Title Slide

Social media & Participation 1

Democratic design and co-curation of exhibits (Simon, 2010; Ciolfi, Bannon, & Fernström, 2008)

Each museum in a 2010 study, 2.0 tools represented less than 10% of their online presence (Lopez, et al, 2010)

Building community and two-way engagement are core misssions of museums (Allen-Greil and MacArthur, 2010)

Museums should reflect the current prevailing behaviors of an information world (Lovejoy,

Waters, and Saxton, 2012; Peacock and Brownbill, 2007)

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Research Questions

How are museums using social media?

What degree of participation does a museum engage in based on its postings?

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Sampling

50 museums selected through purposeful sampling

Used Twitter and Facebook search tools to identify sample

All museums in the sample have both Facebook and Twitter accounts

Limited to Facebook and Twitter activity because they are textual sources and free

Outwit Hub Pro www.outwit.com

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Dimensions of analysis

COUNT of followers and following RELIABILITY for official status & info FINDABILITY from a search or homepage ENGAGEMENT monthly, weekly, daily FREQUENCY monthly, weekly, daily CONTENT recycled, live, multiple channels

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Content dimension

Recycled content from other users or networks

Uses platform specific tools (e.g., #hashtags, @replies, retweets)

Multiple social media channels with links across platforms

Has “live content/interactive” sessions (e.g., Twitter townhall)

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Frequency dimension

Once a month<frequency<once a week

Once a week<frequency<every day

New content posted every day

Several times per day

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Engagement dimension

Once a month < Active user engagement < once a week

Once a week < Active user engagement < every day

Actively engages (and responds) to users every day

Not at all

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Content dimension Findings

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Dimension Aspects Twitter

Recycled content 29.2%

Platform tools 89.6%

Multiple social media channels 97.9%

Live Content 2.1%

Frequency dimension Findings

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Dimension Aspects Twitter

Once/mth 6.3%

Once/wk 18.8%

Every day 77.1%

Several times a day 75.0%

Engagement dimension Findings

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Dimension Aspects Twitter

Once/mth 12.5%

Once/wk 22.9%

Every day 27.1%

Not at all 37.5%

What is participatory?

Public Relations

Events announcements

Fact of the day

Retweeting other users or institution’s content

Less Participation Greater Participation

Games (voting, “like if”)

Co-curating projects

Live tweeting events

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So what?

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Final Slide

References

Allen-Greil, D. and MacArthur, M. (2010). “Small Towns and Big Cities: How Museums Foster Community On-line,” in Museums and the Web 2010: Proceedings, edited by J. Trant and D. Bearman. Toronto: Archives & Museum Informatics. http://www.archimuse.com/mw2010/papers/allen-greil/allen-greil.html.

Ciolfi, L., Bannon, L.J., Fernström, M. (2008). Including visitor contributions in cultural heritage installations: designing for participation. Museum Management and Curatorship 23(4), 353-365.

Lopex, X., Margapoti, I., Maragliano, R. and Bove, G. (2010). The presence of Web 2.0 tools on museum websites: a comparative study between England, France, Spain, Italy and the USA. Museum Management and Curatorship 25(2), 235-249.

Lovejoy, K., Waters, R.D., and Saxton, G.D. (2012). Engaging stakeholders through Twitter: How nonprofit organizations are getting more out of 140 characters or less. Public Relations Review 38, 313-318.

Peacock, D., and Brownbill, J. (2007). “Audiences, Visitors, Users: Reconceptualising Users Of Museum On-line Content and Services,” in Museums and the Web 2007: Proceedings, edited by J. Trant and D. Bearman. Toronto: Archives & Museum Informatics. http://www.archimuse.com/mw2007/papers/peacock/peacock.html

Stratford Institute for Digital Media. (2012). Becoming a Digital Nation: An Evaluation of Provincial and Territorial eGovernment Initiatives. Stratford, Canada: The Stratford Institute for Digital Media. Retrieved from http://stratfordinstitute.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/eGovernment_final_web.pdf

Simon, N. (2010). The Participatory Museum. Santa Cruz, CA: Museum 2.0.

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