CUSTOMER SATISFACTION SURVEY Participating target group: MUSEUMS By Svenja Pokorny (Amitié) December 2010 eten Euromuse.net is co-financed by the European Commission in the framework of the eten programme. Euromuse- Museum Survey
Table of Contents 0. Context... 3 1. Purpose of the report... 3 2. Questionnaire analysis... 3 Annex I: questionnaire elaboration... 6 Annex 2: museums questionnaire... 25 Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 2
0. Context Euromuse.net is a joint project of large museums throughout Europe which has been founded in 2001. Euromuse.net is a public access portal providing multilingual information on museums and their exhibitions in Europe: Euromuse.net provides short texts and detailed information on exhibitions, as well as information on opening hours and entrance fees. The platform informs about the participating museums and provides a direct access to their websites. A substantial archive informs about the most important exhibitions in Europe since 2001. Currently, Euromuse.net presents more than 397 museums and their exhibitions from 24 European countries. Several major museums from all over Europe have joined the internet portal and benefit from their participation in Euromuse.net. All given information on the exhibitions is available in English as well as in the local language. By now the website navigation is available in eight languages and it is still expanding. 1. Purpose of the report In order to improve the existent service by consultation with the eurmuse.net member museums and organisations, a questionnaire was designed. The questions cast a light on the direct experience gained by museums operators with the data entry functionalities over the last two years. The collected feedback is reflective of the opinion of those museums that are registered Euromuse members. The results will integrate the information received via Web analytics tools since the latter do not give direct qualitative feedback. 2. Questionnaire analysis This chapter analysis the responses provided to the evaluation questionnaire by 27 museums in the first half of December 2010. The questionnaire was developed with the assistance of the project partners and put on-line using LimeSurvey Quick statistics. Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 3
Key findings Euromuse members joint the portal to reach new audience, especially the immense on-line market, and to become part of a museum community including the so-called big players. On-line promotion is considered a cost-effective and easy ways to promote exhibitions. There is no measurable increase in visitors for 85.19% of the respondents but nevertheless nearly 10% the number of visitors did rise. The decision making process for becoming an euromuse.net member was not so much governed by internal administrative or staffing issues as we might have expected. Surprisingly the first and most important obstacle to be overcome was to find out about the existence of the service/portal. Translating the information on exhibitions into English (which is mandatory) is considered the most problematic work task to be accomplished by a member. Adapting the existing information to the data scheme used by euromuse.net as well the use of the backend are both ranked second most difficult work step. The know-how needed for entering or up-dating exhibitions is most often in the hands of one person who is nominated by the organisation. The expertise is rarely shared with colleagues because very few personal is working on-line. More than half of the respondents feel very positive about the multilingualism of the portal. 51.85% find the feature very effective. The majority enjoys the newly created exhibition alert (regular and customisable email updates about exhibitions). The service is considered very effective (37.04%) or rather effective (37.04%). Of the people who responded to the evaluation survey, 51.85% rated the description of the new exhibitions in facebook as rather effective. This means that the service is for sure an added value but it is not considered essential. The same is true for twitters (judged rather important by 55.56%). Not everybody seems to be familiar with twitter which might explain why 18,52% did not answer the question at all. A vast majority believes in the importance of location maps (55.56% very effective, 33.33% rather effective). Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 4
