JAM 36 by Andrea Perseu

> Mobile technology

ISSUE 36 | October 2009

Mobile marketing: an intimate conversation Mobile decisions Plugging the ‘Always On’ into eCRM

> Project: Proper clever

> Five things to consider when mobilising your audience

> Mobile – more than just a marketing platform

Contents

JAM is published by

JAM is sponsored by

> Regulars Spotlight ................................................................. 3 www.a-m-a.co.uk

Research round-up ............................................ 4 Just a minute ..................................................... 10

AMA annual review ........................................ 11 Resources ............................................................ 23 > Mobile technology Mobile marketing: an intimate conversation ..........................................................6 Case study: Project: Proper clever ...............9 Mobile decisions ................................................15

Mobile marketing : an intimate conversation

AMA annual review 2008–2009

Case study: Mobilising your audience

Mobile decisions

Case study: Five things to consider when mobilising your audience ..................17 Plugging the ‘Always On’ into eCRM ........ 19 Case study: Mobile – more than just a marketing platform ............................. 21

This issue of JAM was edited by Andrea Perseu with assistance from Helen Bolt and Julie Aldridge e andrea@a-m-a.co.uk

JAM is published four times per annum. UK subscription rates £18 per annum Overseas subscription rates £37 per annum e andrea@a-m-a.co.uk

JAM is published by the Arts Marketing Association 7a Clifton Court, Cambridge CB1 7BN t 01223 578078 f 01223 245862 e info@a-m-a.co.uk w www.a-m-a.co.uk

Make JAM for the AMA JAM is always on the lookout for new writers with good ideas for case studies and features, especially from some of those smaller organisations out there. If you would like to contribute, please e-mail: andrea@a-m-a.co.uk

2 > JAM 36

Plugging the 'Always On' into eCRM

Opinions expressed in JAM are not necessarily those of the AMA and no responsibility is accepted for advertising content. Any material submitted for publication may be edited for reasons of style, content or available space. Meanings will not be altered without permission from the author. ISSN 1474-1172

JAM is available in large print or electronic format. e andrea@a-m-a.co.uk t 01223 578078 JAM is also available on the AMA website at www.a-m-a.co.uk/publications.asp

> EDITORIAL

Keeping it personal

could see the look on their faces, when I told some of my friends that this issue of JAM was going to be on mobile technology: ‘You are not going to write about your iPhone, are you?’ So, yes, I am aware that this is going to provoke a Marmite-esque ‘love it or hate it’ reaction, but I am going to write about my iPhone. Actually, I am going to write about its name. It might read iPhone, but if you think about it, what you hear is I, Phone. It’s the same with iPod: I, Pod. iPhoto: I, Photo. Plenty of people assume that the ‘i’ in Apple product names is just shorthand for internet. Maybe, but there are lots of connotations carried in the use of ‘i’. So, what if the ‘i’ denotes something special, something important, something you should take notice of – namely, yourself? This is what is different about mobile phones. They are personal, more so than any other device. People use

them to contact friends and family, and receive messages on them that are almost exclusively from friends and family. That is why, as marketers, we need to be careful if we want to integrate the mobile channel into our mix – a message that worked well in an email might be perceived as spam in the more private mobile media environment. This issue of JAM is all about the dos and don’ts of mobile marketing. Nancy Proctor analyses some of the strengths and weaknesses of three popular mobile marketing platforms (page 6), Marcus Austin guides us through the process of adapting your website for mobile users (page 15) and Mike Saunders finds out what the key things to consider are if you want to engage your audiences using mobile media (page 17). Roger Tomlinson discusses the changes, threats and opportunities brought on by the 'Always On' generation (page 19), we

tell you about how Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse used mobile vouchers in a ‘proper clever’ way (page 9) and on page 21 Tom Hunter and Sarah O’Hanlon ask ‘what happened to the good old text message?’

Andrea Perseu Editor, JAM e andrea@a-m-a.co.uk

> SPOTLIGHT

Spotlight on Emma Metcalfe

‘H

istory of Art?’ [Eyebrows raise in quizzical fashion] ‘What are you going to do with that?’ Prior to my degree, I had sold scones and lattés at a local supermarket. I then took my honed tea-making skills into clerical work and, for the next three years, temped with the National Health Service (NHS), earning myself enough for the odd term-time ale festival, while sharpening my database skills. During those three years, I studied History of Art at the University of Warwick. Not because you got to study in Venice in your final year (okay, maybe a little bit) or for the picture books, but because they had a fantastic un-auditioned music department. Warwick Arts Centre ensured campus had a great atmosphere and a highly active population of ‘thesps’ (easily identifiable by their uniform of decorative scarves). I quickly became ‘Marketing Manager’ for the Brass Society and organised tours for the Wind Orchestra. I also discovered that, unless you’re in a sunny park, brass band audiences are particularly elusive, even if you design super-cool posters. Upon graduating, I still didn’t really know what to do with my new but very expensive letters, so I headed off

to London for an interview at the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (RPO). I told them, among other things, that Beethoven wrote five symphonies (nine! He wrote nine!) and left thinking I’d blown it. Fortunately, I was forgiven and I made the big move to London to start work as Marketing Intern. I had such a fantastic time at the RPO, stuffing, researching, proofing, as well as working in some fabulous venues, and that led to my current job at the AMA. Becoming Events and Services Administrator has opened even more doors and I am excited to be providing professional development services for arts marketers, through organising events, training programmes, and being part of the AMA team in many ways. In the year since graduating, I’ve been thoroughly inspired by all those I’ve met and worked with, so feel free to ask me, ‘History of Art – what are you doing with that?’

Emma Metcalfe Events and Services Administrator, AMA e emma@a-m-a.co.uk JAM 36 > 3

On the go

Susan Hallam exposes our relationships with our mobile phones

obile phones aren’t just for talking on: the UK’s burgeoning love affair with the mobile internet means lots of new opportunities for arts marketing professionals. Most handsets are now internet enabled, mobile phone companies are offering ‘unlimited’ internet data tariffs, and 90% of UK residents live in postcode districts offering 3G mobile services with increased capacity for delivering high speed data and voice.1 But the love affair is still in its early stages, and adoption of the mobile internet has plenty of potential for continued growth. According to The Nielsen Company, over 8 million people in the UK, or 16% of adults, used their mobile phone to gain access to the internet in the first quarter of 2009. And Nielsen also report that the number of people accessing the internet via their mobile is growing more rapidly than those going online using their computer. But do our audiences use mobile? Is this mobile activity the sole preserve of geeks and the younger generation? Orange’s Exposure 2 Research reports the average age of mobile media users as a surprisingly mature 36. Men are twice as likely as women to access the internet via their mobile phone, 15% and 8% of mobile phone users respectively, and the most popular activity for all users is sending or uploading of photographs or video clips.2 Where do they use their mobile? Exposure 2 reports the answer may be at home, with 67% of mobile users reading their email at home, and 56% engaged in mobile internet browsing. If they’re on public

4 > JAM 36

transport, they’re likely to be engaged with entertainment, and when out and about they’re looking for local information to help facilitate moving about. This probably means more of your audience are looking at your content via mobile than you realised. I may read your emails while at home, but there’s a good chance I won’t be reading them on my PC, but rather on my Blackberry. How good do your emails look on a mobile phone? How easy is it to interact with your website on a mobile phone if I want to see what’s on? One surprising demographic that may challenge your assumptions, however, may be that teens browse the mobile internet less than half as much as the typical user. Today’s teens, or ‘Digital Natives’, are less likely than working adults to have all-day access to broadband connections, with 77% of teens saying they are not permitted to use their phone in class.3 Apple iPhone users in particular are phenomenally busy on the internet: comScore reports 79% of iPhone users accessed news or information via their mobile browser, four times the rate for all mobile phone users. Keep in mind that only 2% of UK mobile phones are iPhones, and 75% of iPhone users are male, mostly

between the ages of 18 and 44.4 iPhone users personalise their mobile to suit their own preferences, and have downloaded more than a billion applications, or apps, in the first nine months of the iPhone launch. The all-time most popular application is Facebook, but applications like ‘Artsnear Pro’5 helps users to discover museums and galleries by city or by proximity, and includes calendars of events and openings. The ‘Broadway in Chicago’6 app helps you to find what’s on stage and performance times, preview video, and purchase tickets. And here in the UK, Queen Theatrical Productions launched ‘We Will Rock You’ in September 2009, professing to be the first UK theatrical iPhone game application. This boom in mobile user activity leads inevitably to advertiser growth. Advertisers spent £28.6 million on mobile advertising in 2008, and the Mobile Marketing Association predicts mobile will grow by 26% this year, despite the economic downturn, and despite the decline in traditional media advertising.7 Developing a strategy for mobile marketing starts with understanding how, and why, your audiences interact with the technology. Orange8 breaks the mobile users’ universe

Apple iPhone users in particular are phenomenally busy on the internet: comScore reports 79% of iPhone users accessed news or information via their mobile browser, four times the rate for all mobile phone users.

