Advice for anime convention

[nancylebov]

I recently got email from someone who's starting an anime convention at a university. He hasn't asked for my advice, but I'm probably going to offer some anyway. In the interests of improving the odds of it being good advice, I'm checking with my flist.

The convention is planned for April, with the weekend not yet chosen. The intent is to do intensive publicity once they've got guests and dealers.

My reaction is to say "Oh my God! Choose a date and start publicity immediately!!11!!" However, there may be more slack for that sort of thing for university and/or anime conventions. Is there any slack left for when the publicity should start?

Comments

[hughcasey.livejournal.com]

Publicity needs to start NOW! April is to damned close. He needs to get his guests and dealers lined up right away. Most cons give themselves a YEAR or more to line this stuff up, not four months!

(Granted, last year Philcon pulled itself together in 2 months, but we'd all been doing it for a while, and we had venue, guests, artists, and dealers already lined up!)

I don't know that he has enough time, TBH.

[madfilkentist]

To qualify my comments, I have no experience with anime cons and next to none with college cons. But I really doubt those factors can give a huge advantage in time.

I'd be amazed if any convention could come off in April from a standing start in January. The shortest start-to-con case I know of was ConCertino in 1992, when MASSFILC decided in February to hold the con, and held it in June. Even then, we had the advantage of replacing an existing con (ConCerto) that had been cancelled.

A lot depends on how good an organization is behind the con, and on how much other preparation they've done. For instance, do they have guests yet?

Maybe they can do it; I'd be highly impressed.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

They're planning to choose a date and start publicity by the end of this month. I might huckster there. I have fond memories of a SWILcon(?) that had 50 attendees where I made $250. So if they get 200 people (they're hoping for 700), I might do alright.

[thnidu.livejournal.com]

In addition to the other commenters, I'd say don't even try for April starting now.

I'll pass this along to #1 son, who is into anime and may have advice.

[thespian.livejournal.com]

also, where is it? I ask because the last weekend of March is Anime Boston. They get about 12,000 people, and if they want people from outside the university, the don't want to follow too closely on its tails. Further away from here the more of a difference, but with 12k people, Anime Boston gets a lot of anime people blowing their wad right then.

[gildedacorn.livejournal.com]

The university in whose library I am currently sitting has a small gaming convention every year. They have some basic things done already, but the actual work is just starting now, and the convention's in March.

The thing about college conventions is that they don't have the massive overhead issues that ordinary conventions do. For example, they get the site for free, there's no hotel issue (unless the guests come from far enough away that they need one, in which case they get it themselves), and publicity is mostly a combination of word of mouth, repeat attendees, and posters and a web page. We get around 50 people, depending mostly on whether there's a snowstorm that weekend.

Which doesn't mean it shouldn't start as soon as possible, just that it's not the disastrous scenario it would be if it were the usual kind of convention.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Really depends on whether the guy wants anyone outside the college and/or his circle of friends to show up, I guess.

[cleverthylacine]

If he wants anyone he

a) doesn't sleep with;
b) doesn't go out to eat with at least twice a month;
c) hasn't slept with in the past;
d) doesn't game with;
e) doesn't know is sleeping with someone he used to sleep with or currently eats or games with regularly;
f) isn't related to by blood or marriage

to show up?

He needed to start at least 6 months ago.

[thnidu.livejournal.com]

He comments:

Hm. My main thoughts..

Guests can be harder to swing on short notice for an anime con than a sci-fi con, because the fandom's professional end is so concentrated. With a sci-fi con you may be able to swing a writer who lives in the nearest city or some such (like how Hal Clement regularly guested at NJAC); with anime, all the suitable stateside guests tend to be concentrated in a few companies. In that way, it's a bit more like arranging guests for a media con, although you have the advantage that voice-actors and translators tend to be much easier guests to arrange than mainstream/big-name media workers.

It really depends on what their cutoff for the definition of a con is. If they just want to have a local thing to raise awareness of their fandom and sound out the area, they might have time; if they want it to be a "Real Con", they certainly don't have enough time. A key thing to bear in mind for an anime con is that they tend to be extremely focused around media showings, moreso than "classic" sci-fi cons, which means clearing up rights and licensing for any series with a US licensor. If they're not prepared for that already, I suspect they don't have enough time to resolve it tidily before April.

But it's an *anime* con

[thnidu.livejournal.com]

See #1 son's comments above.

:-)

[onyxhawke.livejournal.com]

Heh, i thought you were on my list somewhere... I just haven't looked atLJ in forever and two cons...

Love the buttons :-)

[nolly.livejournal.com]

How big an event is he thinking of? There's a big difference between a traditional full-weekend con with independent facilities and a one-day student-oriented event using university space.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

It's a two day event. They're hoping for 700 people. I don't know where they got that number from, and I don't know what facilities they're using, though university facilities seems like a good bet if they're doing it on such short notice.

[landley.livejournal.com]

That's not enough time. They should have started advertising months ago. I expect they're going to belly flop badly. To do a convention right, you need a full year to organize it.

That said, the sequence of events is:

1) Get a fixed date and time. Until then, the event doesn't _exist_. (Having a university means you don't have to negotiate with a hotel to get space, which is nice and keeps the budget down. But you still need a _specific_ weekend in a specific place to invite anybody or advertise to paying attendees.)

2) Invite your guests and panelists and so on. (To get the hard to get ones you have to ask them a year in advance.) Nail down the attractions you're going to advertise which will make people want to come. Get that in place fast. Your advertising can overlap with this, but what have you got _to_ advertise before this part is locked down?

3) Advertise, advertise, advertise. Advertise online, hit other conventions and do room parties and hand out flyers, post flyers around your university, find local anime clubs, find the appropriate mailing lists, etc.

In general? Now to april is about 1/3 as much time as they're actually going to _need_.