Museums and the Web 2011 - Thomas's Recap

The 2011 edition of the international Museums and the Web conference wrapped up this past Saturday and was a 4-day whirlwind of presentations and workshops. Presentations covered many of the exciting new technology projects currently in place and coming up from museums around the world. Topics at the conference ran the gamut from mobile technology to augmented reality to ways of creating interactive communities of constituents online. All of the papers from the conference can be found online at the Museums and the Web’s conference website. Here are just a few of the themes and tidbits that stood out to me from the 4-day conference:

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Crowdsourcing - Now in 6 delicious flavors!

I attended an unconference session, roundtable talks with topics proposed by conference attendees, that aimed to crowdsource the idea of crowdsourcing. The overall feel I got from the discussion was that many museums are taking crowdsourcing very seriously these days. The talk brought up a lot of cool new projects, ranging from including constituents in collections and archives work to new ways to display crowdsourced material.

Johan Oomen, Head of Research of the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision, presented his ideas on how crowdsourcing can now be defined in 6 distinct ways:

Correction & Transcription

Contextualization (Adding to wikis, telling stories)

Complementing the Collection

Classification, Tagging

Co-Curation

Crowdfunding

Out of the Museum, into the streets - taking advantage of geo-location

Geo-location was a popular theme, using GPS and mapping to take information and media from the museum and attach it to a location. Many presentations touched on how this idea could really help visitors build a strong connection to the history and importance of objects and sites of a community.

Some notable projects included PhilaPlace and the Rock Art Mobile Project.

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Access, access, and more access

There was a lot of discussion around how to not only get more content on the web, but also make that content easily accessible. The types of content being made available on the web, for free, ranged from things like online collections to projects like online teaching portals. There was a general call to standardize access to this content and data and to use more open systems to encourage data sharing among organizations.

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Intuitive design - What's the point of building it if no one can figure out how to use it?

The conference featured a variety of opportunities for museum professionals to gain feedback on their projects, one of the most popular being the Mobile Crit Room. A reoccurring theme of these critiques was the emphasis placed on the user experience, how easy was it for someone to use your mobile app/website? The Rock Art Mobile Project led the charge, along with a few others, in insisting that any project's user experience needs to be designed in a way that is both intuitive and immediately easy to use. Building around this concept will ensure that users of all ages and skill levels can take part in a project, not just the tech-savvy ones.

Check out the range of mobile projects from the conference’s Mobile Parade.

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So now you want to build an mobile program? Better be up on some of the new business models.

One of the most informative presentations I attended was the “Getting on (not under) the Mobile 2.0 bus”. This talk featured case studies by MoMA, SFMOMA, Balboa Park and the Smithsonian on the new business models that now exist for developing a mobile program.

Some of the subjects from the presentation included: Digital retail (app/download sales), Donations (e.g. by text message), Sponsorship and ad-supported content, Monetizing data from mobile social media and Using mobile to support membership and other revenue channels. The full paper is available here.

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The Rise of the Mobile Internet

Kristen Purcell, from the Pew Research Center Internet and American Life Project, gave the opening plenary of the conference. Kristen presented on some of the changes in technology from 2000 to 2011. Some pretty surprising stats were thrown up during the presentation. Among them:

• 1 in 3 adults do not have broadband Internet access.
• 69% of Internet users watch online video content, 14% of Internet users upload/create video content.
• 85% of adults will own a cell phone by 2011, making 2011 really the Year of the Mobile. (Purcell stated respondents had difficulty being able to distinguish between what was and was not a smartphone, so that statistic was not available)
• Mobile usage varied among different ethnic groups, Latinos and African Americans were shown to be in the highest percentage of users actively engaging with mobile content.
• 11% of mobile users use their phones to make charitable donations. (These numbers may be skewed by mobile donation drives for large natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina and the recent earthquakes in Japan)
• 35% of adult mobile users have apps on their phones, but only 24% use them.
• The 90:9:1 rule for understanding the level of engagement on social media. It states that 90% of social media users are lurkers, just observing content and never really interacting or contributing. 9% are regular contributors, the ones who often like, retweet or comment on online content. 1% are the super users - always online, always engaged.

These were just a few highlights, for me, of the conference. Coming up, Molly will do her recap on what she found interesting at Museums & the Web 2011. Definitely go to the Museums & the Web conference site to check out all of the presented papers from the conference.

Twitter by Example: Our Favorite Tweeps

Why are some Twitter users so effective at getting your attention while others fall flat?  What can you do to make your tweets stand out in a crowded feed?  By taking the time to reflect on some of the engagement techniques you see cropping up amongst your fellow Tweeps, you can invent your own ways to harness the power of Twitter for your organization. The Technology in the Arts team thought it might be fun to highlight a handful of our favorite Twitter users from the arts sector.   Check out these Twitter streams to see illustrations of successful, interesting, and unique ways to use the platform ...

My favorites:

@SFMOMA I love the tone of San Francisco MOMA’s tweets – they do a great job of blending humor with behind-the-scenes photos, museum happenings, and random things like wacky art historical facts.  They actively participate in dialogue with not only other orgs but also their Twitter audience - and sometimes they even project their audience’s Tweets on their museum walls…now that’s some serious tweet integration.

@TheSoapFactory With a staff of only five people, this Minneapolis nonprofit gallery proves that small organizations can make a big impact via Twitter.  Their tweets are conversational, friendly and often funny – and they actively tweet their support & enthusiasm for local arts happenings and the artists they work with.  @TheSoapFactory loves shout outs, and always takes the time to publicly say “thank you” to volunteers and interns in their tweets.  Their warmth and graciousness on Twitter creates a personal connection with their audience – which goes a long way in the tweetosphere, despite their relatively small size.

