Warren Wilansky, Founder of the agency «Plank» points out that pivoting digital is not simply a workaround for the pandemic but an essential task for the future of cultural institutions. Future generations are fully digital and might not want to access Institutions in a way it is done today, they want different experiences and want to connect in different ways. Insofar, making your collection available online is an investment into the future but digital is an enhancement, not a replacement. it adds value.
For example: think about micro-donations as they are already usual in American politics. The internet might unleash this potential for museums as well, at least for those with a big followership.
Wilansky also points out that museums should be trying not to reach everybody but the minimal viable audience. What is the audience that wants to connect with you and your organisation?
The 5 main takeaways:
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you have the duty to serve the larger community
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The future of the organisations is in the hand of digital natives
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Reach future generations online by going to where they gather
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Constant innovation and experimentation
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Serve with generosity from an accessibility standpoint
The Barnes Foundation has moved their adult education online, offering four to seven new classes per month. Since spring 2020 the Barnes Foundation has enrolled 4500 students across 73 courses which has produced an additional revenue stream of 715.000 Dollars. This also enabled them to hand out more scholarships for people who can’t afford the courses. However, this was only possible with the help of the expertise of their advanced IT and AV teams. One very helpful tool was the deep Zoom function allowing for extremely close access to artworks on the screen.
Interesting was also that about 85% of the users were watching the courses life rather than recorded.
The Barnes has now established a strategic content team: it develops an institutional content plan and makes sure that the programmes are properly evaluated. For the future, the Barnes Foundation will try to further align their special exhibitions with the online classes and extend their online offerings. What is particularly interesting is that they are looking for other institutions to collaborate with.
Ian Ellard explained that the V&A also had to pivot their academy programme to online, which they did via Teams, with a team for each course which worked out nicely. Like other institutions, they were able to massively increase their reach. But even more so they become a kind of online course provider in their own rights. Whereas before the main preposition was that courses were supposed to be brilliant because they took place «in the V&A» now it was the fact that they were produced «by the V&A». Obviously in this case just as with the Barnes Foundation it helps that the courses are in English as this opens up a huge market. So they could develop courses around themes that would particularly attract people for example from the Caribbean or people of colour.
«Mystery at the Museum» was a fundraiser by the Oxford University Museum of Natural History, a fantastic collection of fossils, taxidermies, etc.. in a neo-gothic building. It was an event for an online audience (particularly aimed at kids from 7-12) streamed live via YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. The central idea: A person (A TV presenter for natural history programs for children ) was trapped at night in the museum. So the museum turned into a spooky escape room. The task of the online audience was to provide Sam, the trapped TV presenter, with clues that would help him to leave the museum. Part of the story was also, that an important collection object was missing and had to be found. Everyone could sign up for free as a detective. At the same time, various donation levels were offered. After registering a personalized email was sent to the «dear detective». The online event was a huge success with about 120.000 life views and at least 16.000 people who deeply engaged in the event.
The People’s History Museum in Manchester, a museum dedicated to the history of democracy did a crowdfunder to support their audience engagement activities. When starting a crowdfunder you should first think about what should be funded. What is the ask? Donors are attracted to something specific, saving something or building something new. You also need to think about whether the ask is «relevant, is compassionate and sensitive to the timing».
The museum calculated that the cost of engagement activities was 903 pounds a day and that this was the focus of the campaign. The crowdfunder was named «secure our future». It was pushed via Social Media, particularly Twitter. They tried to engage everyone, particularly celebrities who worked with them before by sending them personal emails asking for a five-minute video they could use for their campaign, no meeting involved: just Spare five minutes and record a video for us. The eight videos they got from high calibers like Melvyn Bragg were extremely helpful
The event made clear that digital offerings such as online courses or crowdfounders can be interesting ways of adding revenue streams for cultural institutions. Obviously, it is helpful to have a big initial followership, support by media or celebrities when trying to reach a digital audience. Big institutions, therefore, are at an advantage. The fact that many more people speak English than German is also an advantage. But the fact is also that many even big institutions ins Switzerland still don’t really try to unleash the potential that lies in a proper digital representation that would cater not only to their traditional audiences visiting their building. For smaller countries like Switzerland, the German-speaking market altogether still carries a potential of almost 100 Mill visitors. It could be an interesting strategy to think about outreach beyond the traditional physical periphery towards a wider audience and why not think about offerings for English speakers as well. Just consider the Landesmuseum in Zürich doing an exhibition on Swiss emigration and offering history courses in English aimed particularly at the descendants of Swiss immigrants in the Americas.