There are three main reasons for audiences to stay away from our venues – the three Fs:
Fear: of the virus
Finance: lack of money
(Not) Fussed: a.k.a. not bothered about going, having got used to doing without
For new audiences, not only returning audiences, the points above all still stand. The only difference is that the lack of interest is a harder challenge to overcome. So let’s break down what we can do to tackle each of these.
F#3 (Not) Fussed
Starting in reverse order: if you can’t get people interested enough to start with, you can have the best plans to tackle F#2 (finance) and F#1 (fear) but you’re going nowhere.
Your pre-covid audience should already have some level of interest. It’s easier to sell to people who have bought from you before. But they’ve gone cold-turkey on you for a while now.
Maybe they’ve moved on with their lives… or maybe they will be very much missing and waiting to hear from you…
The latter should take care of themselves. For those who have moved on without you – you didn’t have a messy break-up, you just drifted apart. rekindle that spark with a reminder of how much better real life is with them in it.
What is it about the real life experience of your venue that you can’t get without being there?
If it’s something you can use to evoke a sensory recollection – be it the smell, the quality of sound, a sense of what it is to actually be there – so much the better. We should not ignore new audiences, either. Half of lockdown fines went to people aged 18–29. This is a demographic who are much less likely to be put off by fear (F#2). So it is worth seeing if you can make your offer interesting, entertaining and relevant to this audience.
Typically, under-35s are more likely to value experiences over goods in terms of their spend, so they should be a good fit. finance (F#3) may have more of a bearing for this group though, as under 35s have been hit especially hard by pay freezes and redundancies due to covid-19.
Where people are buying for others, for example, parents looking to entertain and enrich their childrens’ lives through arts venues, then a reminder of the benefits, and that this is worth it may be more important, as their motivation is slightly different than someone buying primarily to support their own cultural life.
Finally, for your returning audiences, there is the call to solidarity – that you need their support for your venue to still be there for their future enjoyment.
F#2 Finance
There’s no getting away from how grim it is out there. There’s less disposable income and more competition for where it’s spent. It is going to be hard. But we can be creative in how we approach these challenges.
If people have a good time at your venue, they’re more likely to come back. this means it’s really important to get audiences in for that first time, and that the first time is a great time.
Therefore, some kind of price incentive to get them in the door is worth exploring. if you don’t charge for entry, you probably want to pick up some income from retail and refreshments – and here the same principles apply. you can try and incentivise sales with lotteries for cheap tickets, ‘refer a friend’ codes, percentage discount, 2 for 1, a limited number of items sold at a loss-leading rate… whatever works for you to make it as affordable as possible and easier for people to justify their spend.
Fear is one reason audiences might stay away from our venues
F#1 Fear
This boils down to good communications. the key things to communicate are what you’ve done to make your venue safe, and how their experience will still be great despite measures such as social distancing.
At the point where people are likely to make the decision to attend or not, communicate to reassure that you have signage, processes and protection in place. communicate again the experience they will have (and implicitly or otherwise) how this will not be significantly impacted by the new safety processes, etc. Make sure you follow through on those promises.
Your processes need enforcing. if visitors are not abiding by the guidelines and socially distancing, that is going to impact on the stress and experience of other visitors, who may be less likely to return. you need to make sure your staff are trained and supported in dealing with and challenging such behaviour.
As far as convincing audiences to return goes, there are a lot of elements outside of your control, but all is not lost. it’s not just about the decision to visit your venue – the journey there, and all that entails is part of their experience too – but keep reminding top them why the experience will be more than worth their time, money and effort to get there.
The process of course does not stop with the return of an audience member – aim to amplify their experience by encouraging and incentivising people to share via word of mouth, social media, etc that they had a great time. If we can put these building bricks in place, then hopefully we will see audiences begin to grow once more.
You can find more information and resources on pricing on AMA CultureHive
Top Tips
Tips for making audiences return to your arts and cultural venues:
- Emphasise the real life experience your audience is missing out on.
- Tell people what you’ve done to make the venue safe – and reassure them that they will still have a great time.
- Don’t forget to look at audiences who are more comfortable with covid risk. (e.g. under 35s)
- Use a price incentive to get people back – and make sure that their first time back is a great one.
- Make sure that your staff are trained, ready and able to support your audiences in having a good time.
by Amy Firth, Head of Marketing at the arts Marketing association