@yokoono With nearly 1.9 million followers, Yoko’s got a worldwide Twitter audience, and she keeps them engaged in a variety of innovative ways that other artists and arts organizations can learn from.  Each week, she posts a series of responses to questions that are tweeted to her – showing that she really cares about engaging in dialogue with her fans.  Her own tweets are powerful in their simplicity and she’s always got a positive message to share.  She encourages followers to participate by creating their own positive messages, too: the Imagine Peace Tower, an art installation located in Iceland, lights up a few weeks each year with tweeted "wishes" related to peace and love.  So far, over 1.3 million wishes have been sent via @IPTower, and it's happening now through March 26.

Amelia's favorite:

@SUEtheTrex at Chicago's Field Museum.  "Hi. I'm Sue, I'm a Leo, I like meat, Chicago, the movie Jurassic Park, and what else? Oh yeah, I'm the world's greatest apex predator." This tagline says it all about Sue the T-Rex--she's sassy, hilarious, and about 2 million years old. That doesn't stop her from having conversations with present-day life forms, tweeting about current events--everything from Thanksgiving to Women's History Month--and educating about the T-Rex. A great example of employees personalizing an institution.

David's favorites:

@artfulmanager Andrew Taylor, author of the Artful Manager blog and Director of University of Wisconsin’s MBA in Arts Administration, always provides great resources for arts managers.  His retweets tend to pull from sources that I may not be following – which opens me up to new content that I might not otherwise stumble upon.

@travisbedard Travis Bedard, Artistic Director of Austin’s Cambiare Productions theatre company, provides a great combination of humor and informative posts from the theatre community.

@Brandinyourhand International arts consultant Roger Tomlinson always offers thoughtful information and insights from across the Pond.

@JamesUrbaniak New York stage, screen and voice actor James Urbaniak is a subversive pleasure.  Witty, sarcastic and irreverent – a wonderful 140-characters-or-less chucklefest.

Tom's favorites:

@MuseumNext is one of my favorite sources for finding out not just what is going on with museums now, but in the future as well. Through their blog, publications and their conference, MuseumNext highlights the ways museums are using technology to become more participatory and engaging for audiences. Plus, these are the folks that brought us the wildly popular twitter campaigns Ask a Curator, Follow a Museum and most recently Picture a Museum Day.

@MuseumNerd Oh, the Museum Nerd. That Brooklyn-based lover of all things art. Museum Nerd is an anonymous persona who tweets about his/her experiences as they weave through different exhibits. Besides the color commentary, Museum Nerd is great at engaging both visitors and museums on Twitter while exploring exhibits and other art world happenings.

@NancyProctor The Head of Mobile Strategy and Initiatives for the Smithsonian Institution, I feel like Nancy Proctor is the Queen of museum mobile tech on Twitter. I check her feed for the latest developments in museum mobile tech, thoughts on best practices and to find who is experimenting and how. You can usually find her dropping some mobile tech knowledge with the hashtags #mtogo and #simobile.

Tara's favorite:

@atane Atane O. is one of my favorite music and audiophile nerds to follow on Twitter. He's currently a blogger for the Elements of Jazz blog, and always has cool pictures, videos and music clips to share via his Twitter stream. He also has an amazing vinyl collection (and great turntables!).

Now, it's your turn: who do YOU love on Twitter, and why?

Museum crowd-curation and the way we live now

Should more museums follow the Brooklyn Museum’s lead?

Recently, I helped curate Split-Second: Indian Paintings, a show for the Brooklyn Museum.  To do so, I simply visited their website and participated in an online activity.  It took me about ten minutes, and it involved briefly looking at images, clicking on those paintings that I found most intriguing and rating other paintings on a sliding scale.

My participation in this process got me thinking not only about Indian art, but also about how my own perceptions of art in general might be shaped, and how my aesthetic tastes might compare to the sensibilities of the general public.  Even more interesting to me was that this experiment in crowd-curation felt like the inevitable extension of the movement towards a more participatory culture.

What is it?

Museum crowd-curation enables the general public to become a part of the curatorial process by helping to determine, through an online platform, the artwork to be included in a physical exhibition displayed in a museum’s gallery.

The Brooklyn Museum pioneered crowd-curation three years ago with its photography exhibition Click! . First launched through an open call for artists to submit photos related to the theme of “The Changing Faces of Brooklyn”, the artwork was then made available online for anyone to curate.   Perhaps most interestingly, the Brooklyn Museum staff took a transparent and scientific approach to the experiment, publicly sharing data and thoughtful analysis every step of the way.  Check out Brad's Technology in the Arts podcast with Shelley Bernstein from 2008 to learn more about Click!

Selection of photographs from Click! by the Brooklyn Museum

Now, Bernstein and the folks at the Brooklyn Museum are offering a new spin on crowd-curation by injecting theories of connoisseurship to Split-Second: Indian Paintings. Based on ideas from the book Blink by Malcolm Gladwell, Split-Second seeks to explore how our first impressions might affect our perceptions of art as well as the production of a museum exhibition.  In the end, we’re left with an engaging viewer/curator experience that subtly mixes the professional with the amateur.

Why is crowd-curation so intriguing?

Increasingly, we are becoming a culture of curators, especially in the virtual world.  We spend our time organizing media according to preference, grouping our memories into online photo and video databanks, and “liking” and commenting on things that other people share.  What this means is that arts audiences are coming to the gallery with a newly emboldened sense of organizing and presenting content.  Arts organizations therefore need to play an active role by creating opportunities for meaningful engagement.

Screen shot of Split-Second's crowd-curation process by the Brooklyn Museum

Organizations that are at the forefront of online audience engagement are presenting ideas that go beyond simply offering information about programming.  Instead, they are experimenting with different ways that audiences can become co-creators of content, which can then lead to a sense of ownership in the institution.  But crowd-curation should not be simply a matter of presenting art works and having a voting contest in the sense of American Idol.  Rather, arts managers need to envision a place of meaningful dialogue between their organization and their audience.