> RESEARCH ROUND-UP

down into three groups correlating to age: Mainstream, Selective and Tentative. ‘Mainstream’ users are under 25, accessing web-based as well as mobile internet sites, and for whom mobile entertainment is a key driver. The 25- to 44-year-olds are ‘Selective’, using the internet to keep up to date, with email as their key driver, and wanting brief, to-thepoint mobile information. And finally, ‘Tentative’ users are over 45, are aware there is a lot available on their mobile but not exactly sure what, and are using mobile to access sports scores or news. There are specific mobile marketing opportunities for arts organisations, and one of the most significant is the mobile use of social networking sites. The IAB reports (2009) that 25% of all social networkers use their mobile to check or update their pages; 44% of 16- to 24-year-olds say they make

updates via their mobile, with a further 17% of over 55s also using mobile social networking.9 Facebook and Twitter have set up dedicated sites, formatted for the mobile screen. For lovers of social networking, mobile is now mainstream. Mobile offers marketers a whole basket of new marketing opportunities. Text messaging is a well-established mobile application that integrates well with offline ads, and research from M-Metrics indicates 75% of mobile subscribers have sent text messages in reply to an offline ad. Outbound SMS is already in use in a number of arts organisations around the UK including the Ambassadors Theatre which is developing strategies for outbound SMS messages to existing customers. But mobile marketing isn’t just about text messages. Other forms of mobile marketing will overtake SMS

1. Emily Keaney, The Digital World: A Review of the Evidence, Arts Council England, May 2009. 2. Exposure 2 Research, Orange Home UK plc, March 2009. 3. How Teens Use Media: A Nielsen report on the myths and realities of teen media trends. The Nielsen Company, June 2009, p. 9. 4. comScore releases First Data on iPhone Users in the UK, comScore Inc. March 2009. 5. Download at http://iphoneapps.oreilly. com/2009/07/artnear-pro.html 6. Download at http://www.broadwayinchicago. com/iphone.php 7. Mobile Marketing Buyers Guide, eConsultancy, August 2009, pp. 4 – 5.

8. Exposure Research Orange Home UK plc, November 2007. 9. Ten Things You Need to Know about Mobile Advertising, The Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB), May 2009, http://www.iabuk.net/en/1/10t hingsyouneedtoknowaboutmobile270509.mxs 10. Advertising – The Future’s Bright, the Future’s Mobile, a white paper in Mobile Advertising: Delivery Channels, Business Models & Forecasts 2009–2014 Juniper Research, June 2009. http://www.juniperresearch.com/shop/ products/whitepaper/pdf/JRL_Advertising%20 White%20Paper.pdf 11. Mobile – Just the Ticket: A White Paper in Mobile Ticketing: Transport, Entertainment and

text ad spend in 200910 with growth in mobile advertising in search engine advertising, display adverts and classified ads leading the way. Mobile ticketing, which offers users the ability to store a ticket on their mobile phone for later redemption, is predicted to experience exceptionally high growth, with over 410 million users worldwide receiving and redeeming tickets by 2013.11 Benefits of mobile ticketing include reduced costs, reduced carbon footprint by reducing paper, and better security. New forms of advertising will also show exceptional growth, in particular ‘Idle Screen’ advertising, which doesn’t interrupt a user’s activities. Likewise, users are very interested in locationbased advertising, which can be well targeted and the precision means relevant and engaging advertising. So, how important should mobile be in your marketing mix? Is your audience using mobile technologies? Are there ways of using mobile services that fit your budget? And are you ready to experiment with some innovative marketing techniques?

Events 2008–2013, Juniper Research, October 2008, p. 6, http://www.juniperresearch.com/ shop/products/whitepaper/pdf/Mobile%20~%20 Just%20the%20Ticket.pdf

Susan Hallam Internet Marketing Consultant w www.shcl.co.uk e susan@shcl.co.uk JAM 36 > 5

> FEATURE

Mobile marketing: an intimate conversation Nancy Proctor analyses some of the strengths and weaknesses of three popular mobile marketing platforms1

udiences are talking about your organisation using a range of social media, but perhaps their most intimate contact with your brand happens through their personal mobile devices.2 Calendar, address book, photo album, camera, media player and even wallet, our mobile

phones have become ‘an extension of ourselves’3 and, as Jonathan Finkelstein has remarked, mobile audio is akin to ‘letting someone whisper in our ear’.4 How can arts organisations engage the unique proximity that mobile devices afford to our community members, both ethically and effectively, in our

marketing efforts? Fundamentally, the challenges of mobile marketing are the same as that of any other marketing project: creating connections between the ‘target audience’ and the organisation’s mission and ability to deliver.5

Know thyself 1. What is your institution’s mission? 2. What is the key message, tied to this mission, that you want to communicate? (If the message/project does not support your institution’s mission, it should be abandoned.) 3. What resources – people, time, money, support – can the organisation put at the disposal of this project?6 Know thy interlocutors7 1. Who are you trying to reach and also hear from or even collaborate with? 2. What do they need or want? How is your mission/message critical for them?8 3. Where are they, both in the ‘real’ and virtual worlds, and how do they communicate when there? What tools and platforms, including mobile, do they favour; how and when do they use them? The answers to these questions will also have revealed that: 1 Mobile cannot be thought of in isolation from any other platform the arts organisation uses and an effective campaign links and leverages the strengths of analogue, digital and mobile platforms.9 2 Not all platforms will be appropriate for all projects. Choose the ones that will best carry your message to your constituents and work with those.10 3 And ‘remember: 80% is strategy, only 20% is technology … success

is dependent on understanding customers, defining an objective, and assembling the right strategy’.11 Nonetheless, the specific contexts, strengths and weaknesses of mobile technologies are relevant: mobile web is not just a scaled-down version of the organisation’s website.12 Short, catchy headlines from advertisements won’t necessarily work as ‘tweets’: transported from the one-to-many broadcast model into the many-

to-many social media model, they can seem bombastic or just plain dull, and are probably aimed at different audiences from those who use mobile platforms. By the same token, what reads well as a tweet may seem cryptic as an update of your organisation’s Facebook status, so use automatic feeds between social media platforms with care. Here are some other quirks and proclivities of three popular mobile marketing platforms:

Short, catchy headlines from advertisements won’t necessarily work as ‘tweets’: transported from the one-to-many broadcast model into the manyto-many social media model, they can seem bombastic or just plain dull. 6 > JAM 36

Podcasts. Although relatively new as a medium, podcasts generally have more in common with the old one-to-many broadcast model than with social media, and as with most broadcast media, download stats alone don’t reveal how much of your podcast message has been heard, if any. But as a ‘push’ medium (users can subscribe and automatically receive updated content), podcasts are a great way to combine promotion with interpretive content and reinforce the organisation’s brand.13 When you have a message suited to mobile audio(-visual), find out who of the organisation’s constituency and target audiences listen to podcasts, where, when and how – through a mobile media player (audio or audiovisual?) or on their computer? – and build your programming for them.

