Collections Trust is an independent organisation that works with museums, libraries and galleries to help them improve the management of their collections. For the past two years, Collections Trust has organised a campaign called Hidden Treasures aimed at engaging the public with museum and gallery collections. This case study outlines the process, objectives and outcomes … Read more
Starting in April 2011, the Museum of Modern Art in New York asked its visitors to fill in notecards “I went to MoMA and …” to describe their experiences of the museum. With the simple tools of cards, pencils and tape to stick the cards on to the museum’s lobby wall, the project turned into … Read more
This evaluation of ‘We Play’ – the North West’s celebration of the London 2012 Olympic Games and Paralympic Games – presents a summary of the key outcomes and achievements. The evaluation measured success of the WE PLAY mission was: to create an ambitious and inspiring four year cultural project for young people and local communities … Read more
This document looks at how new technology and social media can be used in the development, production and marketing of the arts. How can digital media help innovation in artistic content and audience or visitor engagement? We see how online strategies are changing and how the use of Flickr, YouTube, Facebook, etc. enable us to … Read more
This guide is for researchers, arts marketers, audience development and community engagement staff seeking to engage general audiences, to evaluate public engagement activities. After explaining what monitoring and evaluation are, it takes you step-by-step through the decisions and actions needed to build a robust evaluation strategy, and gives tools and templates on questions, and hints … Read more
An article about the impact of a processional performance of Emergency Exit Arts’ Runga Rung show in Bournemouth. Programmed by Bournemouth Borough Council’s Arts Development Unit, the events chief aim was to raise the profile of good quality participatory arts work in Bournemouth and saw almost four thousand people take to the streets to enjoy … Read more
This synopsis of research by Dr Gretchen Larsen, lecturer in marketing at Bradford University School of Management, tested a framework depicting the relationship between the consumer’s self-concept, the symbolic properties of music and the consumption context. It looks at how people’s relationship with the arts has changed over time, from passive consumers to whom arts marketers presented information, to … Read more
The New York Public Library (NYPL) describes how they achieved success with social media to reach new audiences and public engagement. Starting out with Twitter and Facebook, then developing a social media strategy which entailed setting SMART objectives(based on KPI’s), achieving internal ‘buy-in’, governance model (‘hub and spoke’), finding the ‘right’ member of staff for each social media platform (e.g. tweeting, … Read more
Organisations can capitalise on existing marketing assets and work with audiences and visitors to create new marketing resources and tools without spending a fortune. Working closely with audiences can help an organisation recognise and develop its marketing assets. This case study of Theatre Royal Stratford East shows how a cultural organisation engaged audiences with its work at a much deeper … Read more
Is the way we communicate about culture doing more harm than good? This report looks at a piece of research performed across ten arts organisations in Newcastle and Gateshead, which tested theories about public engagement. It focuses on the Culture Window campaign, which encouraged families to try out new arts experiences.