Crowd-curation is exciting because it is a clear illustration of the changing dynamics of the audience/museum relationship.  It takes creative online participation and literally translates the collective online vision into physical space.  Along the way, it can stimulate creative thinking by:

• Getting the participant/curator to think about her own internal perceptions of art, and perhaps inspire her to dig even deeper through self-reflection. What struck me most in my experience as a curator of Split-Second was how successful the exercise was in getting me to think about not only the art in the show but also my own understanding of visual culture.

• Creating discussion, based upon the collective decisions of the audience, about big-picture questions, like: How is artistic value determined? Is general consensus achievable in determining artist merit?

By putting the internal and collective processes together, crowd-curation has the potential to achieve multiple levels of meaningful contemplation.  Of course, arts managers may feel like they are taking a significant risk.  They may fear that the artistic content chosen by the masses will not constitute a “quality” exhibition in the traditional sense.  And, perhaps worse, if crowd-curation IS able to produce a quality exhibition, then what is the point of having all of these professionals around?  However, as sites like Wikipedia or perhaps the “comments” section of any website have shown, opening up the production of content to crowds is precisely the time when professional, articulate viewpoints are needed most.

This is not to argue that crowd-curation methods should or will replace traditional curatorial models.  In fact, it doesn’t make sense for all art museums to try it (based on a number of factors such as the nature of the audience, resources available, the nature of the exhibit, etc.)  Even so, crowd-curation is an innovative approach to breaking down the barriers between art museum and audience, and it’s a fascinating reflection of the way we live now.

Opera by You: How to crowdsource a production

By this point we’ve all heard about crowdsourcing. It's a way to outsource a project and let a large group of people create it online. (See video at the end of the post for a fuller explanation, complete with animated fish.) We’ve heard about crowdsourcing logo designs, requests for proposals (RFP's) or even determining which paintings to show in an exhibition. But how about an full-length opera? Well, one company is crazy enough to try it.

The Savonlinna Festival in Finland has been developing an opera through the collaboration platform wreckamovie since 2010. The Opera by You initiative has been developed in five phases, some of which overlap. First, the crowd collaborated on a plot and name for the opera in July 2010. They decided on the title Free Will and the following plot, as described by Paivi Salmi, Project Manager of Opera by You:

God has had enough of all the misery that people are suffering from and calls a meeting with the angels. They decide to send a few dead geniuses back to Earth to make things better. They are supposed to make a huge difference in science and art and create world peace. The geniuses are Joan of Arc, Oscar Wilde and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

Second, writers began work on the libretto (or script) to the opera. The process is halfway completed and is set to be done in May. Third, the composers in the group began setting the words to music in September. Fourth, the project coordinators launched the visualization plan. Salmi described the process.

Visualization means to us creating the concept of “environment” on the stage: the era of the opera, stage sets, wardrobe, lightning etc. We have decided together with the community that the story of Free Will will take place in our modern time and now we proceed on deciding how the different scenes look like visually.

Visualizations of Hell in the year 2012 from Opera by You

The libretto, composing and visualization plans are set to be ready at the end of May 2011. In the last phase, the whole concept will be moved to the hands of the Savonlinna Opera Festival for production, and that is where the crowdsourcing will end when it comes to the live opera production. The opera will be produced during Savonlinna’s 2012 summer festival season. The crowdsourcing will continue in that the existing community within the wreckamovie platform will work with the current plot, creating an animated movie version of the live opera. To see the opera creation in action, visit http://operabyyou.wreckamovie.com.

Paivi Salmi manages the web community creation process as well as the marketing and community partnership initiatives. I caught up with Salmi and asked her about the collaborative process of crowdsourcing the opera.

How did this idea originally come about? The Savonlinna Opera Festival has been frontrunner in developing opera genre in Finland. We have had several projects for instance for creating operas for kids. This spring we will again launch this kind of project where kids create opera as part of their normal school work. The Savonlinna Opera Festival has had several Finnish world premieres with quite unusual productions. We are actively searching new ways of reaching new audiences for the opera and also new ways of creating the opera. So in the spirit of “Web 2.0,” we decided to try the collaborative product development or crowdsourcing in the web also in the field of the opera.

How did you choose wreckamovie as the platform to create the opera? The wreckamovie platform provides the basic tools for collaborative discussion and working. It is also well-known in the Europe at least and already has lots of members interested in collaborative working on the web. We also plan to create an animated movie about the plot of our opera and for that second phase of the project, wreckamovie will the best available tool.

With so many people collaborating on one project, how do you select the best ideas? How do you deal with differing opinions on the direction the project should take? We have five operatives in the team who are experienced opera creation professionals (a script writer, a stage director, a composer, a production specialist and a visualization expert) who will guide the creative process in the web. Their task is to select best ideas, give the "developing” tasks for the community.

Opera by You Community Members by Country.

Who are the people collaborating on the project? Do you know the make-up as far as country, age, and profession? Do most have an artistic background and collaborate on areas of the project they specialize in? When it comes to age, they are average 35 years old, mostly motivated by composing and visualizing. We don't collect any information about their profession or education, so we do not know if they already are professionals in the field of opera or classical music.

How do you plan to distribute the opera once it is produced at the festival in 2012? Will the footage be available online, recorded or streaming? The opera will be performed 3 times during summer 2012 in the Savonlinna Opera Festival. If some opera house is interested in the project, we will naturally export the production. We plan to make footage available and also animated movie which will be distributed online. The project was launched at the Opera America annual meeting in L.A. last June.

How are you addressing intellectual property issues for the contributors to the project? Every member has to sign user agreement and accept Wreckamovies terms of use where the member gives all rights to the project. So there will be no intellectual property issues.

What has been the response from the online community and the opera community at large? The community has been growing steadily, but only certain members are active in all "production lines". It goes so that some are writers, some others composers and some only interested in the visualization part. But mainly people are very excited and willing to work "for free". We also want make it easy to just anyone without any classical music or opera experience to participate to the collaborative work. We have reached a very good visibility to our project in the internet. For instance in the launch phase of the project there were lots of articles in online media for instance in Latin America, India and Europe. The larger opera community has been very interested and curious. We have been asked to present the project in several conferences and seminars. People are also very interested in the process itself--how has it been ”structured” etc. within opera community but also in the larger community of art, theatre and even social media.

