The health and economic crisis caused by the coronavirus pandemic has affected the totality of the population, companies and institutions. One of the most affected sectors by this crisis is Culture, especially in the performing arts and, above all, in the live music sub-sector, where it is having the greatest impact. During these months of health emergency, restrictions on venues and mobility have caused live music to almost paralyse all its activity completely. Particularly significant, due to the great repercussions of the pandemic, is the music festival sub-sector, mainly large-scale festivals, which have had to postpone their editions to future years. Thus, 17% of the promoters of this type of event cancelled their edition, 56% postponed it, 21% were held on their dates and 6% took place, but the dates were modified, although they did not take place in the traditional way, neither in terms of programming nor in terms of capacity (BIME, 2020). But, despite this situation, the big Spanish festivals - and the smaller ones - have managed to keep some activity, either by organising smaller events, adjusted to health conditions, or through initiatives that are more distant from the live music activity itself. This article, through a case study, offers an analysis of how the management of public relations can enhance the reputation and survival prospects of music festivals. For this reason, we have focused on Bilbao BBK Live, a modern music festival which has seen its business activity almost completely paralysed. In this way, we aim to offer an analysis of the main public relations actions developed in 2020 and provide some proposals for the other festival sector on which the current pandemic has had such an impact. To do so, we conducted an in-depth interview with the communications manager of the promoter of the event, Last Tour, and studied the Instagram posts published and news from the website by the initiatives launched, through a content analysis. These activities have been targeting different audiences, from all kinds of suppliers to general attendees and sponsors. The results confirm the importance of public relations management as an essential tool in business strategy, even in times of pandemic and with business almost at a standstill. Thus, the different campaigns developed during the pandemic have managed to keep and strengthen the relationships with the different stakeholders of the event: attendees, sponsors, city of Bilbao public administrations and the mass media, although it has also focused special attention on suppliers and collaborators, vulnerable communities in its environment and other bodies in the sector that, for the last few months, have been joining forces to exert pressure on the authorities to demand a return to activity. In the same way, and thanks to the work developed by the communication departments of the festival and its promoter, Last Tour, Instagram has become a key tool in the work of marketing these activities, as well as to improve the engagement of its audience, according with the results obtained in previous research (Klara, 2019; Castro-Martínez, Pérez-Ordoñez, y Torres-Martín, 2020).
Analyzing online search patterns of music festival tourists