The question concerning the role of RSS-feeds was probably again too technical. 33% did not answer but those who understood the question are positive (rather effective 48.15%) about the issue. Absolutely no doubts about the importance of linking the euromuse.net portal with the exhibition/museum site (very effective 66.67%). Less important but still relevant the linking to regional or local museum portals. Among the potential new services which could be implemented by euromuse.net the translation service is the one selected by the highest number of respondents (considered very important by 51,85% and rather important by 29,93%). Also the outsourcing of the regular up-load of exhibitions or additional information itself is a valuable service for a vast majority. The advertising potential of banners on the portal or newsletter is judged differently but seems more irrelevant. It seems as if banners were not very popular whereas articles encounter much more favour among the respondents. Few enthusiasm for marketing training courses but a remarkable interest in combined marketing campaigns or media coverage of any activity offered by the organisation in integration to the exhibitions itself. Using euromuse.net as a resource centre which allows press to find reliable information and pictures documenting an exhibition and is a well accepted idea. On-line ticketing must be a very contradictory issue since in all the surveys run by euromuse the reaction from the customer side has always been surprisingly neutral or even negative. Similar to on-line ticketing also on-line museum shops are somehow less an issues as they used to be some years ago. On the other hand nobody mentioned any additional services which could be of intereterest. how much would you pay for is a delicate question with a quite predictable answer. However the response shows that translation and editing are two services museums are willing to pay for. Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 5
Annex I: questionnaire elaboration 1. For which reasons/benefits did your museum decide to join the euromuse.net portal? to present my museums offers to an additional on line audience 15 55.56% to reach an international audience and foreign visitors 24 88.89% to find an alternative to more expensive traditional media promotion 7 25.93% to gain a broader visibility and to facilitate exhibition promotion 12 44.44% to counter declining visitor numbers of our museum/exhibitions 0 0.00% to present our museum together with other prominent museums all over Europe 20 74.07% Question 1 2. Did you notice any changes since you have joined Euromuse.net? Yes (Y) 2 7.41% No (N) 23 85.19% No answer 2 7.41% Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 6
Question 2 2a. If you indicated YES for question 2, please let us know, which changes you have noticed: Our website statistics register more visitors than before 1 3.70% 3. What are the major problems you had to overcome in your museum to join Euromuse.net? to learn about the existence of the euromuse.net service (1) 11 40.74% to decide to join the euromuse.net service (2) 5 18.52% to find the right person to sign the letter of intent (3) 0 0.00% to identify the person within the museum to update the information on euromuse.net regularly (4) 5 18.52% Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 7
Questions 3 4. Which are the main difficulties in the daily work with the euromuse.net and to keep your data updated? the effort to regularly update the information on the euromuse.net portal in the backend (1) 12 44.44% the need to provide all the information also in English (2) 15 55.56% copyright and IPR questions, e.g. concerning the publication of images on euromuse.net (3) to adapt the existing information to the euromuse.net requirements / data schema (4) to handle the data entry into the euromuse.net backend (usability) (5) 0 0.00% 7 25.93% 7 25.93% other (please specify below) (6) 0 0.00% Question 4 Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 8
5. Do your museum colleagues have a positive perception of the euromuse.net portal? No our colleagues are not working on-line (2) 18 66.67% No the Euromuse.net portal is not user friendly enough to capture our colleagues (3) 4 14.81% No answer 3 11.11% Not completed or Not displayed 2 7.41% Question 5 6. Please rank the efficiency of the tools offered by euromuse.net to service museum visitors on a scale from 1 to 4 [the multilingual web portal] 1 (very effective) 14 51.85% 2 (rather effective) 8 29.63% 3 (rather ineffective) 3 11.11% 4 (ineffective) (4) 0 0.00% No answer 2 7.41% Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 9
Question 6.1 6.2 Please rank the efficiency of the tools offered by euromuse.net to service museum visitors on a scale from 1 to 4 [the exhibition alert (regular and customisable email updates about exhibitions)] 1 (very effective) 10 37.04% 2 (rather effective) 10 37.04% 3 (rather ineffective) 2 7.41% 4 (ineffective) (4) 1 3.70% No answer 4 14.81% Question 6.2 Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 10
6.3 Please rank the efficiency of the tools offered by euromuse.net to service museum visitors on a scale from 1 to 4 [face-book - short descriptions on new exhibition entries on euromuse.net] 1 (very effective) 2 7.41% 2 (rather effective) 14 51.85% 3 (rather ineffective) 5 18.52% 4 (ineffective) (4) 1 3.70% No answer 5 18.52% Questions 6.3 6.4 Please rank the efficiency of the tools offered by euromuse.net to service museum visitors on a scale from 1 to 4 [twitter - (tweets on new exhibition entries on euromuse.net] 1 (very effective) 0 0.00% 2 (rather effective) 15 55.56% 3 (rather ineffective) 5 18.52% 4 (ineffective) (4) 2 7.41% No answer 5 18.52% Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 11