Here's a more detailed answer to the question "What is crowdsourcing?"

Data Sharing & Arts Organizations - Take Part in the Conversation

Our friends at Fractured Atlas are relaunching their Issue Brunch series and have asked me to facilitate a discussion on the benefits and challenges of data sharing among arts organizations. As Tiffany Bradley, Development and Marketing Specialist for Fractured Atlas, recently wrote:

As more organizations lead collaborative efforts, the implications of sharing data come to the forefront. Data sharing - whether for marketing, ticketing, fundraising purposes - raises a host of issues. Does pooling information about patrons lead to greater revenues for all parties? Or do organizations risk a negative response from patrons? Integrating the range of software that arts organizations use is also a problem in its own right.

This panel discussion will be streamed live on February 11, 2011 at 1:15 pm EST via UStream at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/fracturedatlas. Online participants will be able to engage one another in discussion and submit questions for the panel.

Panel participants include:

• Deborah M. Abramson - The Pew Charitable Trusts
• Joe Harrell - Alliance for the Arts
• Adam Huttler - Fractured Atlas
• Barbara Janowitz - Theater Subdistrict Council/City of New York
• Chrisopher J. Mackie, Ph.D - Open Health Tools
• Maris Smith - Situation Interactive

So what has your experience been like with data sharing among arts organizations?  What benefits have you received?  How did you approach the organizational and technological challenges?  Leave a comment below and be sure to join us on Friday for what is certain to be an engaging conversation.

A Guide to Mobile Marketing, Part One

This is the first in a multi-part series of articles exploring various tools and tactics for promoting and marketing on the mobile web.

From museums and opera companies using QR Codes to festivals using Foursquare to launch a musical scavenger hunt, it's becoming apparent that designing a mobile marketing campaign can be one of the more challenging, creative and rewarding ways to engage customers.

Consider some of these recent findings:

• A Nielsen Company report recently indicated that U.S. smartphone penetration will be over 50% in 2011.

• Diana Pouliot – Director of Mobile Advertising at Google – revealed that one-third of all Google searches via the mobile web pertain to some aspect of the searcher’s local environment

• Mobile campaigns are capturing an increasing level of consumers' attention across key metrics:  mobile ad awareness reached 31% in 2010, up from 14% in 2009 and 16% in 2008.

US Smartphone Penetration Graph

Smartphone Use On the Rise!

As smartphones increase in popularity, users are often utilizing this technology to discover local events and local businesses that may interest them. This has resulted in an increased demand for businesses wanting to implement effective mobile marketing campaigns. In this blog series, I want to examine what tools and strategies arts organizations can use to implement effective campaigns.

Location Based Tools

One of the most popular uses for smartphones is generating directions to and/or information about local businesses. Here are two tools that organizations can use to elevate their visibility to smartphone users.

1. Google Places:

With the recent launch of a Google Places App for both the iPhone and Android platforms as well as a scheduled Google Maps update for the Android smartphone, the importance of having an up-to-date listing in Google Places is extremely relevant for an effective mobile marketing campaign. Below is a screenshot of the Google Places app in action:

Google Places Iphone App

To ensure that your organization appears in a Google Places mobile search, you must first make sure that you register with Google Places online. Here's a quick overview of how to get started

• Claim your business by verifying your listing
• Add pictures and videos to make your Place Page more compelling
• Review the Google Places Getting Started Guide for any other questions
• Bonus Tip: If your organization receives a certain amount of positive reviews, Google will mail a window decal with a personalized QR Code. 200,000 businesses have already received these decals.
• Bonus Tip #2: An easy way to boost your rankings in a Google Places Search is to make sure your business is properly listed in online directories like Yellow Pages and City Search. Google indexes these "citations" in order to determine what is most appropriate to a user's search query

Google Places QR Code

• Bonus Tip #3: According to a recent article on Mashable.com, Google Hotpot - recommendation engine and ratings/reviews system for places - has "officially gone worldwide."  Hotpot integrates with Google Places and also appears in Google search results.  Here's a brief overview of how Hotpot works:

2. Yelp Another popular app for smartphones is the local search platform, Yelp.  The company has reported that more than 41 million people visited Yelp within the past 30 days (as of December 2010). Yelp also reports that 27% of its searches come from its iPhone application. Businesses can setup free accounts to post pictures, special offers and send out messages to customers.

Yelp Apps

Just like Google Places, businesses owners must first register their organization on Yelp's website. Login to Yelp for Business Owners in order to create a listing for your business. One of the major challenges with maintaining a Yelp and Google Places profile is encouraging patrons to leave positive reviews. The easiest way to receive reviews, is simply to ask for them.

In upcoming posts, we will be examine: effective 'check-in' campaigns on services like FourSquare and Gowalla, how to set up QR codes, developing mobile applications, and how to run effective short code (SMS) campaigns.

Want to Reach [insert ethnic minority group here]? Try Being Relevant

Perhaps one of the most difficult and sensitive topics in the arts community is that of building audience diversity. As national celebrations like Black History month approach, artists, arts managers and arts organizations often brainstorm for ways to reach out to and include minority communities in their organizations, especially if there is special programming during these celebrations. As the Pew Research Study indicates,  minority groups do have a strong presence on Twitter, with 13% African  American and 18% Hispanic. There are also a host of groups within the LinkedIn and Meetup platforms that are exclusively for minority professionals. Many arts marketers are concerned that targeting groups of people based upon their ethnic background can come across as unethical or forced.

An example of one such social media marketing tactic popped up in my Inbox earlier this week courtesy of Thomas Cott's clipping-service "You've Cott Mail."  In this Clickz article, Giovanni Rodriguez suggests that using hashtags is an effective way to reach the Latino population on Twitter.  While the article appears on a website with general marketing advice that is not necessarily specific to the arts,  its inclusion in an arts-related clipping service suggests that this practice should be considered by arts managers.

