread out across their desk. Colour is important and should be chosen carefully rather than merely leaving it up to chance, allowing the decision to be taken by default.

Another very important design issue to consider before launching into the creation of your brochure is how to make sure that all your advertising literature can be updated easily and regularly in order to provide up-to-date and relevant information to the reader. Remember that, amongst other elements, the definition of advertising contains the words "at the lowest possible cost". If you design and print a brochure that looks great and is innovative and original but unchangeable, then its usefulness will be limited by the longevity of the information contained within its pages. If, after six months the brochure is out-of-date (due to you winning a competition and releasing a CD or two), the whole brochure will have to be reprinted creating a waste of resources, time and money. In addition, marketing is about identifying all your different products and services and all the different target customers who will benefit from these products and services. Therefore, one brochure is not going to be able to send the correct message about all these different products to all your diverse target market segments. Therefore, in effect, each time you send out a brochure, it needs to be Ð to some extent Ð tailor made for the reader to whom you are sending it. For that reason, whatever brochure design you settle for, you must ensure that it can be updated, changed or altered in order to provide you with a versatile and practical advertising tool.

There are many possible design styles for a brochure, the simplest and most common of those being an A4 sheet of paper folded three times giving you six panels to place text and photographs. The advantages of this design are that the size fits very nicely into a standard envelope and that double-sided page (pre folding) can be very easily printed on a home printer. The disadvantages are that there is not all that much space to write detailed information about your career or repertoire and inserts such as press cuttings become messy to append to the brochure. In addition, if you get the brochure professionally printed, then any changes or updates will require you to throw away the remaining out-of-date brochures and print a new run of updated literature. This can become very expensive.

A Tri-fold brochure

The user-friendliest alternative is to create a "loose leaf" brochure whereby by you can add or remove as many inserts as you wish while still keeping the same outer cover. In this way you can effectively create a unique brochure for each "customer" by printing relevant information on your home computer as inserts while maintaining a "timeless" high quality designed and printed cover to house all your supplements.

An Insert brochure

However, with all of this it is vital to remember that brochures need to tell a story. Not only in the words that are written but also in what the design says about you as a musician or what you have to offer as a product/service. They say never judge a book by its cover, but we all make initial impression by what wee see. Product packaging is an artistic science and design features create very distinct emotions in all those that come into contact with created and creative objects. As stated above many of those people that govern your musical career will form initial impressions about you based upon advertising and marketing literature that they have some visual and kinaesthetic interaction with. Making your brochure look and feel right may mean the difference between a fixer, agent, concert promoter or festival organiser opening your brochure and reading what is inside and throwing it in the bin.

Now I am going to teach you a mantra. Above, we looked at the issues involved in designing a brochure, however, no matter how good the design, if the information presented within the brochure is weak or in some way unconvincing, then the whole exercise will be discarded as a quirky gimmick that is long on style but short on substance. There is no objective requirement for the contents of a brochure; however, there are certain elements that must be included while others are optional or highly customisable. As a starting rule of thumb: a brochure made up of inserted pages housed within a printed outer folder should contain no more than 10 pages of text. Just think about the mathematics of it all. Above I stated that approximately 1000 brochures are sent to every music clubs and society in this country every year. If every one of these brochures incorporated 10 pages that would equate to 10,000 pages of text that every music society director would have to read each year. That is equivalent to 28 pages a day Ð Saturdays and Sundays included! And all this for an average of just six concerts per season! Therefore, remember your poor readership when you are loading your brochure with even more information. And so to my mantra - remember this when you are preparing the text for your brochure:

Don't write it all down just because you can!

Brochures fall into the category of Direct Marketing and, as such, you will have conducted quite extensive research as to who you are sending the brochure to, what they do, what their needs are and what you have to offer them that will meet these needs. You will have made a quantitative and qualitative decision as to whom you should send your brochure to and, therefore, instead of blanket mailing, for example, 600 music societies, you will have targeted, say, 50 of them. In exactly the same manner, the contents of your brochure needs to be tailored and targeted to each specific recipient so that you are answering their needs and requirements as precisely as possible. Each brochure is, therefore, a bespoke publication made-to-measure for each individual addressee. So, as can be seen, one cannot just write and create one brochure that fits all purposes. There is an amazing book about web design entitled "Don't Make Them Think" (by Steve Krug) and this philosophy should permeate the design of your publicity material. It is up to you to sift through all of your biographical and achievement data and choose the most relevant and pertinent information for each specific recipient. Do not leave it up to the reader to do this Ð it will only land up in the bin!

As stated above, while there are many different sections of information that your brochure requires, they do not necessarily have to be in the order in which I am going to outline them or, indeed, be included at all. However, there are some pieces of vital information that cannot be left out and the first of those is your biography. Once again: don't write it all down just because you can! In addition Ð another rule: it is advisable not to write a brochure in the first person ("I", "my" or "me"). Rather it should be in the third person ("he", she" or your name) for this makes the biography sound more professional and less inhibited.

Your brochure biography should first and foremost be interesting to read. Don't just give a listing of dates and events structured in a paragraph of prose. Like any good first line of a novel or book, the opening of your biography must draw the reader into the story and make them want to read on. Use emotive language. Use language that sells. Most importantly, use language that excites the reader. It is important to list significant and major musical events and achievements and to demonstrate what successes you have had that applies to the requirements of the person to whom you are writing. For example, if you have recently performed a series of highly successful and well-regarded recitals for a series of regional music clubs, then Ð if you are writing this brochure for another music club Ð this information will be very attractive to your reader. However, if you are sending this brochure to a European orchestra in order to obtain either a concerto opportunity or an orchestral position, this information, while impressive, is not totally germane to your biographical experience as a concert soloist or orchestral member.