Question 6.4 6.5 Please rank the efficiency of the tools offered by euromuse.net to service museum visitors on a scale from 1 to 4 [rss-feeds (short descriptions of new exhibitions via RSSfeed)] 1 (very effective) 1 3.70% 2 (rather effective) 13 48.15% 3 (rather ineffective) 3 11.11% 4 (ineffective) (4) 1 3.70% No answer 9 33.33% Question 6.5 Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 12
6.6 Please rank the efficiency of the tools offered by euromuse.net to service museum visitors on a scale from 1 to 4 [location maps (each museum location indicated on google-maps)] 1 (very effective) 15 55.56% 2 (rather effective) 9 33.33% 3 (rather ineffective) 0 0.00% 4 (ineffective) (4) 0 0.00% No answer 3 11.11% Question 6.6 6.7 Please rank the efficiency of the tools offered by euromuse.net to service museum visitors on a scale from 1 to 4 [direct links to the exhibitions and the museum website from the euromuse.net website] 1 (very effective) 18 66.67% 2 (rather effective) 6 22.22% 3 (rather ineffective) 1 3.70% 4 (ineffective) (4) 0 0.00% No answer 2 7.41% Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 13
Question 6.7 6.8 Please rank the efficiency of the tools offered by euromuse.net to service museum visitors on a scale from 1 to 4 [linking to local or regional museum portal] 1 (very effective) 9 33.33% 2 (rather effective) 12 44.44% 3 (rather ineffective) 2 7.41% 4 (ineffective) (4) 1 3.70% No answer 3 11.11% Question 6.8 Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 14
7.1 Euromuse could offer the following additional services for the museum members convenience. Please rank the relevance of specific services on a scale from 1 to 4 [translation services (translations of the exhibition and the museum description into English from your national language)] 1 (very effective) 14 51.85% 2 (rather effective) 8 29.63% 3 (rather ineffective) 2 7.41% 4 (ineffective) (4) 2 7.41% No answer 1 3.70% Question 7.1 7.2 Euromuse could offer the following additional services for the museum members convenience. Please rank the relevance of specific services on a scale from 1 to 4 [data entry in the backend (monthly checks of your museums website for the publication of new exhibition information and publication on euromuse.net by the euromuse.net team] 1 (very effective) 12 44.44% 2 (rather effective) 7 25.93% 3 (rather ineffective) 6 22.22% 4 (ineffective) (4) 1 3.70% No answer 1 3.70% Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 15
Question 7.2 7.3 Euromuse could offer the following additional services for the museum members convenience. Please rank the relevance of specific services on a scale from 1 to 4 [advertising spaces on web site (like banners)] 1 (very effective) 6 22.22% 2 (rather effective) 7 25.93% 3 (rather ineffective) 8 29.63% 4 (ineffective) (4) 4 14.81% No answer 2 7.41% Question 7.3 7.4 Euromuse could offer the following additional services for the museum members convenience. Please rank the relevance of specific services on a scale from 1 to 4 [advertising spaces in the newsletter (like banners)] Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 16
1 (very effective) 5 18.52% 2 (rather effective) 7 25.93% 3 (rather ineffective) 9 33.33% 4 (ineffective) (4) 4 14.81% No answer 2 7.41% Question 7.4 7.5 Euromuse could offer the following additional services for the museum members convenience. Please rank the relevance of specific services on a scale from 1 to 4 [articles about your museum in the euromuse.net newsletter (like advertisements)] 1 (very effective) 9 33.33% 2 (rather effective) 12 44.44% 3 (rather ineffective) 2 7.41% 4 (ineffective) (4) 2 7.41% No answer 2 7.41% Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 17
Question 7.5 7.6 Euromuse could offer the following additional services for the museum members convenience. Please rank the relevance of specific services on a scale from 1 to 4 [marketing trainings courses for museum operators] 1 (very effective) 7 25.93% 2 (rather effective) 9 33.33% 3 (rather ineffective) 5 18.52% 4 (ineffective) (4) 4 14.81% No answer 2 7.41% Question 7.6 Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 18
7.7 Euromuse could offer the following additional services for the museum members convenience. Please rank the relevance of specific services on a scale from 1 to 4 [combined marketing campaigns in other platforms (euromuse.net taking care to distribute information on your museum on alternative platforms like route planners, tourist internet platforms, online magazines etc. to promote your offers on behalf of you)] 1 (very effective) 12 44.44% 2 (rather effective) 7 25.93% 3 (rather ineffective) 6 22.22% 4 (ineffective) (4) 0 0.00% No answer 2 7.41% Question 7.7 7.8 Euromuse could offer the following additional services for the museum members convenience. Please rank the relevance of specific services on a scale from 1 to 4 [publishing events and activities (offering additional information on events like guided tours, workshops, lectures etc. taking place in your museum)] 1 (very effective) 8 29.63% 2 (rather effective) 12 44.44% 3 (rather ineffective) 4 14.81% 4 (ineffective) (4) 1 3.70% No answer 2 7.41% Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 19