The screen shot below shows one of these hashtag-driven discussions in action.

Hashtags in Action

Hashtags in Action

The bottom of the screenshot shows a promotion for the Broadway musical Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown using the hashtag "#latism."  An important thing to note is that the user promoting this event is NOT the Belasco Theater or the musical's production company, it is another person promoting Latino Events in general. While this musical is certainly relevant to the Latino community, the message is especially relevant coming from a community insider.

As an African American female who frequently uses Twitter to discover cultural events in which I may be interested, I can see how "community insiders" could either be offended or altogether ignore this type of "hashtag marketing" from someone outside of their community.  A random #Black or #BlackHistory tag from an organization I'm not familiar with would probably be ignored.

Reaching out to a key influencer or community-recognized group is a more genuine and relevant approach for social media campaigns.  One possible workflow might be:

1. Define the target audience (young professionals, African American women, Hispanic youth, etc.)
2. Pick an appropriate social media platform (Twitter, LinkedIn, Meetup)
3. Find and connect with a key influencer on the platform (for example: @LatinoEvents or @ElementsofJazz on Twitter)
4. Find and connect with relevant niche groups on the platform (for example: minority professional networking groups on LinkedIn and Meetup.
5. Offer Value.  A great example of this is to host a special pre- or post-event gathering exclusively for these new community members whom you targeted.

This type of strategy boosts an organization's credibility within the communities to which they want to develop connections. It is also a more genuine way to build relationships.  As my colleague Amelia Northrup pointed out in a previous article on this topic:

At long last, the diversity question has come around to the classic “old vs. new” debate.  When faced with declining arts attendance, is it better to “pick the low-hanging fruit” and focus on maintaining and growing our existing audience demographics (”the more return on investment for less energy” approach) or make a long-term investment in trying to attract new groups of people to our performances?

Cultivating new audiences may be a daunting and often challenging task, but it is one of the most worthwhile investments that any organization can make.  A relevant and genuine outreach campaign is the first step in this important process.

Social Media Spotlight: The ToonSeum

Welcome to the fifth installment of the Social Media Spotlight, our monthly feature focusing on arts organizations’ social media strategies.

How to allocate time and money towards both social media engagement and online marketing is different for every arts organization. To get a different perspective Technology in the Arts decided to talk with a smaller organization, the ToonSeum, about how they achieve their social media and online marketing goals with a limited staff. I had a chance to chat with Joe Wos, Executive Director of the ToonSeum, about his approach:

So Joe, what is the ToonSeum?

The ToonSeum is Pittsburgh’s Museum of Cartoon Art. It is one of only three museums in the country dedicated to the cartoon and comic arts. We offer rotating exhibitions covering all aspects of cartoons and comics, from animation and anime, to comic strips, comic books, editorial cartoons, illustration and much more. We also offer ongoing workshops, screenings and lectures.

It really is one of the most unique museums in Pittsburgh. Every city may have a version of a children’s museum or traditional art museum, but there are only three cartoon art museums! New York, San Francisco and Pittsburgh. We take great pride in our unique place in Pittsburgh.

What kind of marketing and PR challenges does the ToonSeum face?

Our number one challenge as with any small non-profit is budget. We are a small museum up against juggernauts! We are up to the challenge.  If anything, budget limitations have led to creative thinking. You aren’t going to see us investing a lot in “traditional” advertising.  Being a smaller museum also eliminates a lot of the fear of change you see from larger venues. We don’t have a huge investment in outmoded technology or ideas, so we are more inclined to let go and move forward to embrace new ideas in both marketing and tech.

We have been very lucky, the media both locally and nationally has been very supportive.  Part of that attention is because of our approach to marketing. We use online marketing to create interest in “real world” experiences. We innovate new ways of reaching out. How many museums can say they had their own beer? Illustration Ale was a great success. We didn’t mail out postcards we used facebook.

In February we will launch our own themed hotel room in partnership with the Wyndham Grande downtown. It’s all about immersive experiences, translating virtual experiences we enjoy in gaming and through cartoons into the real world. That’s the kind of creative thinking we embrace.

A limited budget forces truly creative thinking.

Why did you choose to go with social networks/online marketing as a solution?

We are a fan-based museum. It’s a new approach to museum management, marketing and even exhibitions. Comic and cartoons by their very nature, are a fan-based medium. We embrace that. Just look at San Diego Comic Con, why is every major movie launching there? Because of the power fans have via social networks. We tap into those same fans. We are a geek museum, and proud of it. Our audience is very tech savvy, early adopters who can market virally better than anyone.

We know that the ToonSeum is a real world extension of a fan based virtual world. We are a museum of characters, icons and avatars. We want to become a real hub for comic and cartoon fans, and the only way to do that now, is through creating online connections and then inviting them to join us at the ToonSeum. Once we get them here, we know, they will tell their friends, strangers, tweet, blog, post, and tell the world about us.

We also recognize that it can’t be just virtual, you have to take it to the fans! We have booths at major Comic Cons, from San Diego to New York. We also host Blogger events and Tweet Parties at the ToonSeum. If we can get the word out to them about our exhibits and programs they will help us spread the word.

Beyond the standard social media efforts, such as a Facebook page and a twitter account, what other types of online efforts are the ToonSeum trying?

I worked for twenty years with a museum that had a real aversion to technology, it took a decade for them to come around. The ToonSeum is the opposite. We want to be the first. We were the first museum in Pittsburgh to have an I-Phone App. We may still be the only one! MailChimp, EventBrite, every new social marketing tool that comes out we give it a try. We were among the first to participate in KickStarter (we were even featured in the New York Times in an article about it.) I attend the Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas just because I know we need to stay at pace with the public. The technology in most museums is outdated, kids can do more advance and exciting interactions at home. So we reach out, we are a Beta Test museum. We put ourselves out there to new technology and say, let us try this out first!

