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During the last few years, cultural institutions have been required to do more with less—cutting back seems to be the order of the day. However, there are creative and collaborative strategies that may allow museums to create spaces of inspiration for individuals and communities—while on a budget. Presented at the Mid-Atlantic Association of Museums (MAAM) Annual Meeting, October 2011.
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STRATEGIES FOR ENGAGEMENT ON A BUDGETMid-Atlantic Association of Museums 10/11/2011
Presenter
Dana Allen-GreilChief of Digital Outreach and EngagementNational Museum of American HistoryTwitter: @danamuses
Doing more with less
Less of what? Money Staff Time
Pick two!
GOOD
FastCheap
Key to tech tools
Most of these tools are free. A green iconthis indicates a cost and/or freemium.
The orange icon suggests tech skill requiredon a scale of 1-10, 1 being least skill.
NOTE: These tools are simply those that I have direct experience with. This presentation is NOT an advertisement for any of these products. It is recommend that you review and evaluate tools based on your own organization’s needs and budget.
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Viral marketing
Race to the museum
The Challenge Increase visitation
during typically slow period (January and February)
Budget: $0 Creativity: 100%
An experiment
First time curators have given up any control over the display of its objects over to the Museum's audiences
True collaboration across all departments
Inaugural attempt at pitching enthusiast bloggers via Twitter
Online experience built entirely with free Web tools we had never used for such a purpose
“In the National Museum of American History, there is a cabinet full of keys—keys that fit the 73 cars in the automobile collection. Most are sitting under car covers...but now the covers are coming off!”
Blog posts were written about each auto “contestant.”
The contest got top billing in our January enews.
A dozen Facebook posts piqued interest prior to the vote, announced the voting period, and then announced the winners.
We used HootSuite to monitor the use of our hashtag #Race2Museum and other mentions of the initiative on Twitter
HootSuite
http://hootsuite.com HootSuite is a Social Media Dashboard for
managing Twitter, Facebook, etc. Useful for scheduling posts, tracking trends
and keywords, analytics on clicks, etc.
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A. B.
C. D.
E. F.
G. H.
SurveyGizmo
Online surveys, polls, quizes, formshttp://www.surveygizmo.com
Cost: Free version limits number of responses; $19/month for up to 1,000 responses; 50% nonprofit discount on all plans
1$f
And the winner is…
In addition to traditional television news, we used the museum’s blog and YouTube account to tell the story of “moving day.”
Results
3 Weeks the voting period was open
24,000 Public votes received
6.5% Increase in visitation in January and February
53,000+ Pageviews to related blog posts
20,300 Pageviews to vote opening post; most popular blog post of all time
Lessons Learned
Customize content to multiple platforms and types of media to maximize reach
Tap into existing enthusiast communities via social media
Design experiences that can be engaging for off-site and on-site visitors
Don’t be surprised if a shy curator becomes your next media superstar
O Say Can You Sing? contest
Results
Over 800 eligible entries were submitted Thousands of people rated and commented on
their favorite singers
Grand Prize Winner
Jordan Shelton of Arvada, Colorado
Performed the national anthem at the museum and at the Baltimore Orioles versus Atlanta Braves game in Baltimore on Flag Day, June 14, 2009
Julia Child Recipe of the Week
Blog series
Weekly post by a staff member Followed Julia’s detailed instructions (included
links to recipes) Featured specific tools and gadgets in Julia's home
kitchen Invited readers to join in the celebration of Julia
Child's life, work, and contributions to American culinary history.
Juliachildrecipes.tumblr.com
Tumblr
Microblogging platform that allows users to post text, images, videos, links, quotes and audio.
http://tumblr.com Cost: Free; Can purchase
premium themes
3
User-submitted photos
TalkBack Tuesdays
User-generated photos
MailChimp
Design and send email newsletters, manage subscriber lists, view reports
http://mailchimp.com Cost: Free for up to 2,000 subscribers
and up to 12,000 emails per month.
3$f
Geotagging photo apps 2
WordPress
Blog tool and publishing platform
Free hosting with WordPress.com (ads, limited themes)
Or download and manage your own implementation with WordPress.org
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WordPress.org
Recommended hosting provider: Bluehosthttp://www.bluehost.com/
Hosting cost: $7/month
Purchase themeshttp://themeforest.net/category/wordpress
Theme cost: $12-60
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Omeka
Open-source Web publishing platform for collections, exhibits, user-contributed content
Download and use on your server (http://www.omeka.org) or use a hosted version (http://www.omeka.net/)
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Sandbox: http://omeka.org/codex/Try_Omeka_Before_Installing