SMS. Some organisations are really exploiting the strengths of the mobile phone as a two-way communication device by offering coupons, reminders and subscriptions services via text message.14 The Smithsonian American Art Museum’s audio tour pilot, opening in autumn 2009, will allow mobile users to get membership information and ‘save’ artworks of interest as SMS messages with links to further details on the museum’s website.15 And new ‘mobile giving’ services allow supporters to make small donations to organisations through their phone bills,16 while others are pioneering the concept of micro volunteering through web-enabled phones.17 Twitter. Twitter spans both mobile and fixed web.18 Like a cocktail party for shy people, you can engage ‘tweeps’

singly and in groups, but they can also talk to each other, and there are at least as many conversations going on as people in the room. Start by listening in to (following) organisations similar to yours and their followers. Tools like TwitterAnalyzer.com will help you discover what your target audiences are talking about and time your messages (tweets) for the time of day they’re most likely to be on Twitter. The ‘shelf life’ of a tweet is about the length of a good party, and if your contributions are keyed to the shared interests of those participating, they will ‘follow you back’. Hashtagged keywords in your messages can help people with similar interests find you in the Twitterverse. Some may invite their friends to listen in. The popular folks at the party can be particularly effective in spreading

JAM 36 > 7

> FEATURE

your message; you may want to enlist them directly (@ or direct message) to help get your message out (retweet). If you are offensive or, more likely, boring, still others will drop out of the conversation and miss what you say now and in future (unfollowing). We live in an age of abundance when it comes to brilliant, energetic and generous people using social media and mobile platforms in the arts, so additional advice won’t be hard to find.19 Among the best tips I’ve found are:

1 Be a personal user of social networks such as Twitter, Linkedin or Facebook before entering your museum. Experiment, contribute. 2 R esearch what other organisations are doing in different platforms. 3 Explain the project to the rest of the staff, be prepared for some resistance, be motivating, be patient. And most importantly: ‘start small, start right away’.20 It takes time to build both audience and expertise on mobile platforms, but demand for mobile content and experiences

is exploding.21 Few are better placed than arts organisations, as trusted and creative social partners, to respond to this call.

1. All internet sources cited below were consulted on 12 July 2009. 2. Sebastian Chan and Angelina Russo, Planning for Social Media workshop at Museums and the Web 2009, www.archimuse.com/mw2009/abstracts/ prg_335002068.html 3. Roxanna Samii, Mobile Phones: The Silver Bullet to Bridge the Digital Divide? http://rsamii.blogspot.com/2009_03_01_ archive.html 4. J onathan Finkelstein, interviewed with Len Steinbach by Nancy Proctor, 2 January 2009; forthcoming podcast at http:// museummobile.info/archives/category/ podcasts 5. N ina Simon’s How to Develop a (SmallScale) Social Media Plan informed my list above: http://museumtwo.blogspot. com/2009/06/how-to-develop-small-scalesocial-media.html 6. And are these resources sustainable for the life of the project? See the Sustainability Checklist in the slides from Seb Chen and Angelina Russo’s workshop at Museums and the Web 2009 (op cit.). 7. In the old broadcast model ‘audiences’ passively receive or ‘hear’ one-way communications. When audiences are engaged in a conversation, they become affiliates, members, constituents, collaborators and contributors. 8. John Durel urges arts organisations to define a mission that is of critical importance to its constituencies: 1 July

2009 webinar, Strategic Thinking and Planning in Today's Economic Climate, http://iweb.aam-us.org/LogIn/login.aspx ?ReturnUrl=%2fCommunities%2fforum. aspx%3fforumid%3d35&forumid=35. See also 2007 article, A Golden Age for Historic Properties with Anita Nowery Durel, http:// docs.google.com/gview?a=v&q=cache:sTDLL 53bI5wJ:www.qm2.org/Golden_Age.pdf+joh n+durel+historic+house&hl=en&gl=us 9. See, for example, the social media policy for Headset Bros. in Sharlyn Lauby, 5 Steps for Successful Social Media Damage Control in Mashable.com, http://mashable. com/2009/07/09/social-media-damagecontrol 10. Simon, op cit. 11. Jeremiah Owyang, Report: Companies Should Organize for Social Media in a “Hub and Spoke” Model, http://www.webstrategist.com/blog/2009/06/25/reportcompanies-should-organize-for-socialmedia-in-hub-and-spoke/ 12. And the failure to recognise the specificity of the mobile platform and experience in the interpretive sphere was the ruination of many a multimedia tour early in this century. 13. One of my favourite examples is SFMOMA’s Artcast podcast series: http://www.sfmoma. org/pages/audios 14. See, for example, projects by Guide by Cell in the US (www.guidebycell.com/gbc) and X-on in the UK (www.x-on.co.uk/products_ mobile_audio_guide.htm).

15. See also http://wiki.museummobile.info/ museums-to-go/projects/american-art 16. See www.mobilegiving.org 17. See The Extraordinaries, http://beextra.org and http://wiki.museummobile.info/wikiref/ mobile-fundraising-volunteering 18. There are many excellent Twitter primers on the web, such as www.youtube.com/ watch?v=ddO9idmax0o 19. T he best starting point is Social Media for Non-Profits: 26 Great Slideshare Presentations You Can Use, a guest post by Rebecca Leaman on Beth's Blog: How Nonprofits Can Use Social Media, 1 July 2009, http://beth.typepad.com/beths_ blog/2009/07/guest-post-by-rebeccaleaman-social-media-for-nonprofits-26great-slideshare-presentations-you-can-u. html. On all things mobile see http:// MuseumMobile.info and http:// tatehandheldconference.pbworks.com/ 20. Comment by Conxa Rodà, @innova2, to Jasper Visser, Practical Advice on Developing your Presence on Social Media Websites, 15 June 2009, http:// themuseumofthefuture.com/2009/06/15/ practical-advice-on-developing-yourpresence-on-social-media-websites/ 21. Labellec, E-learning in the Mobile World and the Right Business Model to Deliver It, 9 June 2009, http://blogs.oregonstate.edu/ instructionaldesign/2009/06/09/e-learningin-the-mobile-world-and-the-rightbusiness-model-to-deliver-it/

8 > JAM 36

Nancy Proctor Head of New Media Initiatives, Smithsonian American Art Museum e proctorn@si.edu

> CASE STUDY

Project: Proper clever Facts and links to the online resources and theatre production by Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse and MediaSnackers The arts organisation: Liverpool Playhouse began life as the Star Music Hall in 1866 and was converted to its current configuration in 1911 on the formation of the Liverpool Repertory Company, one of the first reps in the country. The Everyman was established in 1964 in what had originally been built as a chapel in 1834. Also a rep company, the Everyman had a less formal, younger and more politicised ethos than the Playhouse, and it went on to create pioneering, socially engaged drama, to inspire generations of young theatre-goers, and to launch the careers of a prodigious range of writers and performers. In 1999, the Everyman and the Playhouse were joined together under a single management: a new organisation created for the new century, to take the city’s producing theatre forward. (From www.everymanplayhouse.com) The social media specialists: Media snacking is a term DK coined back in 2006 to describe what young people were – and still are – doing with the media. DK has an educational background in communications and media, plus a professional background in local government – he was the first Corporate Youth Officer for any UK local authority. MediaSnackers has been going for three years now, but DK’s approach is essentially the same: among MediaSnackers’ brand beliefs are ‘real life has more bandwidth’, ‘everyone has something to teach’, ‘conversation over advertising’ and their overarching mantra, ‘everything we do must kick ass’. (From http:// mediasnackers.com/manifesto) The show: Proper Clever was a threeweek production for a youth audience which ran in October 2008. Written

