A rather irregular series of shorts now: and just like Peter Griffin said, you know what grinds my gears? Having to hunt for information about a show.
I’m finding that nowadays, promotions are putting an unhealthy amount of focus on social media when it comes to promoting and informing about shows. Granted, with some promotions selling out almost instantly, you can make a case for “well, we don’t need to tell you what you’re seeing”. Heck, it works for some.
But when it comes to building buzz, particularly without spoiling results, why is it that a lot of promotions follow the school of “stick a match graphic on Twitter and call it a day”? Or even worse, “stick a match graphic on Twitter and retweet everyone’s reactions to it”? Trust me, when it comes to following a promotion on Twitter, that method of retweeting everyone is going to make me tap “unfollow” a lot quicker than it will make me dig around in settings to find the option to hide your retweets!
Some promotions are Twitter-only. Others have Facebook events, and actually keep those up to date with announced matches. Some even have a website and keep that up to date too. At time of writing, Beyond Wrestling were promoting their New Year’s Eve show, with the ticket page for that listing the entire card for the main and pre-show sections. Rev Pro are getting better at this, with their website listing the up-to-date cards for their Cockpit shows in January, while not mentioning a damn thing on their event page for High Stakes two weeks later.
Elsewhere, PROGRESS’ website being run by Shopify makes it clear that it’s primarily a front end for tickets and merch – and whilst that’s not a bad thing, it is a pain when it comes to looking for entire cards, with “scroll through the media section on PROGRESS’ Twitter” usually being the best course of action.
If you have a website, use it!
Even if you’re just updating your BigCartel ticket pages to list matches, give fans *somewhere* to go to find out what’s going on, especially if you’re so hyperactive on social media that you create too much noise. Websites like Hashtag Wrestling for upcoming cards are a good thing (for those following the UK scene), but it’s damn near a dereliction of a promotion’s duty to keep this sort of stuff buried away on Twitter. So, now we’re in 2018, can promotions start to promote properly? Even if you sell out in a hiccup, keep your matches listed somewhere central and easy to follow. Don’t retweet every response, every emoji, “EEE!” or shriek of joy because a name has been announced. As a promotion, it is your duty to create buzz but not too much so that it becomes distracting noise for all but the most ardent of fans.
Oh, and one more thing: for the love of God, make sure people know at the very least when tickets are on sale what your door and bell times are for your shows. If folks are travelling, especially if they’re having to book Megabuses, trains or anything else, start and finishing times are a Godsend!