I’m writing this in Bridlington on the east coast of Yorkshire sat in café by the sea.
I always forget how something as simple as a change of scenery – in this case the North Sea with a fishing boat just coming into the harbour – can refresh your mind and help with clarity. It’s been a while since I did an update – a combination of time (writing with a three year old is tricky), touring (I was finishing my storytelling tour through to April) and then, simply, the relentlessness of work. I’ve done quite a lot since that last update so, rather than try and pick up things that are months ago I thought I’d do some bits from the past month or so. Oh, and I’ve finished with a classic “wait, is this a good idea”.
Enjoy.
💻 Microsoft Ads
I’d never done the Microsoft version of Google Ads – essentially adverts on Bing. If you know Google Ads then it’s quite easy to pick up and a less competitive marketplace than Google – although arguably it’s less sophisticated. Worth it? I’m not sure truthfully (as can be the case with some marketing) – I used it for our room hire and events business for which it is very tricky to track ROI. I’d probably try it again on other campaigns alongside google in the future.
📖 Programmes
I got a decision to radically change Theatr Clwyd’s programmes from 2027 over the line. Programmes are contentious – some people love them, some people think they’re a lot of adverts. They’ve been in decline with us for a while despite efforts to make change – they’ll be replaced with something free that’ll lose less money, have lower organisational impact (both in terms of cost and capacity) and (hopefully) make the audience experience better. It feels nicely inclusive that everyone will get the same thing and will give a space for us to talk directly to audiences.
🌳 Outdoor Blog Post
I wrote this blog post about some of the external works happening at Theatr Clwyd. I think lots of the time we get very giddy about video and short form content and forget the written word. It’s tricky to turnaround successfully for us – making sure translation is factored in – but I was pleased to get this done and get some lovely comments (and nip the question of why the gardens aren’t finished in the bud*). Deliberate pun. I think if I had more time in my work life I’d spend more of it creating the beautiful, well-written, slightly click-bait content that constantly draws me in – telling a story, not rehashing a press release.
💡 Revamped Heritage Trail
Sometimes you do something and it doesn’t work. We’ve had it with shows, with events and with projects. I think we sometimes get hung up on things and it can be hard to make changes – it’s the sunk cost fallacy. I’ve had a few projects now where we’ve reinvented the thing we’re selling after the onsale with success. For Theatr Clwyd’s Heritage Trail I redid the artwork, rewrote the copy and we relaunched it softly and quietly. Suddenly a few more visitors…
🧼 Cleaning A Server (Boring)
This. Is. Dull. Maintenance is not a cool thing to talk about but it is vitally important to the smooth running of any team. The best use of 30 mins to release 35GB of server space so that we can actually design the Spring 2027 brochure! Nowadays there is so little downtime for any team. The old days of June to August being barren landscapes of silence have long gone. I think every team has an equivalent of PAT testing – the stuff that makes sure a team works efficiently, quickly, and without breaking down (too much). I think I wish I’d more time to do it.
🚧 Upgrading the Stiwdio Clwyd website
I built the Stiwdio Clwyd website in late 2025 in a week using wordpress and elementor (with hosting from Big Wet Fish). It was a bit of a last resort build in lieu of having the cash to afford anyone else to build it. I also designed this site btw! It’s not perfect but it’s got us through year one and, crucially, is billingual and, touch wood, works. The stats look really promising – continually increasing audiences visiting and the SC team really taking ownership (mostly because of my lack of time but they’ve done an admirable job). The upgrades are boring mostly background stuff which should make it last a little longer! One of the pleasing things was reminding myself of a site I made in a rush and discovering some sensible things I did then that have saved me time now.
📰 Spring 2027 Press Release
I’m not a natural at press – I’m not a natural as smoozing people necessarily and always struggle with the follow up that really great press people do. We were between national press agencies so I wrote and sent our Spring ’27 release. I was quite pleased with it – sometimes I forget that I can write a bit (and not just whimsical 90 minute storytelling shows). It got picked up better than I’d hoped (but slightly less than I’d have liked!).