Question 7.8 7.9 Euromuse could offer the following additional services for the museum members convenience. Please rank the relevance of specific services on a scale from 1 to 4 [press releases publication (publishing, storing and documenting your museums press releases and press images on euromuse.net to serve journalists and other editors)] 1 (very effective) 9 33.33% 2 (rather effective) 10 37.04% 3 (rather ineffective) 6 22.22% 4 (ineffective) (4) 0 0.00% No answer 2 7.41% Question 7.9 Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 20
7.10 Euromuse could offer the following additional services for the museum members convenience. Please rank the relevance of specific services on a scale from 1 to 4 [online ticketing (selling tickets to your museum on euromuse.net)] 1 (very effective) 3 11.11% 2 (rather effective) 6 22.22% 3 (rather ineffective) 6 22.22% 4 (ineffective) (4) 9 33.33% No answer 3 11.11% Question 7.10 7.11 Euromuse could offer the following additional services for the museum members convenience. Please rank the relevance of specific services on a scale from 1 to 4 [online shop (offering posters, catalogues, etc. from your museums for online sale)] 1 (very effective) 5 18.52% 2 (rather effective) 7 25.93% 3 (rather ineffective) 6 22.22% 4 (ineffective) (4) 6 22.22% No answer 3 11.11% Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 21
Question 7.11 7.12 Euromuse could offer the following additional services for the museum members convenience. Please rank the relevance of specific services on a scale from 1 to 4 [networking opportunities (organising events for the participating museums on euromuse.net like seminars, etc.)] 1 (very effective) 7 25.93% 2 (rather effective) 10 37.04% 3 (rather ineffective) 7 25.93% 4 (ineffective) (4) 1 3.70% No answer 2 7.41% Question 7.12 Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 22
7.13 Euromuse could offer the following additional services for the museum members convenience. Please rank the relevance of specific services on a scale from 1 to 4 [museum prize (to award a prize to the participating museums)] 1 (very effective) 2 7.41% 2 (rather effective) 8 29.63% 3 (rather ineffective) 11 40.74% 4 (ineffective) (4) 4 14.81% No answer 2 7.41% Question 7.13 8.1 Translation package (including the translation of up to 5 exhibition descriptions into English) for about 1.500 Euro per year. What is your opinion about the price: 1. yes, it's a fair fee (1) 2 7.41% 2. yes, it's a fair fee, but it's too high for my budget (2) 8 29.63% 3. no, it is a too high fee for this kind of service (3) 11 40.74% 4. no, it is a too high fee for my budget (4) 4 14.81% No answer 2 7.41% 8.1 Editing package (including monthly checks of your museums website for the publication of new exhibition information; up to 6 exhibitions per year published on your museums website in English and the National language will be copied to euromuse.net and published there) for around 500 Euro per year. What is your opinion about the price: Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 23
5. yes, it's a fair fee (1) 2 7.41% 6. yes, it's a fair fee, but it's too high for my budget (2) 9 33.33% 7. no, it is a too high fee for this kind of service (3) 3 11.11% 8. no, it is a too high fee for my budget (4) 10 37.04% No answer 3 11.11% Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 24
Annex 2: museums questionnaire Euromuse members - Customer satisfaction questionnaire For which reasons/benefits did your museum decide to join the euromuse.net portal? 1. to present my museums offers to an additional on-line audience 2. to reach an international audience and foreign visitors 3. to find an alternative to more expensive traditional media promotion 4. to counter declining visitor numbers of our museum/exhibitions 5. to present our museum together with other prominent museums all over Europe 6. to gain a broader visibility and to facilitate exhibition promotion Do you noticed any changes since you have joined Euromuse.net? 1. Yes ---> please continue directly below 2. No ---> please continue with question 3 If you indicated YES for question 2, please let us know, which changes you have noticed: 3. Our website statistics register more visitors than before 4. We have received feedback about our museum s euromuse.net presence by our visitors 5. We have more foreign visitors than before 6. We noticed an improved page rank of the search engine rank position (SERP) of our website 7. We were able to establish contacts with new target groups 1. Please specify: 8. Further changes noticed: 1. 2. 