The Situation:

Weeksville Heritage Center, a historic site and cultural center preserving the legacy of Weeksville, one of pre-Civil War America’s largest free Black communities, faced dwindling event and program attendance. After losing their Marketing Director, promotion became inconsistent and ineffective, hindering community engagement and event attendance. Its valuable programming wasn’t reaching its full potential, impacting the organization’s ability to inform and empower.

The Challenge:

Key challenges included inconsistent marketing materials, decentralized processes, and overburdened program managers. The goal was to boost event attendance, ensure consistent brand messaging, and alleviate the burden on program managers who were juggling multiple roles. We needed to empower Weeksville Heritage Center with a sustainable, staff-friendly marketing process. This meant creating structure, providing support, and streamlining workflows.

The Solution:

We implemented a multi-pronged approach: a streamlined process for collaborating with marketing support, bi-weekly marketing meetings for strategic alignment and collaboration, request forms for clear communication, and a shared marketing calendar with clear deadlines to ensure organized and timely promotion. We also reorganized their Google Drive workspace to create a centralized hub for all marketing materials.

Results:

Weeksville Heritage Center saw a significant increase in event attendance thanks to consistent, advanced promotion. Proactive planning prevented conflicting marketing efforts, and freed from marketing burdens, program managers could focus on their core responsibilities. Most importantly, select programs experienced registration increases of up to 60%, amplifying Weeksville’s mission to educate and empower the community.

The Situation:

Like many Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), The Ben Appelbaum Foundation hosts annual fundraising and cultivation events to educate, emphasize and empower their mission of supporting diversity and entrepreneurship through mentorship and education.

The Challenge:

After 15 successful years of hosting events, building membership and growing their network, the organization started to notice a decline. The events weren’t attracting new attendees, and they didn’t know why. As a result, lead generation was down significantly.

The Solution:

By conducting a full assessment of the foundation’s previous promotional tactics, Sunny Day Marketing was able to identify the gaps in marketing their events. Through providing additional strategy, email marketing, social media and content marketing support, Sunny Day marketing helped the foundation draw wider interest to their mission, and extend a more consistent reach to their audience.  

Results:

In two months, under Sunny Day Marketing’s lead:

• Social media followers increased by 50%

• New attendee registrations increased by 58%

• Email subscriber database increased by 21%

• Awareness of the foundation increased among small businesses & prospective partner organizations

The Situation:

Brooklyn’s historic Emmanuel Baptist Church was looking for ways to engage their members, and the neighborhood, with extra-curricular cultural activities. They introduced the Emmanuel Baptist Church Jazz Vespers (EBCJV), among a roster of events to fill that void. Upon launch, the monthly event averaged about 150 attendees, per performance, but was still lacking in consistency. Their branding was disjointed, resources were limited, and they were only using paper flyers to promote events.

The Challenge:

Build a recognizable local brand, and resurge stagnant attendance with minimal budget and manpower. They wanted to become a major destination for Jazz fans, in Brooklyn and throughout New York City.

The Solution:

By quantifying EBCJV’s goals and conducting thorough industry and competitive research, Sunny Day Marketing customized a tangible and realistic strategic marketing campaign that implemented a variety of digital, traditional and grassroots tactics; including flyer distribution, event directories, email marketing and direct outreach, all fitting within their budget and resources.

Results:

Within six months, under Sunny Day Marketing’s lead:

• Attendance increased by 142%

• Email subscribers increased by 26%

• Brand recognition was formed throughout the church, neighborhood, and NYC jazz community