📽️ Cinema Pacing
This is cool if you’re a) a geek and b) run a cinema. Cinema lead times are horrific – at best 4 weeks for a new release – that means you have to be absolutely focused if you’re to look for opportunities to maximise income or add performances. I made a simple sales tracker in PowerBi that looks at sales as a % of capacity and then conditionally highlights where changes need to be. Crucially it’s a single data set update to make it work. 5 mins work twice a week to feel on top of that data a little more. The cinema is a neglected thing at the moment, so it was nice to spend a little time on it!
👨🏫 Facebook Ads Analysis
Facebook Ads are tricky to analyse. I’ve been working on taking the right data from Meta Ads Suite (harder than it sounds), cleaning it a little and then creating a custom Claude.ai project to analyse the data and give me recommendations. I’m not 100% at ease with the AI element, but it’s yielded useful suggestions, particularly around the text analysis of our posts – for example the extent to which emoji’s increase engagement and the vital necessity of proof (e.g. a review) to drive clicks – although I’d caveat you always have to double-check how it’s come up with each bit of advice (it doesn’t necessarily know all the sales context)!
🍽️ Tevalis Analytics on PowerBi
We use tevalis for our restaurant and bars. The data is a lot easier to understand than Spektrix or facebook ads, but does require an understanding of how the menu and offers are structured. I’ve noticed increasingly that when new systems are set up the last question that’s asked is “will this help me analyse this”. Anyway I built an analytics page that interrogated the data to find some interesting and actionable information – for example, set menus often have a higher spend-per-head than a la carte menus. Also pie sales are not a summer dish. Stuff you might guess but not necessarily know. Interesting right?
🎞️ A New Organisational Film
We worked with my favourite filmmaker Alex Harrison to make a cool organisational film. It’s only 30 seconds but encapsulates the organisation – see it here (halfway down the page). I love making films and this sort of creative practice – sadly I rarely get to do it which is a shame because I have some made editing skills that you wouldn’t expect (and I’ve fallen back in love with Premiere Pro since it brought in automated object tracking!).
🧑💻 Google Ads with Youtube
I can go for a few months without digging into Google Ads and then have to revive the skill. I got back into it in a big way for a few campaigns who had some great video assets. The ability to get reach using youtube ads is remarkable. The CTR and ROI isn’t great, but when rolled into a solid marketing funnel is a useful thing to have! There’s also some great training resources available for Google Ads (although we also have a friendly Google expert who helps us out too!).
📊 Baker Richards Advantage Dashboard
I’m not often impressed by other people’s data things but I’ve been massively impressed with Baker Richard’s Advantage Dashboard. The first time I saw it we passed on it – mostly because I was doing similar stuff on PowerBi and I’m a competitive soul and, frankly, while it was good, it wasn’t great. This time however I was blown away to the extent where Theatr Clwyd is now signed up and it will form some of the data structure to underpin data analysis after I leave. More here.
💁♂️ Advice on Tour Booking
I’ve been doing this for ages but never really talk about it. I was so proud to see my mate Alastair Clark‘s show Off The Record on tour – he’s incredibly talented and I was really thrilled to be able to help him develop his tour pack and construct some touring plans. He’s touring in the Spring and I’d really recommend booking it if you’ve a 70 – 150 seat venue (message me if you want me to connect you). I also helped out my comedic hero a bit with some tour information. I’d rather not say who they are, but suffice to say they are smashing it and gave me a lovely hug!
And finally…
I was driving back from Yorkshire on Saturday Night listening to a documentary about Jerry Garcia and The Grateful Dead. It was talking about how they were influential in developing fan culture and live events – arguably more than The Beatles. It got me thinking about membership schemes – often under-loved, often burdened with financial targets – and whether they should be about developing fan-culture instead. Fandom is about connection and affinity, and that fandom is expressed through engagement and subsequent fiscal investment – maybe membership needs to be redeveloped and given more space to be bold, take risks, share the joy and reward our most valuable audiences.
I’ve less than 10 weeks left at Clwyd and so not many of these left to write. I wonder what I might be writing about in six months time. I’m sending out of a load of CVs this week and kicking my future into action a bit – as always, if you’re reading this and recruiting (or would want me to do some work for you!) then do drop me a line.