by Frank Cottrell-Boyce, author of 24 Hour Party People, Millions and Cosmic, Proper Clever is a tale of friendship and identity centred around a group of year 10s who, far from being too cool for school, are a band of bookloving nerds who find strength in their united geekdom. ‘Patrick had a spiritual experience, in Pwllheli. Matthew’s in touch with his feminine side. Rachel likes rules and Bex is confused. They’re the gang and they’re Proper Clever. Then Claire arrives and takes charge. Together they’ll be invincible … or at least not very vincible. As they face the girl everyone’s talking about, it’s a battle of clever versus smart, geek versus chic and how to satisfy the hunger for knowledge when everyone’s eating burger and chips.’ (From www. everymanplayhouse.com/whats-on/ show-detail.asp?id=218) The project: MediaSnackers created a dynamic web presence for Proper Clever by launching a specific blog for the production packed with insights, slideshows and video interviews (www.properclever.co.uk, hosted on WordPress.org). They trained up some of the staff so that they could post ‘behind-the-scenes’ photos and videos; they also involved local young people by giving them the tools and skills they needed to become ‘digital journalists’ for the three-week run of the production. Their role was to create fresh content for the blog (now closed – only used for the specific run), spread the buzz online and engage their peers and other blog readers by using a wide range of online and social media. The cast got involved in the promotion of the production too: on the virtual hotseating page, the actors from the play took turns to meet online to answer the audience’s

questions and chat about Proper Clever from their character’s point of view. (Go to: www.properclever.co.uk/ virtual-hotseating) The Proper Clever project also explored new ways of communicating to young people using their medium of choice – mobile phones. A series of mobile vouchers – snack-size mobile movies including extra scenes from the play – were filmed and propagated via Bluetooth, so that they wouldn’t cost anything to send or receive. The vouchers were distributed with the help of the members of the Everyman and Playhouse’s youth theatre and forum, plus the digital journalists and other staff. People could also pop in to the box office to pick one up, or to use their voucher to book a ticket for one of the Proper Clever shows at a reduced rate. Over 200 young people used a mobile voucher, and some even started collecting them and sending in requests to receive the whole series. (Go to: www.properclever.co.uk/mobilevouchers)

Sarah Ogle, Communications and Sales Director, Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse e s.ogle@everymanplayhouse.com

DK, Founder, Mediasnackers mediasnackers.com/contact Visit www.properclever.co.uk

DK will be a keynote speaker at the AMA’s digital marketing day on Monday 30 November at Sadler’s Wells, London. For more information and to book a place, please visit www.a-m-a.co.uk or email emma@a-m-a.co.uk JAM 36 > 9

0 6

Just a minute 10

What is your first memory of the arts? My most enjoyable early memory would be going to see an opera of Where the Wild Things Are with my granny, which evoked Maurice Sendak’s illustrations so fantastically. I also used to spend hours at home poring over lovely old art books, where the plates are all individually tipped in. The reproductions were terrible by today’s standards, no doubt, but I loved them all the same.

How did you get into arts marketing? By accident! I was reaching the end of a contract as Curatorial Intern of Prints, Drawings and Watercolours (what an awful job title that was!) at Leeds City Art Gallery and fancied something more outwardly focused. A Marketing and Press job at Kettle’s Yard came up and I thought I’d go and see what the place was like. I immediately loved Kettle’s Yard and the atmosphere and thought this would be a great place to promote.

What attracted you to the arts sector? The money, glitz and glamour . . . Really, in my first year at university I found myself severely uninspired by my degree (History) and stepped sideways into Art History which all took place in the beautiful Barber 10 > JAM 36

(

> JUST A MINUTE

Get to know other AMA members in just six questions

Institute of Fine Arts in Birmingham. I fell in love with History of Art and felt that I had to find a way to work with it. I was lucky enough that every year the Barber Institute took on one graduate as a sort of trainee, working with the Curator and the Education Officer, and that was my first taste of working in the arts.

When and why did you join the AMA? When I moved to Kettle’s Yard I had very little experience of arts marketing and felt quite at sea – I am the only person working in marketing here. Luckily, my predecessor recommended that I join the Arts Marketing Association and I immediately found it a fantastic resource.

What is your proudest moment? From a work perspective, getting a job in the visual arts after everyone had said it would be impossible.

And what is your indulgence? It was ER – what shall I do now that it is over forever! The Wire is helping me to recover but I’ve only got two seasons left. Also, days wandering around London shops and galleries without the kids!

Susie Biller PR Officer, Kettle’s Yard e susie@kettlesyard.cam.ac.uk

> FEATURE

AMA annual review 2008–2009

Meet the AMA The AMA is the membership body supporting anyone working to bring arts and audiences together. It has approximately 2,000 members from all art forms, at all levels of their career and from the UK and beyond A word from Simon Drysdale, Chair, Arts Marketing Association Looking back at yet another productive year, I will let the figures speak for themselves to show all that the AMA has put together for its members. Since April 2008 we launched a brand new service, Encore, the coaching scheme for senior arts professionals. We held 57 different events ranging from workshops, seminars, day conferences and network meetings at 18 locations throughout the UK, which were attended by 1,290 people. The annual conference, WHY? Discovering the secrets of public behaviour and the arts, in Newcastle Gateshead, July 2008 sold out in

record time and was attended by 32% of the AMA membership. The 2009 conference, Exploring artistic excellence and public engagement (Curve Theatre, Leicester) was equally successful and was attended

by 528 people. And, as always, we are constantly striving to improve our current provision of services – so read on and see what we have in store for you over the coming months.

The AMA supports its members by offering: • a wealth of resources • networking online and • books, journals, to keep up to date in person with 2,000 reports and case with current issues members from a wide studies to inspire your and best practice variety of cultural thinking and support • professional organisations your professional development • conferences and development opportunities: the training events to Mentoring, Coaching develop new skills, and Action Learning debate current ideas schemes and discover practical solutions

AMA conference at Curve Theatre, Leicester 2009

Leo Cinicolo Photography, www.leocinicolo.com

JAM 36 > 11

It was the need to ensure JAM was printed sustainably that first made me think that sponsorship was a natural fit for London Calling and our sustainable communication drive. The journal’s whole USP is sharing knowledge and experience, so it made complete sense that this advocacy of best practice started right there on the physical page, even before the type was set and the ink had dried. That’s eco-friendly vegetable ink, of course, and it’s reassuring to know that the words inside are as valuable as the pages are renewable. JAM’s good for all of us. It’s as simple as that. Tom Hunter, Sales and Marketing Director, London Calling Arts Ltd

. . . is a not-for-profit organisation, with a turnover of just under £500,000

Did you know that the AMA …

. . . relies primarily on earned income from membership, events and services and does not receive any revenue funding . . . spends just 21p in each £1 on overheads, leaving the lion’s share, 79p, to be spent on supporting members’ professional development . . . provides its diverse range of services from an average subscription income of £75 per member?

Meet the AMA staff Julie Aldridge, Executive Director Helen Bolt, Marketing Manager Annabel Busher, Events and Services Manager Katherine Dimsdale, Programme Coordinator Hannah Fenton, Membership and Finance Officer Kate Flannery, Membership Development Manager Neil Parker, Freelance Business Services Manager Andrea Perseu, Marketing Officer Anna Upward, Events and Services Officer Sarah Wells, Freelance Finance Manager

12 > JAM 36

Meet the AMA board Simon Drysdale (Chair), Managing Director, Impact Print Display Beth Aplin (Vice-Chair), Director, Aplin Partnership Jane Donald, Head of Marketing, Glasgow Cultural Enterprises Helen Dunnett, perviously Head of Marketing at Royal Northern College of Music (RNCM), now freelance Steven Hadley, Chief Executive, Audiences Northern Ireland Sarah Ogle, Communications and Sales Director, Liverpool Everyman and Playhouse Avril Scott, Consultant Jo Taylor, Head of Marketing, Wales Millennium Centre Emily Till, Head of Marketing, The Sage Gateshead

Meet the membership 25% Venue (performing arts only) 15% Gallery/museum 12% Performing arts company 11% arts) visual and ng Arts centre (performi 3% Festival 1% media Cinema, film and new 7% Freelance/consultant 2% Student 24% Other

Thank you for awarding me the bursary enabling me to go to the AMA conference. It was an invaluable experience and I gained a lot from it, finding both the keynote speeches and seminars fascinating. I learnt a lot and it was brilliant to network with so many people from all over the UK. Back in the office I am now totally fired up with enthusiasm for developing our audiences.

