KCTLive.ca Interview

Published: August 29 2008

Feature Project > KCTLive.ca Interview with Randy Zahara, Theatre Manager for the Kelowna Community Theatre - All clients are excited about their new websites and the impact it has on their business. Compliments from customers, increased exposure, increased traffic, increased revenue, etc. But what happens after the dust settles? They say investment in a website can be ammortized over 5 years. That's how long a typical website design will be effective and continue delivering results before it might need a little "freshening up". So what do customers think of their websites a year later after the excitement of a new launch is gone? KCTLive.ca is the official website for the Kelowna Community Theatre and it was completely redesigned and developed a year ago. We asked Randy Zahara, Theatre Manager for the Kelowna Community Theatre if his website still cuts the mustard... so to speak...

DotCom Media (DCM) - The new website with the new design was launched almost a year ago, what benefits has the new website brought to your organization?

Zahara - We now have a web site that we are proud of.  In the past our web site looked quite amateurish, so we did not actively promote it.  Now that we have our new website, which I think is one of the better "Theatre" sites in the province, we actively drive people to the site using it as an effective marketing tool.  We are getting close to 2000 unique visits a month on our site now and it is not only being used by people interested in the events at the theatre, but also by people and organizations looking to rent our theatre.

DCM - Were there any benefits as outcomes to the new website that you didn't expect going into the process?

Zahara - Having an excellent site, not only helps sell the productions happening at the theatre, it really helps to sell the theatre to potential renters.  We also used to send promotional packages out to renters with technical and rental information, but now that we have a comprehensive site that is easily updated, we no longer need to waste that extra money on all that paper, which is also better for the environment.

DCM - What benefits has your organization realized in moving into a database-driven events calendar?

Zahara - It is much easier to keep current, much more user friendly for our potential clients, it is far more dynamic and provides opportunities for numerous links for people who want more details about our events and it gives us feedback on the people that are visiting our site so we can make decisions on future online marketing strategies.

DCM - Has bringing your website to this level got you thinking about any cool new solutions you would like implemented on the website? If so what are they and how would they help?

Zahara - Yes, we would really like to go to a printable version of our calendar that we could encourage hotels and motels and others in the tourism industry to use.  We often get request from the concierge desks of local hotels to find out what is on, and not all of their customers have access to computers or know where to look locally, so, having the ability to give them a printable page from our calendar would be a great help.

DCM - How important is the KCTLive.ca website to the Kelowna Community Theatre?

Zahara - It is our most important marketing and communications tool.  Most of the other marketing we do is designed to drive people to our KCTLive.ca website.  So it is incredibly important to us.

DCM - Does the Kelowna Community Theatre put a lot of effort into promoting the theatre and the website? If so how?

Zahara - Yes, we have weekly advertisements in eVent magazine, on CHBC TV and Global TV and on Power 104.7 FM and B103 Country to promote our web site.

Thanks Randy!