We have an ipad docent at the entrance. Any guests who wants to experience more online while in the gallery can use it as a tool.

For light up night we launched lights in our windows that can be controlled from the outside via an iphone. The guest has control over their experience before they even enter the door.

I am a self-professed geek and nerd, I attend the Consumer Electronic Show in Vegas every other year, I attend the Toy Fair in New York. I bring those innovations and ideas back to the ToonSeum and find ways to integrate them. So the ToonSeum has a giant screen projection in the center of our ceiling that loops cartoons. It is of course blu-ray 3d as well.

We have worked with Behar-Fingal to integrate QR codes into all our exhibitions. This allows guest with smartphones to link to additional content online. Whether it is a wikipage entry on the artists, or video we provide of the cartoonist at work. This is a great tool to take our exhibits beyond our walls and is also cost effective. People are walking around with access to all the information they need. In the future museums won’t need placard after placard of explanatory text. They will just need to provide a link. Their curiosity will take them beyond your walls. Each and every work of art is a potential jumping off point to a world of discovery in the world wide virtual museum.

We know that the traffic has to flow in both directions. A museum should be a destination from those on the web looking for real world experiences, but a museum must also be a gateway to curiosity that can be infinitely explored in new and exciting ways online.

Despite our using technology in so many ways, the ToonSeum is still ultimately about art on the walls. Because we have integrated ways to put the technology in your hands we don’t have to use a lot of monitors and computers. It makes it an individual experience, which is something we learned from social marketing. Everyone wants to interact on their own terms.

I know you operate on a small staff, how does this affect how you manage your various online efforts?

We have a social marketing intern whose only job is to tweet and post. That’s a must! The museum has to have a presence online that allows for immediate interaction. So we respond to every tweet that mentions us, every facebook post. It’s time consuming but it is the most important aspect of social marketing… being social!

All of our staff also has access to post to our various accounts. So we are updating daily. More important though is the fact that our fans are out there, retweeting and posting everything for us. It gives us a much bigger presence.

They also know to speak with the ToonSeums voice. It’s always connected to our mission and not personal. I have seen top-notch museums whose official facebook page has post about their kids getting the flu! Unless there is an epidemic of every kid visiting your venue getting the flu, how does a museum have kids that get sick? It doesn’t. Your venue has to have a virtual identity, a voice that your fans can interact with and it has to be consistent.

This is all easier to accomplish with a small staff. There are no committees, no approval process, no budget meeting, we identify what needs done and do it!

Does your staff size affect how you track the success of all of your online projects?

Every guest that comes in is asked how they heard about us, and their zipcode. We track every single opened email and clicked link. That data is all placed into a matrix we use to measure our success. It doesn’t take a big marketing firm, it just takes a commitment of a few minutes each day.

Can we talk about the Bloggers Blast? What is the event and why focus on bloggers?

I was at the Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas and attended about 5 after parties. What impressed me was they were all geared toward bloggers and social media. I knew this was something the ToonSeum had to do in Pittsburgh.

Traditional press is great, we love them! But today even they are pulling content from bloggers. Bloggers have fans, just like we do. It comes back to embracing a fan-based culture. So we wanted to let those bloggers get a sneak preview at our upcoming exhibitions and programs for 2011. We have special guests, a preview of the art, prizes and every single blogger will get a flash drive filled with all our press releases, promo art and more. If you are reading this and are a blogger, contact joe@toonseum.com for your invite.

We will be following this with tweet parties, where everyone is admitted free if they tweet about the exhibits.

You have mentioned that the ToonSeum was one of the first Pittsburgh museums to develop an iPhone app. What does the app do and what was the development process like? Has there been a good response?

Going to back to my previous experience with another museum, I was often frustrated by the phrase “we’ll look into it.” I began to realize that phrase meant, we don’t know how to do it and aren’t willing to learn. Forget the yellow pages, the phone book is dead. It’s all about web and apps. We knew we needed an iphone app. It provides immediate access to enhance the guest experience. It also goes a long way to legitimizing you to tourist. It’s one of the first things I do when I visit a venue in a new city, I check them out online and then download their app.

Creating an app can be an expensive prospect, thousands of dollars. That was out of the question for our budget. So, I just learned to do it myself. I applied for an apple developer license, found a great site that would allow me total control over the creation of the app, submitted it for approval and that was it. Total process took about five hours, not counting waiting for approvals, which took three weeks. I used rss feeds so that info on our hours and events could be changed on the fly. I created a framework that would allow our youtube videos to be viewed from within the application. As a cartoonist it was easy to do most of the graphic design work myself and there you go. It’s done. Our social marketing intern can update it from anywhere. I can even update from my iphone when I am out of town.

If I am going to run a museum I should know how to do every job. I better know how to market, run the register, curate an exhibition and even mop the floors. I can then have a better understanding of how difficult a task is and more important I can lend a hand when it is needed.

I am working on an android app right now and we are doing a complete web overhaul in spring.

We are geeks, we love this stuff.

Top Technology Trends: What’s Ahead for Arts Marketers in 2011

This post also appears as a featured article on artsmarketing.org, hosted by Americans for the Arts.

In this tough economy, most of us have encouraged ourselves and others to look ahead to brighter times. But, what exactly lies ahead in the next year for us? How can we make the most of our future?

In 2010, technology influenced our field tremendously. Some predicted trends, like Google Wave and Google Buzz, failed to take off, and many unexpected trends, like group-manipulated pricing and Ask a Curator, flourished. The following are some major trends that have gathered momentum in the past year and/or are poised to take off in 2011:

Group discounts and group-manipulated pricing Group discount sites exploded in popularity in 2010. While many organizations have a group sales manager or special deals for groups, these sites allow people to opt in to a deal that will only go live if enough people opt in, encouraging people to sell to their friends. Groupon now boasts 35 million subscribers and 18 million Groupons sold in North America. However, marketers question their ability to attract repeat visitors. Now that the initial novelty has worn off, hopefully the knowledge we’ve gained will result in smarter offers. I recently heard from a colleague about a ballet company that didn’t cap their Nutcracker offer and lost revenue on their offer.