> FEATURE > AMA annual review 2008â&#x20AC;&#x201C;2009

Gill Illingworth, Marketing Assistant Distribution and Audience Development, Swansea Grand Theatre

Leo Cinicolo Photography, www.leocinicolo.com

AMA events and services 2008â&#x20AC;&#x201C;2009

Workshops, conferences and training events Between April 2008 and March 2009 we held 57 different events including the annual conference, workshops, seminars, network meetings, mentoring, action learning and ADUK (Audience Data UK) training courses. These events were attended by 1,290 people in locations right across the UK.

Encore, the coaching scheme for senior arts professionals Aimed at senior arts professionals, the Encore coaching scheme has been designed to help highly skilled marketers to build their potential in their current role and explore leadership opportunities for the future. Delivered with support from the Scottish Arts Council, Arts Council of Northern Ireland and the Arts Council of Wales, Encore provided training to 34 arts professionals across the UK and saw more than double that number apply for a place on the scheme. Fore more information visit www.a-m-a.co.uk/encore.asp

Top 5 downloads from www.a-m-a.co.uk 1. Exploring artistic excellence and public engagement: 2009 conference report 2. New media, new marketing: 2008 day conference report 3. Making your mark: 2009 museums and galleries day conference report 4. ADUK resources: www.a-m-a.co.uk/ ADUKresources.asp 5. Thinking BIG! worksheets and additional resources: www.a-m-a. co.uk/publications.asp

What would the arts and indeed the arts marketing landscape be like without the AMA? I think that none of us can imagine that now. Undoubtedly, the AMA continues to be an essential element in the professionalisation and development of arts marketing professionals all over the country. Along with the resources and steady stream of seminars and workshops, the annual conference is a date for all our diaries not to be missed. Meli Hatzihrysidis, Senior Officer, Participation, Arts Council England, National Office JAM 36 > 13

I’ve belonged to the AMA since it began and have gained a huge amount from my membership. Catherine Holden, Director of Marketing and Development, National Museums Scotland

Leo Cinicolo Photography, www.leocinicolo.com

Looking forward At the AMA we are planning a range of events and services for the next 12 months. The aim is to provide knowledge, ideas, inspiration and skills on topics that members tell us they want to hear more about. We also aim to reflect changes in society in order to support and influence the future of arts marketing. Over the next 12 months, the AMA will be: • launching an annual digital marketing day exploring the impact of new media on arts marketing and audience development • providing Encore, the AMA’s coaching scheme for senior arts professionals,

in all four countries of the UK, with support from the Scottish Arts Council, Arts Council of Northern Ireland and the Arts Council of Wales • hosting a range of practical workshops across the UK on topics that include online marketing, managing change, the communications mix, copywriting, pricing, management skills and audience development • delivering a customised version of the ADUK (Audience Data UK) training programme for the visual arts sector funded as part of Arts Council England’s Turning Point programme

• launching a new cohort of our popular mentoring scheme • publishing JAM, the Arts Marketing Journal, providing theory, case studies, ideas and good practice on current topics such as segmentation (January 2010) • and working with our member reps in every region of the UK to provide local networking events and opportunities for members to get together informally to share current ideas, challenges and good practice. Julie Aldridge Executive Director, AMA

Membership 30%

Overheads 20%

Bank interest 9%

Member Services 26%

Member Services 1%

Events 54%

Events 60%

Where our money comes from (2008–2009) Membership £148,311 Events (incl. project grants and sponsorship) £298,045 Member services £45,607 Bank interest £4,624

How we spend our money (2008–2009) Member services £128,316 Events £266,986 Overheads £101,186

Total income

Total expenditure

14 > JAM 36

£496,587

£496,488

> FEATURE

Mobile decisions Marcus Austin shares the lessons learnt from creating the Guardian mobile site One of the biggest problems for any internet news organisation is how to deal with the increasing demand by users to read your content on mobile devices, and how to make the experience on mobile a useful experience. Whereas it’s easy to test a conventional site against a range of common browsers (Internet Explorer/ Firefox/Safari) and screen resolutions (800x600, 1024x768 etc.), when it comes to mobiles things are much more difficult. With mobile phones you have to work with thousands of browsers, as each phone typically has its own proprietary browser. Additionally, each browser can also work in different ways, depending on the network and the country; for example, a Motorola RAZR might display a website in a different way on Vodafone in France, compared to the same handset on O2 in Ireland. On top of this, there’s the problem of screen size, memory and connectivity. A low-end handset can have a screen size as low as 128x160 pixels, slow GPRS connections, and can be limited to page sizes no greater than 19k. Then you have users of high-end devices like the iPhone and G1 Android that typically have resolutions of 320x480 pixels, can view multiple megabit pages and have fast 3G connections. Because of all those different variables, creating a website for mobile users is always going to be a bit of a balancing act. Many publishers solve the problem by just creating a site for a specific device like the iPhone. And while the iPhone tends to dominate mobile page views, there is a ‘long tail’ of other device users

out there who are desperate to get mobile news – if only they could find the right ‘mobile-friendly’ site. So, when we embarked on the Guardian mobile site, we decided that we would try to give the best user experience across as many devices as we could. To do so, we decided to split the service into four different versions that fitted with the Mobile Marketing Association (www.mmaglobal.com) screen definitions of small, medium, large and X-large: • a low-resolution, text-only version of the site, for devices with resolutions less than 240x260 pixels, which would work on very small screens and would give a good user experience no matter what the connection speed • a medium-resolution version for devices with resolutions from 240x260 to 320x480 pixels which works with the majority of handsets on the market and displays text and graphics when appropriate • a QVGA (Quarter VGA) version for devices with a resolution of 320x480 (e.g. iPhone, Android) and most PDAs which displays text and graphics and can handle video and audio • a high-resolution version for devices with resolutions greater than 320x480 (e.g. mobile laptops, netbooks) that have a big screen but may not necessarily have a fast connection. The first stage to any mobile website is to be able to identify the mobile users from the normal users, and then to be able to identify the characteristics of the device. We chose to work with two third-party companies, Bluestar Mobile (www.bluestarmobile.com) and MobileIQ (www.mobileiq.co.uk), JAM 36 > 15

Web users’ behaviours are straightforward, but mobile audience’s behaviours are all new. What a mobile user does and what they’re looking for changes depending on the time of day, where they are, the handset they’re using, and who they’re with – and the only way of finding that out is to build and test, and test again.

