Free Research Opportunity (or at least some more details)

Over the past few years, we have worked with nearly 150 museums across the country, surveying over 30,000 museum-going households about their motivations, expectations, and experiences with museums.

This research, which we have shared widely through this blog, has told us a lot about our repeat visitors.  But it has also raised far more questions. 

Now, we want to dig deeper. We want to figure out if there are certain experiences in childhood that are crucial for the development of what we call Museum Advocates.  We want to understand the different types of Core Visitors, who visit museums often but don't seem to be as engaged as we would like.  Are there ways to engage them more deeply? 

To find out more, we are launching a nation-wide research project.  We'll be looking for a lot of museums, representing a wide variety of genres and from all parts of the country, to apply to participate.  Each participating museum will invite their e-mail lists (and Twitter feeds, and Facebook fans, etc.) to take a survey, and in return, each museum will receive their results, with the overall comps for benchmarking purposes. 

Best of all, for the museums it will be free.  Free data they can use about their museum, and we'll, of course, share the overall results widely with the field.  

Look for more information via this blog, and our e-newsletter, the first week of January.  Mark your calendars so you don't miss it!

Comments

[Jennifer Caleshu, Bay Area Discovery Museum]

great! We look forward to participating!

[Jeff Stern]

We'll be involved too. As a thought, our twitter feed has 2,500+ followers, but only 400+ of those are members (most are out of our geographic area). Are you looking to go beyond our core audience (who we reach primarily through email) and into those who are more casual supporters and/or those who are interested?

[Susie Wilkening, Reach Advisors]

Thanks, Jennifer and Jeff.

Interesting question, Jeff. In this scenario, we would consider twitter followers core audience, because they are core audience enough to follow your feed. But your individual museum's results may be slightly skewed by their responses. Which is not necessarily a bad thing so long as you understand why they might be slightly skewed. We are going to want organizations to send it out to a critical mass of potential respondents, and if an e-mail list is sufficient, then it will be up to the organization to decide if they also want to blast their feeds and FB fans. Make sense?

More to come in early January.

[Rita Deedrick]

COSI is definitely interested in participating! Is this open to only "museums" or can it include other ILEs like zoos, conservatories, parks? What about performing arts organizations with educational mission? I'd like to share this with out local visitor/audience studies community of practice, but can be selective with whom I share it.

[Susie Wilkening, Reach Advisors]

We consider "museums" to include zoos, aquariums, botanical gardens, arboretums, science centers, etc., as well as the more "traditional" museums. For this study, we probably would not be inclined to include performing arts as our line of questioning will be very museum-specific. Doesn't mean we are not interested in performing arts, just not a great fit for this project.

[Rena Lawrence]

Yes! We'd love to participate!

Rena Lawrence, Museum Educator
Log Cabin Village--Fort Worth