Since the advent of these group-buying applications, many variants have cropped up. For example, Uniqlo’s Lucky Counter makes clear to the consumer the advantage of group buying, by lowering the price on the offer in real-time as more people sign up. Arts organizations also started implementing dynamic pricing, similar to the way in which airlines price their tickets.

iPhone sunset in the Andes by Gonzalo Baeza Hernández via Flickr.

Go mobile or go home: mobile app development and mobile ticketing In 2010 Wired reported “The Web is Dead”, meaning that the way people use the Internet is moving away from web access on a desktop or laptop computer to mobile applications. Arts organizations have started asking themselves if their website is mobile friendly and, along with companies like InstantEncore and Pop Media, have started to develop apps.

Pop Media has developed Cloudtix, which uses Tessitura to sell tickets in real time through mobile apps and download a scanable ticket to their phone.

Bill Predmore of Pop Media compares the rise of mobile apps this year to website development in 1997.  “Arts orgs started out with a ‘brochure site’ and slowly began to evolve as they realized their capabilities. Things will happen a lot more quickly this time.”

So if the web is dead, which is worth more investment: mobile websites or mobile apps? And if you are going to develop an app, which platform do you develop it for? While Apple’s iOS devices (including iPad, iPhone, and iPod) still outnumber Android devices, Android phones have overtaken iPhones in terms of market share.

Predmore advises companies to begin to look into all three: iOS, Android and mobile websites. “Things are changing rapidly and it’s difficult to know what’s going to be there a year from now. For this reason, many organizations are reluctant to make an investment. But patrons are going to expect you to be there and if you’re not, there’s a problem.”

Changing media consumption At the same time that Internet usage is shifting to mobile devices, the way audiences consume entertainment is changing. The introduction of tablet-style devices like the iPad  and 4G-capable phones running on Android means more people are consuming mobile entertainment, especially video , than ever before. iPad users are also more likely to complete video ads (63%) than desktop video viewers (53%).

In the past several years, performing arts organizations have started taking their performances outside of the theater and concert hall with initiatives like the Met’s Live in HD, San Francisco Opera’s Opera in the Ballpark, and most recently, L.A. Phil Live. In 2010, we saw a shift to more online streaming video. Sites like Tendu TV and classicaltv aggregate video of performances. Streaming on platforms like Livestream has become more commonplace, notably Chris Elam’s efforts with Misnomer Dance Theatre.  Recently YouTube announced that it would offer live streaming to its content partners, several of which are arts organizations.

Are you in the cloud? Photo: James Jordan via Flickr.

The privacy debate Consumers are becoming increasingly aware of how they are being tracked by marketers. At the same time advertisers are under more pressure than ever monetize their online investments as they cut offline budgets. Last year was notable in that two major companies have made privacy faux pas: Facebook over profile information and Google over Buzz. These controversies as well as the rise in location-based apps and ever-nichified Facebook ads have made people more aware of exactly how much information marketers have about them. (If you want to know how much personal information marketers know about you, check out rapleaf.com .

How does this apply to arts orgs? At the same time these privacy concerns have surfaced, arts organizations are being persuaded to move to shared service models, in which databases may be shared by multiple organizations, or have started using other platforms which use cloud computing (where the organization’s data is stored on outside servers). As patrons become more aware of where their information is stored, employees also worry about the security of cloud computing. At the same time, they wonder how secure their database was in the first place. Bottom line: arts organizations should remember that it is crucial to be transparent about their privacy policies to patrons.

Rise of location-based social media No discussion of arts and technology in 2010 would be complete without mentioning location-based platforms like FourSquare, GoWalla, Facebook Places, and Google Latitude. Foursqaure was up 33.2 million users in 2010 from 12.3 million users in 2009.

Arts organizations, most of which position themselves as serving local community, are starting to understand the potential for hyper-local platforms like this. Location-based applications are increasingly attracting young, urban influencers with disposable income—precisely the audience many arts organizations are trying to attract. People connect to geolocation apps primarily to “get informed” and “obtain promotions” rather than “to compete” to become mayor of their favorite locations.

2011 will likely determine which “check-in” application will dominate. As of November 2010 Facebook Places had 7 times more users than FourSquare, but Places users utilize the service less frequently. So, which platform will win out? Independent companies like GoWalla and FourSquare, or platforms emerging from established networks and services like Facebook and Google?

What do you think were the biggest trends in arts marketing in 2010? What do you see ahead for 2011?

Social Media Spotlight: SF Playhouse Pluggers

Welcome to the fourth installment of the Social Media Spotlight, our monthly feature focusing on arts organizations’ social media strategies.

Earlier this year, the SF Playhouse invited Bay Area Twitter users to apply for the SF Playhouse Pluggers, a group of individuals invited to "plug in and Tweet during the performance in special 'tweet seats' where their thoughts will be instantly be shared with the Bay Area and the world." I recently had an opportunity to talk with Dan Meagher, Director of Marketing for SF Playhouse, about this controversial and highly debated social media program.

What inspired the SF Playhouse to explore a Twitter program?

When I came to the SF Playhouse as Director of Marketing, I wanted to devise a program that would be unique plus tap into social media. Since I had been using Twitter for quite some time and liked the "real-time" aspect of it, I saw the potential for using it in conjunction with a live performance. More importantly, it lets us give folks a voice for their criticism and instant thoughts of our shows. Twitter lives in the moment, just like theatre. We're creating our own critics. There couldn't be a better combination.

How did you arrive at the program name?

The name came about after thinking about what people were doing with this program. They are "plugging" into the show, into social media, and into the SF Playhouse. Plus, it's darn catchy!