to handle all of the device recognition and to build the site. But if we had wanted to do this in-house, we could have used services like Device Atlas (http://deviceatlas.com), which has details on over 4,500 devices; Handset Detection (www.handsetdetection. com), which lists over 7,000 devices; or the WURFL Open Source database (http://wurfl.sourceforge.net). All of these services allow you to identify a device coming to your site and show all of its particular characteristics like screen size, page limitations and whether it supports audio, video etc. The next stage is to identify what sort of content you want to display. Many mobile sites offer a restricted cut-down version of their normal sites content, so limiting the mobile user to just a few sections (normally news, business, sports and show business) and to just a few short paragraphs from the original copy. We felt that the Guardian audience wanted the same news, and would probably be disappointed if we reduced the text to a précis of the normal articles. There is also a perception in mobile users’ minds that a mobile website is just the normal website but on a mobile device. So, the Guardian mobile site offers content from over 60 different sections from the main Guardian and Observer website; the content is the full content and not an abridged version of what appears on the main website; and we offer all the text and graphics from the site, including picture galleries. The only parts of the main website content that we did deliberately cut out from the mobile service were our audio and video content. It’s not that users are not interested in audio or 16 > JAM 36

video – ringtone downloads have kept many mobile businesses in revenue for years – it’s more to do with the fact that mobile devices and the mobile connections aren’t really suited to downloading or streaming the large audio and video files we have on the Guardian site, where a typical podcast can be anything from 25 to 35Mb and even short video clips can be 5–10Mb. And unless you have a very competitive data plan or an unlimited download plan there would be a good chance that one or two of our readers would get a large – and very unexpected – bill for downloading their favourite podcast. The last part of building the mobile site is to drive traffic to it. We knew from our analytics that we had a large number of users who came to the normal Guardian website on mobile devices, but that many of them were not going to the mobile site or not finding the mobile site. To encourage users to use the mobile site we implemented a mobile redirect, so that if you were a mobile user typing in www.guardian.co.uk the server would automatically detect that you were a mobile user and send you to m.guardian.co.uk. We are currently analysing the first four months’ worth of traffic and it’s interesting to see how mobile users react differently to normal web users, in both the times of day they access the site, and the sort of news and information they look for. The main mobile peaks in traffic are in the morning rush hour between 7 and 9am, at home time between 5am and 7pm and then a peak after 11pm. Whereas the standard web traffic is big between 9am and 5pm, with

a large peak at lunchtime between 12noon and 1pm. Additionally an event like Michael Jackson’s death, which happened outside the core 9–5 hours hardly caused a stir on the web, but mobile traffic was huge between 11pm and 2am when the ‘Is he? Isn’t he?’ speculation was rife. Similarly the Wimbledon semi-final between Andy Murray and Andy Roddick caused a huge leap in mobile traffic as the match went on and on and hit the going-home commute before eventually ending at 6.45pm, while normal web traffic again hardly showed any signs of a peak. The main thing we have learnt from creating a mobile site is that the mobile audience requires a different way of thinking. Web users’ behaviours are straightforward, but mobile audience’s behaviours are all new. What a mobile user does and what they’re looking for changes depending on the time of day, where they are, the handset they’re using, and who they’re with – and the only way of finding that out is to build and test, and test again.

Marcus Austin Mobile Product Manager, Guardian Unlimited e marcus.austin@guardian.co.uk

> CASE STUDY

Five things to consider when mobilising your audience What are the key things to consider if you want to engage your audiences using mobile media? Mike Saunders answers

ith almost thirteen million people in the UK using their mobile phones to browse the web, and a 54% increase in ownership of smartphones last year,1 the market for delivering content and services via mobiles is already significant and likely to get much larger. It’s hard not to get excited by the possibilities, particularly somewhere like Kew Gardens, which offer such a great outdoor space. But developing a successful mobile app can be expensive and technically challenging, so what are the key things you should consider as you plan your killer mobile app? 1. Who and why Mobile phones are ultimately just another channel to your audience so, first, make absolutely sure you understand their needs. Second, decide what success looks like – is it primarily about raising revenue, increasing audience numbers or building your reputation with an influential user group? Once all this is clear, you will probably have a number of propositions staring you in the face. Successful mobile apps generally exhibit at least one of the following characteristics: • providing things you can do on the move (e.g. games) •d elivering location-specific content at the ‘point of interest’. If your proposition includes one or both of these, it could work as a mobile app, but do also consider how your audience uses phones. Currently, mobile access to the internet is

skewed heavily towards both younger people and men,1 although this is expected to even out as ownership grows. 2. Don’t forget the content Because it appears to be the toughest bit of a project to crack, it’s often tempting to focus just on technology. But the reality is that planning, preparing and delivering your content will probably be the most difficult, time-consuming and therefore costly element of your project. Choosing the right content treatment is important – for example by offering a service that is locationdriven, and feels exclusive and unique. At Kew, we’re aiming to develop services that feel as informative and delightful as walking around the gardens with our most knowledgeable gardeners or scientists. Where possible, it’s of course sensible to re-purpose existing content – and there are a number of ways to do this. A great example is Brooklyn Museum, which has created a publicly accessible window onto their collections called an application programming interface (API), which now delivers content into their iPhone app.2 Mobiles are also a great platform for people to contribute their own comments or media, which is well illustrated by a trial run at Kew by the BBC and partners under the name ‘Stories @ Kew’. One hundred participants representing a crosssection of Kew’s visitors took part, and between them uploaded over 700 photos, videos and comments.3 It needn’t be complicated or expensive to offer such opportunities

Brooklyn’s iPhone app, image by Trish Mayo

– there are many existing applications that are free to use. For example, using services like GPS Mission4 or Flickr5 your audiences can record their visit with locationstamped images that can be shared with other visitors. There is an active Flickr community posting photographs of Kew, many from mobile phones. We are encouraging this and will be displaying some of them on our website. 3. Networks, guides and apps Before you do anything else, make sure that people will be able to access your service by checking the network coverage at your site or sites.6 Even with good coverage, you may want to consider providing a free wireless network which can remove barriers to uptake and improve the quality of experience. JAM 36 > 17

> CASE STUDY

1. UK mobile internet use, http://bit.ly/Yr239. Access date: 13/7/09. 2. Brooklyn museum iPhone app, http://bit.ly/PfUtv. Access date: 13/7/09. 3. Stories @ Kew run by BBC and partners as part of the Participate project, www.participateonline.co.uk. Access date: 15/7/09. 4. G PS Mission, http://gpsmission.com. Access date: 13/7/09.

5. Kew on Flickr, http://www.flickr.com/ search/?q=Kew. Access date: 13/7/09. 6. Ofcom information on mobile network coverage, http://bit.ly/15Zn2j. Access date: 13/7/09. 7. Tate multimedia guide, http://bit.ly/M93UA. Access date: 13/7/09. 8. Dial-up audio guide technologies, www.mobi-tour.co.uk/mobile_phone_tour. htm and www.mobitour.co.uk. Access date: 13/7/09.

If you can’t do either, then you can still offer content to download from your website in advance (for example as a podcast), but beware that take-up may be slow. Tate has taken a successful hybrid approach, offering multimedia tours on iPhone and iPod Touch which you can download in certain Tate galleries from iTunes via a wireless network. If you don’t own one, you can rent an iPod Touch when you’re there.7 If you do have good mobile coverage, one neat and simple solution is using technology such as Mobitours8 to deliver audio guides as a dial-up service. We offered this service at Kew during our Henry Moore exhibition last year, also making them available on iTunes and from our website. The dial-up service was charged at £1.50 for access to all eighteen guides, and featured exclusive access to scientists, educators and Moore’s collaborators. The technology allowed for different payment methods and multiple languages, and provided detailed statistics of use – which enabled us to refine the content. We found, for example, that offering a free taster of the service increased people’s understanding of the service and hence readiness to pay. Technically speaking, neither of the above examples is an app. An app is a piece of computer code that you download and run on your phone, which can offer enhanced functionality. But a major challenge in developing mobile apps is the multitude of different mobile phone platforms, meaning that to offer a universal service you may need to recreate your app for each platform.

In addition, creating an app for the iPhone, for example, requires development in the Objective-C programming language – a specialist and therefore expensive business. Just the technical development could cost you tens of thousands of pounds depending on your aims, so you will need a good business case to ensure it delivers value.

