In this learning case study Louise Yates from Back to Ours shares her experience of delivering a large-scale production for the community, by the community. She explains how dialogue, engagement and listening to local audiences became key.

This webinar recording is one of four Digital Heritage Lab webinars that took place in April and May 2020 to provide free support to small and medium sized heritage organisations during the COVID-19 pandemic.  In this webinar Becki Morris and Sarah Simcoe look at understanding and removing the barriers to digital inclusion; roles and responsibilities; ... Read more

In the second of three think-pieces, Andrew McIntyre argues that rather than looking backwards in an effort to re-create the way we were, this crisis presents us with a unique opportunity to take a leap forwards. Here he shares The 7 Pillars of Audience-focus, a framework to help us do that.

In this first of three think-pieces, Andrew McIntyre, Morris Hargreaves McIntyre (MHM) argues  that the phenomenal effort we’re all putting into giving audiences access to our digital content needs to be re-framed as a series of radical experiments that can make our post-Covid organisations far more audience-focused.

An audience workbook for performing artists written by Lisa Baxter, The Experience Business and beautifully illustrated by Philippe Brasseur. Designed by Creative Scotland. Supported by The National Lottery through Creative Scotland. Created to inform the ‘audience benefit’ element of Creative Scotland’s Touring Fund application its uses aren’t limited to just that. It can be used in many ways and ... Read more

This guide and template created by Thrive will help you identify your ideal audiences.

This training video is based on the Action Research project Not for the likes of you, which carried out a study of 32 cultural organisations that have successfully become accessible to a wider audience by changing their overall positioning and message.

The Urban Playground Team share their experience of involving audiences in the creative process and building positive relationships with funders.

In this JAM article Malgorzata Zamorska evaluates the success of the concert Kwartludium in Wonderland in opening a door to contemporary music for children.

Luoghi Comuni 2014 – “Play with us” was the sixth edition of a festival organised each year by Etre Associazione (a network of Italian performing arts companies).  The 2014 festival took place in Mantova.  Participating companies were given the remit of producing (or adapting) theatre that would bring performers closer to their audience to create ... Read more

This guide was developed by the US nonprofit National Arts Marketing Project – a programme of Americans for the Arts, and is full of innovative case studies and fresh, bold ideas to boost audience development and revenue. Inviting naked cyclists into a museum to find new audiences? Bringing art to the local laundromat to promote ... Read more

This research undertaken in 2011 by Morris Hargreaves McIntyre on behalf of Creative New Zealand, uses two sector specific products Audience Atlas and Culture Segments to identify and understand arts, culture and heritage audiences in New Zealand. The research is designed to help arts, culture and heritage organisations to target, reach and engage with new audiences and meet ... Read more

In this white paper Ballet Memphis and National Arts Strategies (USA) share the findings of the initial stage of fact finding work that set out to ‘reinvent’ Ballet Memphis by ‘building bridges to new communities and planning a variety of sustainable scenarios for the future business model’.  It gives a fascinating insight into the questions ... Read more

A report looking at how cultural organisations can better understand disabled people as audiences, the barriers they may face and how they access the sector. This research-based report includes data on audience behaviour, as well as an analysis of the barriers that must be overcome, such as access, and how those involved in audience development ... Read more

An article, The Unusual Suspects, contextualises arts audience segmentation but also seeks to provide a new model for the 21st century based on key understandings about how audiences want to engage with the arts and how they want to be communicated with. The Culture Segments segmentation model presents eight segments that offer a common language ... Read more

An essential guide to learning how to speak fluent ‘Artistic Director’, enabling you to build a positive working relationship with the person who programmes your venue.  Respecting each others skills and experience, putting art and audiences on an equal footing, using the audience to influence programming policy and allowing real and authentic CRM practices to ... Read more

What do you get when 12 leading arts innovators get together in a room to discuss audience engagement with artistic excellence?  Answer: a thought provoking, insightful and creative view of modern programming, marketing and communication practices in the arts, where value, quality and excellence take centre stage.

How action research can help an organisation develop a better understanding of its visitors, broaden its audiences and explore new ways of communicating with them. Based on a case study of West Yorkshire Playhouse’s recently-launched programme of audience-focused action research.

How to develop an organisation that is artistically-led and audience focused.  Jodi Myers explains the importance of dialogue between the marketing and programming departments in arts organisations, seeing this as the key to developing ‘the audience for the art, and the art for the audience’.

Jo Taylor, then Head of Marketing and Louise Miles Crust, Artistic Programme Manager – Wales Millennium Centre share their experience of the restructure of Wales Millennium Centre – bringing its arts and programming elements together.