How does the program work? How do you find program participants? What are the criteria for participation?

A few weeks before a Plugger event, we start advertising on our Facebook and Twitter pages. The requirements are: - Must be 18 years or older - Must be a Bay Area resident - Must have an active Twitter account - Must have a portable texting device that can last a least 90 minutes.

Participants are selected on a first-applied basis and receive one complimentary ticket to the show, where they sit in the last row. We also extend to them a special ticket offer if they want to bring a friend (who won't be tweeting). We've had Pluggers use everything from cell phones to iPads! We accept 8-101 Pluggers for the event and usually end up with a wait list.

Do they tweet for a single performance or are they invited to come back to tweet throughout the season?

The Pluggers are initially invited for the one performance. Some love it..some find it challenging and not their thing. It's not a program for everyone. We have about a 70% rate of people asking to come back to plug for the next show, but it is important to me to have new people with us each session. We have one guy who has been with us for every Plugger session! It's great to see them arrive and become a group...they get each other's Twitter screen names and even start tweeting to each other during the performance. For that show, they become a community.

Our Pluggers come from all over - different backgrounds, communities, jobs, you name it. We've had them as young as 18 and up to their 60s. Our average age in 30 -40.

What rules (if any) govern the program?

We have a few basic rules: must turn ringers/any sound elements off; all screens must be dimmed; no talking; and no photos or recording devices may be used (we're an Equity theatre). We do let them drink from their seats, which, with a laptop or iPhone, has caused a few spills!

The biggest rule (well, not really a rule) we have is that we will not censor anything our Pluggers have to say. We retweet all of their messages about the show, whether they be good and bad. This has allowed us to gain a trust with our Pluggers and our audience, because they know that they are seeing all of the instant reactions - not just selected ones.

Someone once asked me if this is bad, letting people possibly criticize your production. Actually, I see it as a good thing. Theatre must be able to take the good and the bad. It allows us to see things from another perspective. We've had some Pluggers be very direct about what they didn't like in a show.

Is there a particular hashtag for the Pluggers’ tweets?

#sfplay - We started using this hashtag during our last Pluggers session in the hopes of making the feed more streamlined. Also, in the past, we have crashed our Twitter page because of too many feeds going out at the same time. I have been in touch with the folks at Twitter to ask for their help in maintaining our feed, but they weren't very responsive.

Do you post the hashtag feed on a screen in the lobby for your audience before the show, during intermission, and after the show?

That's a great idea! Unfortunately, we don't have the capability to do that right now. We do mention at the start of the performance to the audience that they should go home and look at our Twitter page and see the live feed.

What are your benchmarks for measuring the success of the program?

I don't use any specific bench marks for the Playhouse Pluggers.  Since it's a very "organic" kind of program, I don't feel the need to throw in tickets codes or other marketing positions.  We know it works because we have people come to the SF Playhouse and mention that they read the Plugger feed from the last show.  We've also received much press coverage.

What feedback has the program received from your on-site audience?

It's funny.  When we first announced this program, we received emails from patrons unhappy with the idea.  Of course, we heard this before we even did a Pluggers night!  However, Executive Director Susi Damilano and Artistic Director Bill English were unwaivering in their support for trying this crazy new idea.  Without their support, this would have never gone forward.

After our first session went off without a hitch, we didn't hear many complaints.  We have had audience members sitting right behind our Pluggers and, at the end of the show, say they didn't even know the Pluggers were there.  The non-Tweeting audience members wouldn't even know it was happening if we didn't tell them.  Now that people see that this isn't disruptive to the show, they seem to have embraced it.

What type of response and interaction have the Pluggers’ received from the Twitter community?

The Twitter community has been very supportive of the idea. I've heard from people all over the US and the world about how much they enjoy following the live feed.

Twitter has also brought us some surprises.  During our last Pluggers session for the new musical Coraline, who should join in the tweeting but the author himself - Neil Gaiman!

Another wonderful thing happened during our Plugger session for Cormac McCarthy's The Sunset Limited.  We were about 40 minutes into the show and suddenly, someone from Twitter-land sent one of our Pluggers a direct message asking them a question about something they just tweeted.  That was a first for us.  We now had Twitter users from other places asking questions of our Pluggers during the show!  It helped me realize the scope this program.  Those interactions took the Playhouse Plugger program to a whole new, unexpected level.

Why do you think there has been so much controversy and debate about the program?

Many theatre people are afraid of the "new."   Technology scares a lot of folks.  We're taught that theatre is a revered place where you come, sit, watch, and applaud.  Interaction is not allowed or encouraged.  So when you create something that breaks down a wall, people are going to jump up and say, "Not in my backyard!"  Here's the bottom line...the Playhouse Pluggers program is not going to end the world or change theatre as we know it.  This program will not cause thousands to run out and start tweeting during Romeo & Juliet.

Theatre is about change...about evolution.  The basic nature of theatre requires us to adapt to the new, or else we would be going to see plays by Euripides on Broadway.  Theatre is a shared experience and this program is just a way to let the theatergoer have voice in the theatre going experience by sharing their thoughts.  That's it..it's a very simple concept.

In an article earlier this year, Theatre Bay Area quoted Artistic Director Bill English as saying of the program, “It’s an experiment. We're trying to check out the balance between social media and theatre.”  Eight months into the experiment, what has SF Playhouse learned?

We have learned that social media (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Skype, etc.) has become a major force in everyday life.  It's here to stay.  We've also learned that people love to discuss theatre using these platforms.  It can connect a theatre fan in England with a theater fan in the US instantly.  If anything, social media has opened up lines of instant communication that never existed before and encourage discussion.

I'm happy to share my knowledge about this progam with all!  Feel free to contact me at Dan@SFPlayhouse.org

This has lead to the creation of citizen critics. Everyone today has a voice and the ability to broadcast their thoughts. With the demise of print and media criticism, theatre needs to find and cultivate these new voices that will talk, criticize, and promote.