Storm Festival
India’s most authentic camp-out Music Festival

Who?

Storm Festival is the most authentic camp-out music festival in India. It is touted as an annual open air love letter to the beauty of nature. An eclectic mix of Music and camping set in the hills of Coorg, Storm Festival has already garnered accolades across the globe. Promoted by Liquidspace Entertainment Pvt. Ltd, Storm has successfully completed its first year in existence and has started the preparations for the 2nd successful year.

What?

Storm festival is an eco-friendly, camp-out music festival set in the hills of Coorg, Karnataka. The location is a hillock called Napoklu where a 28 acre piece of land surrounded by the river Kaveri on 3 sides. Storm is a multi-stage, multi-genre music festival; it had a bunch of bands performing their own creations and Indian and International DJs belting out Electronic Dance Music. Storm is the first of iots kind in India with a camp-out facility where festival goers can stay at the festival grounds itself. Utmost importance was given to the “Green Festival” tag with extra care going into environmental conservation and eco-friendly nature.

The organizers of the festival, Liquidspace Entertainment Pvt.Ltd, run by brothers Lavin and Sachin were already our clients while we worked along with them on their website. They had the trust to give us the complete digital front to us and let us have a free hand on the creatives and promotions. The services we rendered includes

a. Website
b. Social Media
    a. Facebook
    b. Twitter
    c. Youtube
c. Paid/Viral online promotions

The website of the festival became a hot topics within days of its launch with industry stalwarts NH7, Indiecision and Gibson Guitar writing rave reviews about the website.CNN Go tagged it as one of the top 10 events to attend in the country even before the first edition was executed. The website created ample publicity and buzz into the festival. The whole site was made on 2 simple words, HAPPY & NATURE. The interactive nature of the site and the ambient happiness of the theme made it an instant success in the events industry with veterans like Nikhil Chinapa sit up and take notice. To accentuate the success of the site and to create public buzz about the festival we launched the Social Media channels.

Twitter and Facebook pages for the festival was launched in May 6, 2011. With the tentative dates of the festival 6 months away, our team had the gargantuan task of creating an awareness about the festival. The organizers had full faith in us and decided to do away completely with traditional media and trust the New Media for this new festival. The strategy paid off handsomely, with Twitter amassing 2000 odd followers in just a month’s time and Facebook crossing the coveted 10000 fan mark in just under 2 months. Storm Festival was the most discussed and awaited event of the season.

The effectiveness of the social media channels were proved when we had 65% of the people discussing about the festival. The artists and their fans were also quick to embrace the event. When the tickets were launched, Storm Festival did the impossible; the early bird tickets were sold off in JUST 3 DAYS! It was unheard of in Indian Music Industry, a new festival selling off their inventory of early birds in just 3 days. The festival tickets also were selling like hot cakes since the moment it was launched. Bookmyshow.com was the ticketing partner. The event was scheduled to happen on 11 and 12 Nov, 2011.

Then disaster struck; the weather conditions in Coorg became chaotic with heavy rains lashing out across Coorg. The whole venue was under heavy downpour with certain parts of the venue experiencing water logging and slush pools. The organizers had no other go but to postpone the event with just 6 days to go. All the stake holders were expecting a heavy public backlash, especially from the people who already booked tickets and made plans. The whole social media team of CrossWorks DGTL was working around the clock to make sure the festival goers and public were not antagonized. The whole fiasco turned out to be the biggest advantage for the organizers with the media and the public lauding the way the whole issue was managed. Facebook and Twitter were filled with hundreds of feeds from the fans and followers regarding the positive and proactive way in which CrossWorks managed the whole issue. The festival was rescheduled to happen on 20-21 Jan, 2012 and again the early birds got sold out in just 3 days. The tickets were promoted only thru digital media until media partners, MTV and Times Of India came into the fold. By then the festival was 80% with the tents completely sold out. The online promotions were reaching a fever pitch with more promotions coming from peer-to-peer communication rather than the promotions. The event was sold out with the organizers reopening the ticket window on the 2nd day of the festival again to sell 250 tickets more than planned.

Benchmarks.

1. Online
        a. The only Indian music festival to have featured in more than 100 blogs and              news articles since the day of launch
        b. Rave reviews for the event/social media from media as well as public

2. Facebook –
        a. 10000 fans in just under 2 months
        b. 14400 fans as of March 1st, 2012
        c. 65% of ticket sales thru Facebook promotions

3. Twitter
        a. 2000 followers in just 1 month
        b. Trended thrice, during the period November, 2011- Jan 2012.
        c. Celebrities and artists patronizing the festival.

4. Ticket sales
        a. Digital media was the only medium of promotions
        b. Early bird tickets sold out in just 3 days.
        c. Sold 250 extra tickets than planned due to public demand.

DGTLisation

Storm festival was the first of its kind in India with no precedents to follow. It was a tough task to create a buzz for a new idea, how much ever innovative it was. The website and social media channels succeeded in creating the right image and impression in public minds. The green nature and the strict “No drugs” policy was promoted aggressively thru online media which garnered international accolades, including CNN Go.

Another feat for us came when in the beginning of the promotions a section of local media turned against the festival, thinking that it would be detrimental to the ecology and culture of Coorg with possibility of littering and drug usage. With comprehensive scanning of the webspace and timely intervention, they were convinced that the festival would be as green as it could be with “zero tolerance” to drugs. Then on it was smooth sailing in terms of permits and public support at Coorg, where the event was to happen.

The postponement of the festival posed another challenge; managing public outrage was a tough task indeed. The whole social media team at CrossWorks DGTL came out of this with flying colors, with accolades raining for the manner in which we managed public criticism. Every comment/mention over the web, positive or negative, was answered within 10 minutes without fail, which made a huge majority of people supporting the decision to postpone and fighting in our favor when occasionally a negative voice was aired.

Lighter moments

Storm festival was one of the most fun-to-work projects till date for CrossWorks DGTL. There were a lot of funny moments during the project. “Our dance floor is at 5000 feet. Unfortunately we have no elevators”- Storm Festival homepage

How will we reach there? Is there mountaineering involved- User “The news comes via the horrendously-designed festival website that seems to have been inspired in equal parts by Pandora, home of the N’avi, and clown puke” – NH7.in announcing the launch. Later they went on to become out partners in artist management and promotions.

Another funny turn of events happened when we had 38 people suggesting us a band from Kolkata thru our “Suggest Artists” link on the website. The “Suggest artists” option was overcrowded by enthusiastic fans who wanted to see their favorite artists performing at the festival.

CrossWorks DGTL is a Bangalore based Digital media agency with operations in Cochin and Trivandrum apart from Bangalore. Established in Jan 2011, CrossWorks DGTL already serves above 30 distinguished clients and has won 3 International Design Awards and 10+ nominations since inception.

To bring us aboard your digital marketing and branding bandwagon, contact us.