While trying to make your biography sound exciting and emotive, try avoiding phrases such as "highly acclaimed", "critically triumphant" or "internationally renowned". These phrases are over-used, rather ambiguous and, more importantly, unless you have empirical data to back it up (such as reviews and testimonials), then these phrases are fairly unreliable.

The next element of your biography that needs to be present is some detail is your musical education. Again, this should be written in the third person and must contain details of whom you have studied with, where you have studied (city, country, institution) and what education achievements (degrees, special awards, etc.) you have earned. Again, don't write it all down just because you can. Don't list every single teacher you have ever learnt with including Mrs Grimbleweed who started you off when you were six! As you tailor your brochure for your targeted reader, you must decide whom they are most likely to have heard of. However, if you are writing to a concert society in your hometown (where you began learning your instrument) then it is possible that the directors of that music society may have heard of Mrs Grimbleweed, so it would be appropriate to include this information in your biography in this instance.

You need to inform the reader about your recent or relevant performances. At this stage, you can break free of writing prose and simply create a bullet point listing detailing the date the performance (just the year is sufficient), what type of concert it was (recital, chamber music, concerto, etc.), who it was with (orchestra, chamber ensemble), where it was (hall, city, country) and what music you performed. Again, don't write it all down just because you can. Only list the performances that are pertinent to the reader you writing to. For example, if you are sending a brochure to the director of a festival that focuses mainly of 20th century chamber music, then it is vital that first, you list all concerts where you have performed 20th century chamber music. As a cellist, you may have performed the Bach solo suites many times but this information is not of primary importance to an artistic director of a 20th music festival. Equally, if you are sending your brochure to a fixer in order to procure freelance rank-and-file orchestral opportunities, it is your orchestral experience that is important and not your numerous solo recitals up and down the country. However, following the listing of relevant performance information, you may then list selected other performances to demonstrate to the reader that you are a well-rounded and experienced musician.

Some mention of awards, prizes and competition success should be made. This can either be embedded within the biography section or can be set as a separate bullet point section. Once again, my mantra: don't write it all down just because you can. Just like the performances section, list only those awards and prizes that the reader is likely to take note of. Having won the under 12 eisteddfod that Mrs Grimbleweed entered you in is of little relevance or interest to a conductor of a European orchestra (however, once again, it may be of attraction to the local orchestra conductor of the town in which the competition was held). If you have won 15 competitions throughout your career of which only three of them are of note, then it is quite acceptable to phrase your opening to this section as, "Amongst the 15 prizes [Sam] has been awarded are theÉ" followed by the listing of two or three major, well known prizes/competition. Remember: make it relevant to the reader.

Masterclasses are another key area where it is vital not to write it all down just because you can. A long list of names that eventually merge into one unpronounceable mass only serves to confuse and alienate the reader. Like the biographical section, try and tell a story when listing the masterclasses you have participated it. First, identify which masterclasses would interest the reader and then examine any elements of your attendance that made the event even more special. You may have been the only person from the UK to participate or maybe these masterclasses were the result of a prize you won elsewhere. Maybe your participation was by special invitation or possibly the masterclasses focussed on one particular musical area. Whatever the story, make it worth reading and move away from a simple list of names and dates.

When it comes to repertoire my mantra remains unchanged: don't write it all down just because you can. You should list the core repertoire for your instrument, however, you cannot catalogue works that you think you should have learnt (because everyone else has) but haven't quite got around to it yet! You can only list works you have actually studied. It is vital to highlight the works in your repertoire that are relevant to the reader, demonstrating that you have the required programme to meet their needs.

It is always good to include press cuttings in your brochure if you have any. These can be reviews, previews, interviews or anything else that you feel will be relevant to your readership. However, this is where I become a little militant. A cutting is exactly that: something cut out of a newspaper/magazine (which is then photocopied and included in the brochure). However, a newspaper cutting does NOT mean a subjective selection of random words encased in the ubiquitous quote marks and dots. For example: "Éwonderful performanceÉ" These dots indicate an omission of text and it is what has been left out that is always a worry: "Under no circumstances could this concert be deemed a wonderful performance and was a complete waste of time." If, from a whole page review, it is only possible to select two or three words then it is probably not worth using the quote in the first place. If the review only mentions you is passing or only mentions you as part of an ensemble, then still include a photocopy of the whole review and simply underline the sections that relate to your performance or involvement. In addition, if the press cutting is in a language that you are unsure the reader will be able to interpret, then you must provide a translation of the text. On one side of the page place a photocopy of the original and on the other side, type out a translation.

Finally it is important to place your contact information as clearly and visibly as possible all over the brochure. The final stage of our acronym A.I.D.A is "Action" and the reason you are sending a brochure to someone is to persuade him or her to take action by contacting you via some means. List your primary points of contact (whether they be phone, fax, e-mail, mobile, etc.) as many times and as obviously as you can so that there is no doubt in the mind of the reader as to how to contact you. To conclude: creativity, targeting and focussing the information you use will help provide you with a much more potent marketing tool that should allow you to provide the most persuasive possible selling message to the right people and the lowest possible cost.

Liam Abramson 2003

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