Focus Areas
Email Marketing, Marketing, Public Relations, Communications, Digital Marketing, Technology, Facebook Advertising, Social Media, Web Design
About
Ceci Dadisman is a marketing professional with more than 15 years of experience creating effective communications campaigns utilizing innovative, forward thinking methods. She is nationally recognized as a leader in digital marketing and specializes in multichannel communications campaigns.
A frequent public speaker, Ceci’s recent and upcoming engagements feature national conference appearances at NTEN, Museums and the Web, National Arts Marketing Project, Arts Midwest, American Alliance of Museums, OPERA America, Midwest Museums Association, and Chorus America in addition to many other local and regional events. Known for her easy-going and vernacular style, she creates open learning environments with an emphasis on information sharing and useful takeaways.
She is a member of the National Arts Marketing Project Advisory Committee and the West Virginia University College of Creative Arts Visiting Committee, and is a mentor in West Virginia University’s Creative Consultant program. She also teaches the arts marketing course at West Virginia University’s College of Creative Arts and is on the faculty of Chorus America’s Chorus Management Institute.
Ceci was born and raised in Pittsburgh, PA and graduated from West Virginia University’s College of Creative Arts. She currently lives in Cleveland, Ohio.
Connect With Ceci
Article Archive
Should You Use MailChimp’s New Website Builder?
Quick Answer: No. Longer Answer: MailChimp recently added a website builder to its suite of features. This is a logical addition especially because MC is looking to become a full-service CRM platform. The website builder is easy-to-use and lightweight, but it doesn’t have enough features for what most arts organizations need. That said, it could be useful to very small organizations building a first website or making the move from Wix or…
A Guide To Better Donor Communications
I recently wrote a bit of a rant on Medium about the need to be more insightful in terms of how we communicate with our donors. This led me to think about the tactical side of that and how that would be implemented in a communications campaign. We tend to start with a patron’s donor level in creating messaging for an appeal. Whilst the amount of a gift is important information, so…
Arts Admin Conferences You Should Know About
A while back, I asked my fellow arts administrators to help compile a list of conferences that are applicable to our field. Here is the finished list! Conferences for Arts Administrators Well, perhaps it isn’t finished…if you have any conferences to add, you can still do so here. We’re on the honor system here, folks. Only edit the document for the forces of good.
Is Your MC Hooked Up To Your GA?
Did you know that you can track traffic on your website from MailChimp emails right in Google Analytics? It’s true! Why would you want to track traffic on your website that comes from emails, you ask? So that you can see how people move through your website after getting there and if anyone converts. You can use this to gauge the efficacy of your email campaigns as well as your website usability….
What Is Your Favorite Conference?
I want to know what conferences you attend or want to attend! Please share your favorite (arts and non-arts specific) conferences that are useful for arts administrators. My goal is to compile a rather comprehensive list that can then be shared with everyone in the industry. You can add to the Google Doc here (yes, folks, we are on the honor system here, please don’t abuse this document). Add To The Doc…
How to Create Date-Based Automations with MailChimp
If you’re a MailChimp user and you’re not using their automation feature, you’re missing out! Automated emails can save you time and allow you to send more timely emails to your list. Let’s take a look at how you can use date criteria to create an automation. Let’s say you’re a museum and you collect the email addresses of your visitors. You want to follow up with them after their visit with…
Using MailChimp Segments for Frequent Targeting
So, you’ve got an email you send out to the same people frequently. Now that you have your tags in place, you can easily create segments so that you don’t have to do the and/or segmentation each time. The first thing you’ll do is go to your audience and click Manage Contacts. In that dropdown, you’ll see “Segments” — select that. Then select “Create Segment.” Now you’re ready to enter your criteria:…
So You Didn’t Have A Goal Set Up In Google Analytics?
It’s ok. I promise. So, you should have been tracking goals in Google Analytics all this time, but you didn’t know how to set it up and now you do but you don’t have any data to show. There is at least something that can redeem the situation! Let’s talk about how we can look at a conversion rate retroactively. You won’t be able to see conversion dollars, but this will at…
Gifs Have Come To MailChimp!
