PROMOTIONS/PUBLICITY/OPPORTUNITIES

Approach the management of your city’s most prominent radio and/or cable
television stations inviting them to serve as “Official Circus Station”. Provide the
station with free tickets suggesting that the tickets be offered, via on-air public
service announcements, to agencies representing under-privileged, minority
and/or handicapped children. The agencies would be asked to request quantities of
tickets from the station, in writing. The station would supply the tickets to the
agencies in quantities based on the number of agency requests received. The
promotion lends prestige and a positive public image to the station involved and
creates pre-circus publicity for you.

Provide free tickets to a number of local radio stations suggesting they be used in
giveaway promotions by the station. DO NOT approach stations with similar
program formats. For example...approach an “easy listening” station, a “news”
station, a “rock” station...but not more than one in each programming category.
Stations do not like to duplicate the promotional activity of a station programming
a similar format. Many stations look for such give-away opportunities during
audience-measurement periods, which occur from February thru June. In many
instances, you may combine the ticket give-aways with commercial buys for your
circus. In other words, spend some cash for advertising on the stations and offer
free tickets for equal value (or more) in additional commercial time.

Invite your largest local department store or department store chain, or a local
children’s clothing store, to participate in a circus promotion. Provide the store(s)
with free tickets, which they will offer in their newspaper ads and electronic
media advertising to “the first 50 customers on a given Saturday.” The promotion
will benefit the retail outlets by increasing customer traffic while providing
excellent pre-circus publicity for you. You may even combine # 2 and 3 above by
convincing a local broadcast medium and its best retail advertiser to participate in
a joint circus promotion.

Approach your largest local newspaper inviting it to serve as “Official Circus
Newspaper.” Suggest to the paper’s management that it run a coloring contest for
a one-week period approximately 3 weeks prior to the circus’ performance in your
city. A simple black and white line drawing could be prepared relative to one of
the circus acts and published daily for a week, perhaps adjacent to the paper’s
comics page. It would invite youngsters to color the picture and mail it to the
paper. Tell the paper’s management that your organization will pick up and judge
all entries so that the paper would not be burdened with the task. You appoint
judges from among your membership or the community to determine the best
entry in each of three or four selected age categories (perhaps local grammar
school art teachers could serve as judges). Present the winners and their families
with free tickets to the circus. It would be agreed, beforehand, that the
participating newspaper would photograph the presentations and publish pictures
and a story within a one-to-three day period prior to the circus’ opening in your
city. Depending on your treasury, you may choose to award tickets and savings
bonds or scholarships of some kind to the winners.

Contact the program managers and talk-show hosts of local stations presenting
“talk” programs. Convince them that principals in the circus acts make good
interviewees and can provide a fascinating insight into behind-the-scenes circus
life. Take a similar approach with “sports show talk” hosts. The Hamid Circus,
Inc. circus acts feature many performers with fascinating backgrounds and the
circus’ acrobats and trapeze artists are athletes in their own right, giving local
stations an opportunity for interesting, change-of-pace programming.

Declare “NIGHTS” for various surrounding towns in your area. Make opening
night “Official East Jonesville Night.” Make the second night “Official North
Brownsville Night,” etc. Have the mayors of the respective towns head their
town’s contingent of attendees for their given night.

Create school ticket contests within your city’s grammar schools, offering a free
appearance by the circus’ clowns at the school showing the largest advance ticket
sales for a pre-determined date.

Send circus-advertising flyers to local elementary school principals accompanied
by a letter outlining the benefits provided through funds raised by circus
performances, and ask the principals to post the flyers in their schools.

Invite well known local personalities to serve as “Guest Ringmaster” for each
performance. Prime candidates are radio and television personalities, newspaper
writers, your city’s mayor, local sports heroes, etc. The “Guest Ringmaster” will
serve as an added attraction for potential circus ticket purchasers and will
welcome each night’s audience.

Invite the same personalities outlined above to appear in full clown make-up and
costume for a brief appearance with the circus’ clown act, another audience draw.
When the guest performer-clown is a TV or newspaper personality, it increases
the chance that his or her media will cover that personalities appearance at your
circus, thus adding to the publicity exposure that helps you sell tickets.

Invite a popular local radio DJ or sports play-by-play man to do a circus “play-byplay for local blind youngsters.” Most local telephone companies will cooperate
by setting up a given number of headsets on a closed-circuit system in the arena
or building in which your circus is performing. The station, phone company and
you each creates good will within the community and a group of deserving
youngsters will enjoy an unusual treat.

Invite a local newspaper feature writer or television reporter to “spend a day
behind the scenes” with the circus performers; to actually “live” with the circus
stars. The reporter will receive a fascinating insight into circus life while
gathering a wealth of material for a feature story to appear while the circus is in
town.
NOTE: Many circus-sponsoring organizations have utilized other valuable promotional
tools to increase circus attendance and create good will within their communities. If you
would like to share your success stories with groups like your own, please send them to
us. We will forward them to other circus sponsors.