Introduction
Hamilton is a famous Broadway musical devoted to the history of the United States. Based on the story of its success, there is a variety of ways to generate profits in the theater industry, including merchandise, social media strategies, and touring. This essay is devoted to the potential of new content and online contests in converting young people into playgoers and the use of books and films as revenue-generating opportunities.
Leveraging Hamilton’s Success
Making the musical more popular among young people would be extremely positive when it comes to profitability and developing the new generation of theatre lovers. In their book, Aaron and Moorman argue that the practice of leveraging and using opportunities involves “building on the core business to create synergy”. Broadway can use Hamilton’s success as a source of knowledge to convert more teenagers and young adults into habitual playgoers.
First of all, Broadway can achieve the mentioned goal by creating more content that is reflective of their aesthetic preferences. Young people differ from their parents when it comes to tastes in music. The 2015 production of Hamilton utilizes different genres of music, including hip hop, and this variety is among the factors that allow attracting younger viewers. To appeal to this audience, Broadway is recommended to invest in new shows that combine modern and traditional music in a unique way. This strategy involves two potential challenges, such as financial constraints and the reaction of the adult playgoers. To guarantee popularity, it can be necessary to reinterpret the most well-known shows, which involves a lot of work and increased wage expenses. Moreover, trying to meet young people’s interests, Broadway will face the threat of losing its more mature audience that prefers different styles.
Secondly, to make more young people become playgoers, Hamilton’s team can benefit from this age cohort’s social media activity. Modern teenagers and those in their early twenties often fail to survive at least two hours without online communication. Some theater columnists argue that it can be exploited and even advocate for the introduction of “laissez-faire approaches to phone use” (Hassoun, 2016, p. 101). Hamilton’s team can use the play’s success by rewarding young playgoers for sharing their impressions of Hamilton and other projects on social media. For instance, by organizing social media contests, the team will increase the young audience’s interest in visiting Broadway shows. Concerning the challenges peculiar to the strategy, contests aimed at young social media users can cause older Broadway fans’ discontent. Thus, the team needs to make sure that all contests attract the required age group but do not discriminate against other playgoers.
Alternative Revenue-Generating Options
Prior to being implemented, leveraging options should be analyzed and evaluated to avoid the use of ineffective and costly development strategies. Aaker and Moorman propose the following evaluation criteria: attractiveness of the product market, core business’s success and transferability to new product markets, new businesses’ chances to become market leaders, and leverage strategies’ repeatability.
The revenue-generating options for Hamilton include creating a high-quality film version of the musical and distributing it in cinema theatres in the U.S. and abroad. Despite decreases in movie attendance rates that took place in the 1990s, the cinema industry market is still profitable and attracts new entrants (Gil & Gutierrez-Navratil, 2017). The success of the team’s core business, live performances, is also obvious as Hamilton tickets used to cost up to $500 (Aaker & Moorman, 2017). The core business can be easily adapted to the new market just by changing the format of the show. The musical is hugely popular, but Broadway show tickets may be too expensive for some populations. The proposed decision will provide less wealthy people with an affordable alternative to visiting the live show. The musical’s popularity is likely to make its video version regarded as a competitor to high-grossing movies, but the presence of its market leadership potential remains an open question. The growth option being discussed is relatively simple and easy to implement. Due to that, the experiment can be repeated with other Broadway projects in the future.
Apart from selling merchandise, Hamilton’s team can grow the show’s revenues with the help of books about the play, its history, and funny situations behind the scenes. The book market is still associated with substantial profits, especially when it comes to highly visual books (Button, 2019). Hamilton’s team is extremely successful in its primary business, which is clear from the show’s profits. The business can be transferred to the new field by compiling exciting facts about the show and rare photos and presenting them in printed and electronic books. It will be hard for Hamilton to become a new market leader, but the show’s fans will definitely give the book a warm reception. In case of success, it will be possible to duplicate the strategy and create books about other Broadway musicals.
Conclusion
Finally, being able to recognize new opportunities and leverage success is among the key traits of successful teams in different industries. Broadway can leverage Hamilton’s success to increase the number of young playgoers by investing in shows that use their favorite styles of music and rewarding this age group for popularizing musicals on social media. Other growth options for Hamilton include publishing the book for the musical’s fans and presenting the film version of the play to reach less wealthy audiences.
References
Aaker, D.A., & Moorman, C. (2017). Strategic market management (11th ed.). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.
Button, L. (2019). BookExpo education: “The state of the publishing industry today” [Blog post]. Web.
Gil, R., & Gutierrez-Navratil, F. (2017). Does television entry decrease the number of movie theaters? Economic Inquiry, 55(2), 736-756.
Hassoun, D. (2016). Engaging distractions: Regulating second-screen use in the theater. Cinema Journal, 55(2), 89-111.