18 > JAM 36

4. Sell, sell, sell If you want to make money from your app or service, you may decide to sell it. The good news is that through Apple’s App Store, Android Marketplace and others, a simple and effective route to market has emerged. It is reported that in the first eight months of the Apple App Store, over 25,000 applications were distributed through 800M downloads. Here are a few issues to resolve if you want to charge for an app or service: • E nsure the proposition is clear and people clearly understand its value, and offer a free trial or taster. •G et the price-point right and check the market for comparative apps. •G et the payment mechanism right. App stores and iTunes are great because they’re easy to buy from. An alternative that worked well at Kew is reverse-charge text messages. These appear directly to your phone bill and seem to be popular for small amounts. Avoid credit card transactions, as people don’t like providing card details on phones. • P rovide offers and bundles to incentivise purchase. Even a free service needs to be sold – a fact that often gets overlooked.

You’ll need a proper marketing plan, and never miss any opportunity to promote the service and explain its benefits. Make sure it’s all over your website, e-newsletters, direct mail, tickets and every other channel you can access. 5. Test and improve At the point that you have a clear proposition, it’s a really good idea to test the concept with your target audience – it can save you large amounts of time and money. At Kew, we used this approach to test a mobile quiz using a simple paper mock-up, and some willing testers recruited from school groups. Like many things digital, the testing and improvement cycle will probably never end, which can be a positive thing. Remember to build an evaluation strategy into your project so you can continue to improve the app once it’s live and grow your user base. Finally, consider providing an opportunity for people to feed back and talk about your offering – if you don’t let them do so on your own website they’ll do it elsewhere. And if you respond to their questions they will generally be constructive and become advocates for your service.

Mike Saunders Director of Digital Media, Kew Gardens e m.saunders@kew.org

> FEATURE

Plugging the ‘Always On’ into eCRM Roger Tomlinson discusses the changes, threats and opportunities brought on by the 'Always On' generation

t is estimated that there are over 17.4 million internetconnected mobile phone users out there in the UK (Mobile Data Association, February 2009); though estimates do range from only 7.2 million upwards.1 These bring us new and specific opportunities to get closer to potential attenders and build relationships, but it may not be that easy to turn this into results. If customer relationship management requires that communications are tailored, personalised and reasonably specific to the individuals and their behaviours, then the same is required for eCRM – only more so, as for most people, the device receiving the communication is intensely personal and most messages are specifically for them.

Apps for the arts The development of mobile apps is great news for iPhone users, though apps are inevitably aimed at already informed attenders, likely to be insiders. Do we find this an attractive development because lots of arts marketers are early adopters of iPhones themselves? Given the size

Mobile-friendly In parallel, arts organisations should be asking web developers to provide ‘mobile-friendly’ browser front-ends for their websites, where, in the same way as an app, it would be possible to consolidate key information and rich content links, with an optimised mobile ticket purchase engine. Key to this is of course people having signed up to an account, so they are recognised and the data entry minimised for returning customers.

The ‘Always On’ generations Because mobile phones are defined channels of communication, to specific people, in their hand, they give us a distinct advantage by enabling us to tailor our campaigns, choice of channels and mechanisms, and then the messages and their style and content, to the recipients. With the explosion of Twitter on top of the openness of personal communication on which Facebook, Flickr JAM 36 > 19

Not just iPhone Currently in the UK smartphones account for one in seven mobile devices sold. While the iPhone and the Blackberry get the most attention, there are a fleet of different smartphones, led by Nokia, who now have the Ovi store (www.store.ovi.com) to handle sales and distribution of apps similar to Apple’s iTunes. This is important when thinking of focusing on smartphone users, since Apple only has 10% of the global market with the iPhone and RIM (Blackberry) 20%, while Nokia’s share is 37%, though down from 49% in 2007 when the iPhone launched. All the research analysis shows that smartphone users are younger than average, in higher income brackets, with going-out lifestyles (though the UK’s Mobile Data Association questions the ROI appeal of the iPhone for advertisers, pointing out that ‘unfortunately, iPhone users still make up a relatively small, young and chiefly male audience’). So, while users are likely to be in social grades ABC1, they may not be the core current audience for most arts organisations. Or, on the contrary, smartphone usage could be a defining characteristic of a lifestyle market segment and socioeconomic group which arts organisations will want to target, not least to lead replacement, long term, of their oldest generations of attenders.

of the iPhone segment, apps ought to be developed to be compatible with other phones – Nokia at least. However, there is a clear advantage in these specific apps: we get to recognise the device and, on first launch, can ask the person to register and volunteer some profiling information, so we can tailor the service and communications.

> CASE STUDY

and YouTube are built, it is absolutely clear that there are segments of the marketplace where communication styles have changed completely. I know of some senior managers who think that blogs and tweets are ‘tacky’ and ‘inappropriate’ for their organisation. I suppose they could be, if they only want their organisation to engage with the, let’s say, over 65s – though that is an unfair statement to all those 'silver surfers' who use the new channels and technologies. The simple fact is that we need to adapt our messages according to whom we are speaking to. Unless you live the life of today's under 45 year old, or under 25 year old, you just won't understand the cultural values and attitudes those different age cohorts have to mobile digital media, and how they expect organisations to be.

Table 1: Use of English language from analysis of MySpace user input: NOT standard formal written English Typographic slang or abbreviations (omg, lol, hugz) Non-standard capitalisation Pictograms Non-standard punctuation Slang, including dialect, swearing, idiomatic sayings Non-standard spelling (other than above) Interjections (haha, muaahh, huh – not ‘oh’) Other non-standard English grammar

97% 41% 75% 16% 81% 51% 33% 13% 56%

Source: Professor Mike Thelwall, University of Wolverhampton Statistical Cybernetics Research Group

older Macmillan's ‘never had it so good’ generation, but they share a cynicism about institutions and what they are told. So we need to be careful if these are the people determining our view of the world, compared with it as seen by, say, Generations X and Y, generally under 50, because these somewhat younger people tend to want to see clearer and stronger brands and personalities, are more into ‘celeb’ culture, and, the younger they are, care less Table 2: Digitally divided society? about privacy and are more into social networking and Veterans Baby Boomers their own values and those Of the Second World War and before. Born 1940 to 1960, aged 50 to 70, whom they share with. Born before 1940, aged over 70; includes includes Paul McCartney and Mick Jagger; Interestingly, the some ‘silver surfers’, but has the largest many silver surfers, but adapting to the ‘Always On’ are apparently proportion of non-digital users technology, and some resisters prepared to have a much wider definition of what Generation X Generation Y constitutes ‘celebrity’ and, Born 1960 to 1980, aged 29 to 49. Includes the ‘digital natives’. Born after for example, the world of Many are early adopters of the new 1980, under 30 now. Grew to be adults classical music has realised technology, leading change in with the internet, mobile phones, iPods that treating someone as organisations, tomorrow’s leaders; and laptop computing a celeb makes them one. often impatient with older bosses Organisations are made up of real people and they need to find a voice and Post-Millennium Children – Born after 2000, mostly the children of the digital speak; people can have natives. Digital technology is a part of their lives from birth an individual personality and ‘own’ their views, and perhaps express the sense Multiple versions of messages? of life and fun in the process. Never forget: the public The simple argument is that you can no longer communicate are listening and watching; and the ‘Always On’ really are to the whole marketplace with your message couched in interested in you. the same vocabulary, tone of voice, text style, references, validations and images. Multiple versions are necessary if you 1. Nielsen Online, November 2008 for people aged 15+ and accessing want to reach everyone. There is an interesting analysis by internet on mobiles once a month. the University of Wolverhampton about the use of language and grammar in social networking, drawn from user input on MySpace – see table 1. Roger Tomlinson There is a whole new language here, which many senior Freelance Consultant managers will not be comfortable with. The Baby Boomers e rtomlinson@actconsultantservices.co.uk (see table 2) are a confusing bunch, ranging from the t +44 (0) 7973 397136 aging hippies – ‘Woodstock's walking wounded’ – to the 20 > JAM 36

> CASE STUDY

Mobile – more than just a marketing platform Tom Hunter and Sarah O’Hanlon ask ‘what happened to the good old text message?’