If you’re a regular MailChimp user, you’ve probably noticed some changes recently. Some are major changes such as the expanded functionality of tags which is by far the easiest way to segment emails. Others are small changes, and yet others are just plain cool. One of the latter is the ability to place an animated gif in an email right from MailChimp. Animated gifs are a great way to add an engaging…
How To Segment Using Tags In MailChimp
Fine, I’ll say it. If you’ve got 25 lists in MailChimp (now called “audiences”), you’ve got about 24 too many. In order to easily segment and suppress members of your list, you should have only one main list in which the majority of your contacts live. I know, this is probably different than how you currently have your lists set up. However, I promise this is the way to go in order…
It’s Like Excel On Steroids
Most of us are using Excel to manage any number of things, right? *everyone nods in agreement* I’d like to invite you to try my go-to spreadsheet software: Airtable. You guys, this thing is like Excel on steroids (in a good way). I use it exclusively to manage advertising campaigns, editorial calendars, speaking engagements, and more. Here are just a few of the reasons why I love it so much: It is…
Quite Possibly The Best Oops Email I’ve seen In A Long Time
First of all, if you do email marketing, you should be aware of Really Good Emails. It is a great resource and source of inspiration and their email newsletter is one of the few I subscribe to AND actually open. Recently they did what happens to everyone occasionally — they sent out an email with an error in it. Upon realizing their mistake, it was time for a mea culpa. This was the rather…
Friends Don’t Let Friends Boost Posts
You’ll find out what I mean by that ^^^ at an in-depth webinar all about Facebook advertising hosted by the West Virginia Association of Museums. Registration is required but you don’t have to be a WVAM member to attend. This webinar is perfect for small to mid-size arts organizations of all types looking to get started with Facebook advertising or take your campaigns to the next level. More information and registration —>…
Stop! Before You Send An Email To That Old List…
Clean your list! If I had a nickel for every client who emailed me in a panic because MailChimp (or Constant Contact or Emma or whoever) froze their account because an exceptionally high bounce or SPAM rate raised red flags… Nine times out of ten it is the result of an email that went out to an old list. If you are thinking of sending a reactivation email to a list you…
It’s Here! The 2017 Digital Marketing Benchmark Study
It is one of the best times of year! Capacity Interactive has published their most recent Arts Industry Digital Marketing Benchmarking Study findings. In looking at these findings year-over-year, it is interesting to see what has changed and what hasn’t. I highly recommend that you download the report for yourself, but here are some tidbits I found particularly interesting: We asked how organizations are informing their new site designs and found that,…
It Isn’t Just About The Price!
In the arts administration world, there is always a lot of talk about things that relate to the cost of admission. Are prices too high that they are preventing people from attending? Should we offer free events to bring new people in the doors? Quick, let’s do a discount to sell some last-minute tickets! There is a host of data that shows that discounting and offering free events alone with the aim…
A Library Is Winning Instagram Stories
Yep, that’s right. A library. The New York Public Library is getting people to read the classics 10 seconds at a time using what they call “Insta Novels”. The launch of Insta Novels has been a resounding success. The library says it has seen an increase of 100,000 new Instagram followers and over 40,000 readers completed Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. My first thought is that this could be a great way to make…
Everything I Ever Needed To Know About Arts Marketing, I Learned From Mister Rogers
It’s no secret that I’m a huge fan of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. When I was a kid, it was the only TV show I was allowed to watch. (I’m not kidding, ask my mother.) As a native Pittsburgher, I was lucky enough to be in his presence with some frequency. I saw him more than once at Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra concerts and even got the chance to talk with him briefly after…
The Best Time To Send Email
The one question I always get when I talk about email marketing at conferences or in workshops is, “When is the best day and time to send an email?” My answer is, inevitably, something about how there isn’t a definite answer for this. Each organization is different as is targeting segment within an organization’s list. For example, if you have segments of parents (to whom you talk about your children’s programs) and…
More Changes To Facebook Ad Targeting
Facebook has been rolling out changes to how advertisers are able to target users through advertising campaigns, and they have announced additional changes to take place by the end of September. The changes are as a result of the whole The Cambridge Analytica debacle which exposed just how detailed the data is that Facebook collects. Some of these include: Elimination of Partner data No more Custom Audience sizes New terms and conditions for…