Impactful Insights – a data-driven approach to audience development

Creative Scene is part of Arts Council England’s Creative People and Places initiative. This initiative has seen significant investment into key areas of England where involvement in the arts is significantly below the national average.

Creative Scene was established in 2014 in the North Kirklees area located within West Yorkshire. The place is a non-metropolitan suburban area located between Leeds and Manchester and includes the towns of Batley, Dewsbury Batley, Birkenshaw, Birstall, Cleckheaton, Dewsbury, Gomersal, Heckmondwike, Liversedge and Mirfield.                                                                                                 Photo: Batley Festival 2018. © Mark Bickerdike

Since 2014 they have welcomed over 130,000 to 141 cultural events. This is a huge achievement in an area identified within the bottom 33% of places where involvement in the arts is significantly below the national average.

The success of their activity is down to a variety of reasons – but one core contributing factor has been a curiosity to understand in-depth the people and place of the small towns that make up the area.

This cycle of development is consistently informed by thorough data collection, analysis and reflection on what the insights tell us about their audiences and their cultural experiences of their work.

Follow their data-driven journey where they:

• Share insights about the value of using data to better understand and engage audiences;
• Outline the challenges of capturing a comprehensive data picture in an area with limited cultural infrastructure and a lesser engaged population;
• Highlight the importance of using a broad data set in order to inform and create evidence-based insights and cultural activity that reflects the diverse communities in a non-metropolitan area.

Bingo Balls © Len Grant

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