This sounds right, and it’s to the credit of the vast majority of arts marketers we’ve spoken to that one of the reasons mobile marketing has yet to reach a critical tipping point in our sector might be an unwillingness to risk an accidental tarring with the scuzzball brush. Yet mobile is such a contentrich, two-way, conversational and immediate social medium that its potential for audience engagement is vast. The key question for us as arts marketers now is, how can we start to meaningfully join the conversation? Before we even consider the rapidly advancing world of smartphone web connectivity, app stores and the locative potential of global positioning, let’s step back a bit to the ubiquitous text message. That 160-character message length ‘magic number’ originated from communication research in the 1980s that sought to optimise transmissions across the then tight bandwidth constraints of the nascent car phone industry. The optimal 160 figure was derived from an analysis of similar postcard and telex messages that were shown to typically contain less than this number of characters. Should we simply consider modern text messages as little more than an electronic postcard then? Not quite – after all, the sheer speed

of transmission is enough to vary the theory on its own – but it can be a useful practice to model the application of new technologies against the basic assumptions we have for our current marketing tools. We all know that marketing techniques rarely translate directly from platform to platform, and yet today’s rapid surge of technological innovation is such that there’s rarely time to beta-test new approaches before the landscape has evolved again. Instead we’re required to adopt what search engine marketing specialist Mike Moran has termed the ‘do it wrong quickly’ approach: the permanent beta approach, favoured by Google among others, that looks to put products out first then listens carefully to user feedback on how to tweak the service.2 For example, when we brought together experiences from the various mobile campaign trials conducted by London Calling Digital, one of the key points of resistance we found was the complexity associated with capturing phone number data in the first place. It takes more time for box office staff

JAM 36 > 21

magine you’re reading this on the train (maybe you actually are on the train). You know you’re on the train because the guy in the seat behind you is providing regular one-sided status updates about his current proximate locality back to the office at annoyingly frequent intervals. ‘I’m on the train,’ he repeats. ‘Yes, the train!’ Forget Seth Godin’s concept of interruption marketing, this is interruption as lifestyle and, like it or not, if you’re the owner of one of the 75 million+ mobile phones in the UK, you’ve already opted yourself in. You could have moved over to the silent carriage, but then you’re probably waiting for a call back from the office yourself . . . What does this all mean for us as arts marketers? From music to comic books, from charity donations to reminders from your dentist, the power of the mobile is being felt more and more frequently across multiple industries, as the most personal technology device yet invented. This level of personal connection to our devices is what makes the mobile platform such a challenge to integrate into the marketing mix – as well as offering exciting opportunities to be creative in reaching out to our audiences. Mark Curtis notes in his book Distraction: Being Human in the Digital Age that ‘for a lot of people, a text arriving is an event (who is it? what’s inside?) which reinforces their sense of identity (someone wants me). It’s more than a little disappointing to discover that you’re wanted by some scuzzball with a nice line in scam.’1

> FEATURE

to capture this extra detail and customers are often unwilling to part with it, or only under very strict and limited conditions – call me if the show’s cancelled and so on. For marketers used to slicing up big database buckets into targeted numbers for direct mail campaigns, the small number of mobile opt-ins is less appealing: lots of effort to send an electronic postcard to a small niche of willing phones for what might appear to be little immediate return. But just think for a moment about the opt-in concept. The key to a working mailing list is to have as many people on it as possible and to keep it up to date. People will perhaps drop off, exclude themselves over time or get their record tagged as a lapsed attendee, but it’s a rare marketer who would actively opt to deactivate a record after a single season, or even at the end of a single show’s run. We tend to assume people are willing to be with us for the long haul. However, in the world of mobile an automatic fixed period opt-out is perhaps a way of encouraging additional trust among our audiences. For instance, imagine a mobile campaign running in support of a threemonth exhibition. You’ve invested in a simple SMS short code and keyword linked to your exhibition (Text Picasso to 12345, for example) and linked the spread of messages to your associated education programme – talks, film screenings, late night events, etc. In this way people can opt in for timely prompts about the connected programming that’s taking place around the event they’ve already attended – get the signage right and a good percentage will likely be signing up while still in your venue. The final message of this sequence would be a last thank you and alert that unless you

22 > JAM 36

re-subscribe this is the last update you’ll receive. Experience tells us that dropoff is likely to be high. The question is, can we embrace this as the end of a successful conversation in its own right? Don Tapscott, co-author of the seminal Wikinomics,3 notes in his latest book Grown Up Digital that ‘ . . . while most boomers still are likely to use the phone to call family and friends, teens are more likely to text messages to their friends and call their parents . . . For Net Geners, email is so yesterday. It’s what you use to write a polite thank-you letter to a friend’s parent.’ 4 In choosing how we talk to our audiences, is it possible to think less like a parent and be more like a friend? Some statistics might help to put things in perspective – a recent survey shows that, regardless of age, while 36% of UK mobile users make at least one call each day, 49% send daily texts (www. emarketer.com). And the dizzying array of smartphone apps might be distracting, but it’s worth keeping in mind that iPhone users represent only about 2% of the UK’s mobile phone market (www.cnet.com) and, right now, consumers are more likely to cut back and limit their monthly spend to talk-and-text services only. All of which makes tapping into the SMS market look like a more and more attractive option. We’re all having to be more targeted with our marketing spend in the current financial climate, and mobile marketing can offer great ROI, as well as fitting with a ‘virtuous recession’ model – marketing with a conscience. In a world where 45% of all email is spam, opt-in marketing plays a huge part in helping overcome that cynical urge to automatically hit delete. And mobile is an essential piece of your opt-in marketing arsenal.

Tom Hunter Head of Sales, London Calling e tom@londoncalling.com

Sarah O'Hanlon Sarah O’Hanlon, Arts Consultant, POP e sarah.ohanlon@pop.us 1. Mark Curtis, Distraction: Being Human in the Digital Age. Futuretext, 2005. 2. Mike Moran, Do It Wrong Quickly: How the Web Changes the Old Marketing Rules. IBM Press, 2007. 3. Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams, Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything. Portfolio, 2006. 4. Don Tapscott, Grown Up Digital: How the Net Generation is Changing Your World. McGraw-Hill Professional, 2008.

> RESOURCES

Advertise in JAM Promote your organisation or your professional services to over 2,000 arts professionals and industry leaders in the UK and internationally. Place an advert here for as little as £150 + VAT (1/8 page advert on single issue) or enclose an insert for just £250 + VAT. For the full price list and to get a quote email andrea@a-m-a.co.uk

Resources Curtis, Mark, Distraction: Being Human in the Digital Age, Futuretext, 2005 Gavin, Jamie, ‘UK PC and Mobile Internet Whitepaper’, comScore. Available at www.comscore.com/Press_Events/ Presentations_Whitepapers/2008/U.K._PC_Mobile_ Internet_Whitepaper/(language)/eng-US Mobile Marketing Association www.mmaglobal.com/main Moran, Mike, Do It Wrong Quickly: How the Web Changes the Old Marketing Rules, IBM Press, 2007 Ofcom information on mobile network coverage, available at www.ofcom.org.uk/media/features/mobsignal Tapscott, Don and Anthony D. Williams Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything, Portfolio, 2006 Tapscott, Don Grown Up Digital: How the Net Generation is Changing Your World, McGraw-Hill Professional, 2008

Digital marketing day Changing mix, changing strategy 30 November 2009, Sadler’s Wells, London Digital media is transforming the way people interact with the arts and cultural industries, by giving them plenty of ways to create, re-mix, share and debate cultural experiences. Join us and 150+ arts professionals to: • learn more about the range of digital media opportunities available to you, • get ideas for how digital media could change the way people experience your organisation, • find out how to build a strategy for attracting, retaining and interacting with the public in today’s multi-media world. Book now at the member rate of £133 + VAT. Book online at www.a-m-a.co.uk or email emma@a-m-a.co.uk. For more information go to www.a-m-a.co.uk.