Nurturing creativity in next gen arts marketers

Arts and culture have always been a hotbed for creative marketing minds. As AI increasingly automates a selection of repetitive tasks that once formed the entry point for early career arts marketers, we face a critical challenge. How do we continue to forge meaningful pathways for the next generation of cultural marketers while developing the creativity and leadership skills of the future?

The answer isn’t to resist the latest tech innovations, but to reimagine how we nurture talent and champion their creativity.

Rethinking the entry point

Early career marketers have traditionally cut their teeth on tasks like updating spreadsheets, drafting captions and writing basic copy. These essential but often repetitive activities create a grounding for understanding campaign mechanics and building foundational and soft skills.

Now as AI tools begin to handle some of this groundwork with increasing aplomb, we must ask ourselves: what will an entry-level role look like when some entry-level work no longer exists?

Rather than viewing this as a loss, forward-thinking organisations can reframe it as an opportunity – a chance to equip cultural marketers with creative problem-solving, strategic thinking and innovative campaign development skills.

Of course this doesn’t happen overnight. It takes investment in training to build those foundations, from a range of structured learning pathways, mentorship support and a willingness to trust newcomers with meaningful creative responsibilities earlier in their careers.

The creativity of cultural marketers

Arts marketers are inherently creative. Many come from creative backgrounds, pursue creative practice in their spare time and spend time volunteering or as board members. Many have squiggly careers, building up a wide range of skills, sector knowledge, and cultivating an in-depth understanding of their audiences.

Arts marketers, like many other roles across the workforce, have a commitment and passion for the cultural sector that has kept it driving forward during these extremely pressurised times – a commitment and passion that isn’t limitless and deserves recognition.

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Arts marketers at AMA’s annual conference. Photo: Arts Marketing Association

Cultural marketers play a crucial role in telling the stories of their organisations. They are community builders and experience creators who understand that audiences don’t simply consume art; they seek connection, transformation and belonging. Consider the Crab Museum’s deliberately surreal social media presence which brings together a mix of natural science, politics and memes that authentically reflect the museum’s values and activism and lean into its eccentric tone of voice.

Creativity can be taking a convention form of outdoor advertising and subverting it, as Oxford’s Ashmolean Museum did for their campaign for the exhibition of artist Stanley Donwood and Radiohead’s Thom Yorke: ‘This Is What You Get’. Passers-by could tear off limited edition art from the billboards featuring one of the paintings from the show. This added to the conversation and generated additional press coverage alongside having a star name.

Campaigns that inspire

Creatively Inspired is our theme for Digital Marketing Day this year where we’ll be celebrating the creativity of digital marketing. Organisations featured will include Leeds University Library, whose digital strategy was inspired by grassroots organisations Women’s Aid and Leeds Animation Workshop – both of whose archives are on display.

Both organisations are community-led, creative and have a DIY approach to their activity. In that spirit they commissioned a student-led society and an independent creator to produce authentic and collaborative content – with full creative freedom – to reach new audiences.

Cardiff-based inclusive theatre company, Hijinx, will share their five-year journey towards a hybrid approach to digital content creation and their focus on creating non-AI content on a budget – all with the close collaboration of their audiences. The National Gallery will share how their move to Threads enabled them to combat the perception they were ‘pretentious’ and develop a fun, informative and relevant tone of voice in a new online space.

Meanwhile Birmingham Hippodrome had to find new ways to rebalance the artistic intention of a climate crisis musical while still speaking directly to audience appeal and to the fact that audience data can be the missing piece of the puzzle, rather than the enemy of creativity.

Creating tomorrow’s opportunities

New tech creates exciting possibilities to support our work, but there’s the risk that foundational marketing knowledge is bypassed and is facilitated by AI. If that knowledge isn’t absorbed, there’s no foundation to build the strategic ‘house’ on later. Without this base, we’re building marketing ‘houses’ on sand. You need this understanding to do good marketing, to communicate with loyal supporters and reach new audiences.

It’s vital we’re investing in those core skills for our emerging marketers, so they have the understanding to underpin their creativity. They are our future managers, decision-makers and leaders who will be tasked with reminding the world why culture matters. Let’s equip them now to develop those key skills – to give them confidence, knowledge and space to be creative. Let’s prepare the leaders of the future.

Arts Marketing Association’s Digital Marketing Day 2025 – Creatively Inspired will explore how creative approaches to digital marketing can help you reach and connect with audiences while meeting your organisation’s objectives. AMA’s Essentials of Marketing is open for a new cohort looking to develop their grounding in marketing fundamentals over six key modules.