3. What are the major problems you had to overcome in your museum to join Euromuse.net? 1. To learn to know about the existence of the service 2. To come to the conclusion to join the euromuse.net service 3. To find the right person to sign the letter of intent 4. To identify the person within our museum to update the information on euromuse.net regularly Which are the main difficulties in the daily work with the euromuse.net and to keep your data updated? 1. the effort to regularly update the information on the euromuse.net portal in the backend 2. the need to provide all the information also in English 3. copyright and IPR questions, e.g. concerning the publication of images on euromuse.net 4. to adapt the existing information to the euromuse.net requirements / data schema 5. to handle the data entry into the euromuse.net backend (usability) 6. other: Do your museum colleagues have a positive perception of the euromuse.net Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 25
portal? 1. Yes 2. No our colleagues are not working on-line 3. No the Euromuse.net portal is not user friendly enough to capture our colleagues Please rank the efficiency of the tools offered by euromuse.net to service museum visitors on a scale from 1 to 4 1 (very effective) 2 (rather effective) 3 (rather ineffective) 4 (ineffective) 1. 1-2-3-4 the multilingual web portal 2. 1-2-3-4 the exhibition alert (regular and customisable email updates about exhibitions) 3. 1-2-3-4 facebook (short descriptions on new exhibition entries on euromuse.net) 4. 1-2-3-4 twitter (tweets on new exhibition entries on euromuse.net) 5. 1-2-3-4 rss-feeds (short descriptions of new exhibitions via RSSfeed) 6. 1-2-3-4 location maps (each museum location indicated on google-maps) 7. 1-2-3-4 direct links to the exhibitions and the museum website from the euromuse.net website 8. 1-2-3-4 linking to local or regional museum portal Euromuse could offer the following additional services for the museum members convenience. Please rank the relevance of specific services on a scale from 1 to 4 1 (very important) 2 (rather important) 3 (rather unimportant) 4 (unimportant) 1-2-3-4 translation services (translations of the exhibition and the museum description into English from your national language) 1-2-3-4 data entry in the backend (monthly checks of your museums website for the publication of new exhibition information and publication on euromuse.net by the euromuse.net team) 1-2-3-4 advertising spaces on web site (like banners) 1-2-3-4 advertising spaces in the newsletter (like banners) 1-2-3-4 articles about your museum in the euromuse.net newsletter (like advertisements) 1-2-3-4 marketing trainings courses for museum operators 1-2-3-4 combined marketing campaigns in other platforms (euromuse.net taking care to distribute information on your museum on alternative platforms like route planners, touristical internet platforms, online magazines etc. to promote your offers on behalf of you) 1-2-3-4 publishing events and activities (offering additional information on events like guided tours, workshops, lectures etc. taking place in your museum) 1-2-3-4 press releases publication (publishing, storing and documenting your museums press releases and press images on euromuse.net to serve journalists and other editors) 1-2-3-4 online ticketing (selling tickets to your museum on euromuse.net) 1-2-3-4 online shop (offering posters, catalogues, etc. from your museums for online sale) 1-2-3-4 networking opportunities (organising events for the participating museums on euromuse.net like seminars, etc.) 1-2-3-4 museum prize (to award a prize to the participating museums) Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 26
Please indicate other useful services for your communication department Besides a free basic service, euromuse.net could offer additional services on a fee basis for your convenience. You have already indicated, which kinds of additional services would be useful for you. Could you please tell us now, if these kinds of services would be worth a fee for your museum? 8.1) Translation package (including the translation of up to 5 exhibition descriptions from your museum to English language) for a price around 1.500 Euro a year. What is your opinion about the price 1. yes, it's a fair fee 2. yes, it's a fair fee, but it's too high for my budget 3. no, it is a too high fee for this kind of service 4. no, it is a too high fee for my budget 8.2) Editing package (including monthly checks of the participants website for the publication of new exhibition information. Up to 6 exhibitions each year published at the participants website in English and in the national language will be copied to euromuse.net and published there) for around 500 Euro a year. What is your opinion about the price 5. yes, it's a fair fee 6. yes, it's a fair fee, but it's too high for my budget 7. no, it is a too high fee for this kind of service 8. no, it is a too high fee for my budget As a member of the Euromuse.net portal please express your opinion on the points of weakness and the points of strengths? Points of strengths: Points of weakness: Euromuse- Museum Survey Page 27