what will the museum of the future be like?
Getting to know visitors' online habits
What kind of questions are people asking their visitors in order to find out more about their social media use and behaviors?
We would like to understand what our visitors are doing while they are online so that we might be able to gear our museum's use of social media in that type of direction, therefore reaching and engaging our visitors more effectively. What are some ideas of what we should be asking them?
We would like to understand what our visitors are doing while they are online so that we might be able to gear our museum's use of social media in that type of direction, therefore reaching and engaging our visitors more effectively. What are some ideas of what we should be asking them?
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by yves apeloig on -
May I suggest to have a look on the functionalities of my system ?
This system is a "wearable human factor computing system", a revolution for museum
It measure the visual behavior in mobility.
It works completely freehand. Means all people can use it. Inside outside
How your visitors are moving, what they are looking haw much they are interested with what they are looking.
If you want more info about feel free to write me
By the way I will be present with Percipio on the SITEM in paris on the stand of a friend Art2Conseil
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Permalink Reply by Jason Adair on -
This is a great question. I'm trying to figure out the same thing at the museum I work at. I'm thinking about some kind of touch counter at the front desk that would look like the bottom of any news story on the web, where they have the facebook, twitter, blogger. etc. icons, so that people could tap the ones they belong to.
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Permalink Reply by AIF on
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Oh that would be cool but I'm pulling teeth just to get staff to agree to have visitors sign in so that we have more accurate attendance/ demographics so a kiosk is way too far in advance for us! ; ) I 'm just hoping to get a survey out to our members at this point but not sure what to ask.
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Permalink Reply by Lynda Kelly on -
Hi there. I have done quite a lot of work on this. In 2007 I did a study of Australians' internet usage and whether they visited museums. The findings are reported in a paper we gave at Museums and the Web called From Ladders Of Participation To Networks Of Participation: Social .... The most important finding was that people who visited museums participated in more web activities that involved two-way conversation.
At the moment I am conducting exit surveys and am asking our visitors the same thing as above, ie what online activities they have undertaken in the previous month. I'll post the results here when they come through (we're still in the field).
To get more information about what the Australian Museum is researching and experimenting with in the social media space check out my website - scroll down the page a bit and look at the section called Social Media and Museums.
Best of luck!
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Thanks Lynda,
The link to From Ladders Of Participation To Networks Of Participation didn't work but I was able to find it anyway. I went through the social media part on your website great stuff but not as many specifics as I was looking for. In terms of audience research between your paper and the paper on the Forrester Research by Li, I was hoping to get a hold of the appendix with the actual questions you asked the visitors. Is there anyway you could give me more specific suggestions of what we should be asking our visitors in order to get an idea of what our specific visitors' habits are?
Thanks Adrienne
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Permalink Reply by Triin Visnapuu on -
The link didn't work, but it was easy enough to find. I'll just post a working URL here, in case somebody else wants to read it as well.
http://archimuse.com/mw2008/papers/kelly_l/kelly_l.html
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Permalink Reply by Amelia Bowan on
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We would like to understand what our visitors are doing while they are online
If you mean what people who visit the museum do when they are browsing the internet, then I can reply with great certainty that most of them are looking for something interesting to read while they are trying to avoid doing work :) Otherwise they are sitting at home on the internet refreshing facebook hoping someone posts a link to something worth clicking on.
This means that museums can make a significant impact on social media platforms by tailoring both the type(s) of information they publish online, and the visual presentation of it.
For example, when people are skiving off work they want the websites they visit to look as much like something work-related as possible so that if the boss/co-worker does unexpectedly walk up to their desk they will not arouse suspicion that they are in fact bludging. So sometimes minimal websites with plain white backgrounds and black text can actually be more attractive to people than a colourful, image-rich webpage (eg. Seb Chan's blog, fresh+newer).
Another factor is that when people do click on links in Twitter or on Facebook walls, the website HAS to be designed in a way that allows instant communication of the most important ideas/information which the museum is trying to convey, and is immediately navigatible. If someone clicks a link that goes to a website which they are unfamiliar with and the information they thought they would find there is lost under unrelated links and graphics, in between mountains of (poorly formatted) text, irritating flash animation, or just doesn't stand out, they will become disoriented, bored, and disillusioned and close the webpage never to return.
Anyway I think you should be asking your visitors the following:
What types of social media do you use?
Where do you use them (work, home, school, on the go etc)?
Where do you use them most often?
What technology do you use to participate in social media (webpages/browser apps/email/mobile phone/blackberry etc)?
Why do you use social media (professional networking, social networking, education or knowledge acquisition/sales and-or marketing purposes/community etc)?
What is your favourite aspect of using social media?
What is your least favourite aspect of social media?
What would you like to do/what kind of information would you like to see on social media platforms that is not currently available? (ie is there anything that you wish you could do that you can't/what is missing from your social media experience?)
How often would you like to receive updates from friends/fan pages/feeds/institutions/companies etc that you subscribe to?
What type of internet connection/speed do you have? (and perhaps does your mobile device support rich online browsing?)
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Amelia- this was very helpful. I appreciate the time you took in your response and we will surely be able to use it!
Thank you!
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Permalink Reply by Amelia Bowan on
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My pleasure! Hope it is helpful. If you have any other questions feel free to message me on here.
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Permalink Reply by Lynda Kelly on
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Hi all. As stated in my post below over January 2010 we surveyed 174 visitors to the Australian Museum and asked them about the kinds of online activities undertaken in the previous six months and the results are quite interesting:
71% watched a video on YouTube
64% looked at/added to an online encyclopaedia such as Wikipedia
57% used a social networking site like MySpace, Facebook, Bebo
53% read customer ratings/reviews
44% read a blog
40% listened to a podcast
36% uploaded a photo to website such as Flickr
34% used a wiki
25% added a rating/review to a website
25% participated in a discussion board/forum
16% added video/audio they created to a website
15% published their own webpage
14% used Twitter
13% made a comment on a blog
We are discussing this work on my Audience Research blog. I'm interested in what people think and if anyone else has done studies like this with their visitors too??
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