The visual arts venues in both Bristol and Birmingham are amongst the most highly respected in the country, says Helen Tobias.
Their programmes of permanent and visiting exhibitions offer visitors the very best in both contemporary and classical art. Both cities also enjoy great support from audiences in and around their immediate area but, despite their proximity and good travel links, there had been little promotional activity aimed at encouraging existing arts attenders to venture further as a cultural tourist.
The venues in both cities, just like in many others within the South West and the UK, are looking to broaden and increase their audience from outside their respective regions and raise their national profiles. A collaborative project managed by South West Arts Marketing and Birmingham Arts Marketing has created reciprocal promotional opportunities, encouraging potential visitors to make the trip to another region using targeted incentives and added value. The participating venues, four from Bristol and seven from Birmingham, all recognised audience development as a key priority and wished to build on the national strategy for developing marketing resources in the regions by undertaking joint initiatives.
A high quality promotional brochure was mailed to 5,000 visual arts attenders named on the database of their partner city. The brochure was accompanied by a letter inviting the attender to enjoy a day or weekend out, enjoying the best visual arts in another city. Incentives for the Bristol end of the initiative included discounts on entrance fees and guidebooks to participating venues, as well as invitations to attend private views of new exhibitions. In addition to these, offers were obtained from the commercial sector, hotels, restaurants and a night club who were also targeting similar customer groups. The initiative was phased with the Bristol leg running between March and April, and the Birmingham leg in May and June 2001.
The aims of the project, were simple:
? To develop a common brand image for key visual arts venues in each city - one that effectively communicates the range and quality of exhibitions, reflects the cultural diversity and celebrates the progressive exhibition policy and individual style of the venues
? To raise the profile of visual arts provision in partner cities.
? To test a new initiative of direct mail campaigns to known visual arts attenders in the partner cities
? To establish a successful marketing campaign which would act as a platform for other visual arts venues to build on, individually or collectively, and develop new audiences
? To increase visitor attendance from target areas
? To build new partnerships with key players in tourism and service industries, such as travel companies, hotels, restaurants, Tourist Information Centres
? To gain intelligence about the potential for future cultural tourism
? To collate results and publish findings for the benefit of other arts organisations and tourist authorities wishing to increase cultural tourism
Since the initiative was launched at the beginning of March, interest in the exhibitions has been high. Initial results from the Bristol end of the initiative, through evaluation forms returned, have demonstrated an initial response rate of 5% to the campaign, of whom 37.5% came with friends and 25% either on their own or with a partner. 62.5%, stated that the experience of coming to Bristol was very good; and 75% stated that they would like further information on future events in Bristol. In both cities the average attendance was at three venues during the visit.
Key benefits to the venues participating have been highlighted by Catriona Henderson, Marketing Manager at Arnolfini in Bristol, ?One of the benefits of the project was a rare opportunity to network with other visual arts marketing people, some of whom I?d never met before. It was the first time I had been involved in this type of collaboration in Bristol and hopefully it has opened up the way for future collaborative projects. We were kept well informed and involved throughout the project. It was really encouraging to see the project being supported by Bristol Tourism and the other sponsors.
?I thought the print worked really well. The leaflets looked distinctive in the leaflet racks and were picked up very quickly and numerous visitors were overheard admiring the posters! I think the print, as planned, also worked well as a generic promotional tool within Bristol. Front of house staff reported a number of visitors being aware of the campaign.?
A full evaluation, including a telephone survey of participants and non-participants, will take place during July 2001, when all discount vouchers have expired and all the highlighted exhibitions have closed. A report of the project will be published in the autumn.
Helen Tobias is Bristol Director of South West Arts Marketing t: 0117 927 6941 e: helen.tobias@swam.org.uk South West Arts Marketing is an independent agency established to add value to arts marketing activity in the South West by providing strategic services and support to artists and arts organisations wishing to increase and broaden their arts audiences.