Andrew Logan Museum of Sculpture

AIM Hallmarks in Wales
£6000 – ALMoS Strategic Development, Communications

The Andrew Logan Museum of Sculpture (ALMoS), established 1991 in Berriew, Powys, Wales is a fantastical attraction, featuring a glittering selection of jewelled treasures by artist, sculptor, performer and culture-creator, Andrew Logan – one of Britain’s principal sculptural artists. ALMoS is a Charity run by a Board of Trustees, part-time Museum Manager and Front of House hostess and regular volunteers.

This project was centred around our lack of formal audience knowledge, despite a huge amount of historical information available. If we were to take the necessary step to strategically develop our audience, we needed a Communications Strategy. With AIM funding, we were able to hire a Communications Consultant (Beckie Smith, Flying Geese) and social media specialists (Mogwai Media) to look at our historic, current and future attenders.   We were also able to work more deeply with our designer (David Hand, Along Bird Alley) and translator (Claire Owen).

Firstly, the parameters of the project and the key deliverable outcomes within the confirmed funding were defined: new branding (tested in the 2020/21 MWT Cymru Bedroom Browser and launched with our 2020 season brochure) and a Communications Strategy, to enable effective methods of monitoring, analysing and reporting for our small team; provide benchmarking baselines; propose programme projects for audience development and targets for increasing our regular Museum admissions.

Audience data from 2015 onwards, including a 2019 Audience Finder survey, and bespoke questions, were collated and Beckie completed analysing and reporting. Mogwai Media looked at our online presence and related analytics, implemented a new platform and presented final reports and recommendations. David Hand, Beckie and I worked through the design process and, with Claire Owen, fulfilled the Bedroom Browser deadline.

The project has delivered the key expected outcomes outlined above. Beyond those, the project has made possible:

• Increased knowledge of social media terms and processes
• Digital Engagement Plan, which develops knowledge acquisition and strategic planning and plans additional capacity
• Social media plan
• Phased website brief
• Professional working relationships developed

The impact of these new relationships has been immense. Our questionnaires and visitor books should have been contributing to effective change, but responses had been sat in various documents (mirroring the variety of questions asked over the years) without the capacity to analyse them deeply and with understanding.

We can now pin-point where our audiences come from, who they are, their differences and similarities and that with our online and physical audiences and now have plans for conversion, audience development and increasing repeat attendance. The project has not only changed the way in which we think about our audiences, but how we monitor and report on them and will impact our strategies and the organisation for years to come.

“This project’s resulting Communication Strategy and Audience Research are most comprehensive documents. It has been fascinating to find out more about our Museum attenders in detail – their common ground and their differences. The Trustees are thrilled with the results, and I know Anne-Marie has been using it often ever since it has been delivered.” Janet Slee, Chair.

Anne-Marie Pope, Museum Manager