How much should I spend on ads for a 300-capacity show?

It’s less about the budget and more about putting the money in the right place, at a size that matches the show.

I’m not going to put an ad in front of someone telling them to buy from you if they’ve never seen you or heard of you before, I’m more likely to put a snippet of a video up and ask them to follow you. The only time you can push people to buy is when they’re right there with you, and they already know they want it before they get the ad. It’s like Birkenstocks: when yours die, you buy another pair, because you already know and love them.

So start with the people who already know you, get them onto a sign-up or your mailing list, and let them hear first.

Then I’d work it out per head, something like $7 of marketing for every ticket you need to sell, either to sell out or to hit your break-even number. If it’s a tour and you can’t afford an ad for every show, run one ad for the whole tour, $300 or $500 across it.

Ads look very healthy at the beginning, when everyone’s signing up and the urgency is there, and then each ticket gets more expensive to sell as you go, so I run a sprint around the first fortnight of the on-sale and go quiet on ads after that.

And keep an eye on it early, so you can tell whether you’re throwing money into a money pit or it’s working.