Carol Bolton Betts, editor for the
Illinois Heritage Association, wrote an overview of The Small Museum Toolkit as
part of the IHA’s Technical Insert series.
The IHA has graciously allowed The Small Museum Toolkit to share this
introduction in seven blog posts during July and August. The posts will help
you to get to know about the content of the Toolkit from an outside
perspective.
If a museum is well funded, well staffed, well organized, and well
managed within its walls, what’s missing? For one thing, an audience. All of
the aforementioned qualities should be directed toward serving the museum
audience. This book tells in broad terms how a museum can attract and serve its
constituents.
Chapter 1 takes on a basic subject: how a museum can let people
know about its collections and its programs. Kara Edie stresses that marketing
and communication are important parts of a museum’s long-range plan. After
identifying a museum’s audience and analyzing its own marketing methods, the
staff can build on that knowledge. Edie advises establishing a “brand identity”
and using it as the basis for a strategic marketing plan. Advertising via
radio, television, and social media is important in making contact with the
public, and she describes how to use these outlets economically. The newly
established relationships must be nurtured, Edie says, which can be done
through ongoing communication, notably a newsletter. Once the visitors come
through the doors and even return for another look, it’s helpful to collect
information about them so a museum can be sure of its strengths and
shortcomings. In chapter 2 Stacy Klingler and Conny Graft write about visitor
studies and evaluation. They tell of ways to convince staff and board members
that this data collection is worthwhile, and they outline ways to assemble such
data. They advise zeroing in on a particular project and then defining desired
outcomes, finding the target audience, deciding what you hope to learn, and
drafting survey questions. A large portion of Klingler and Graft’s chapter is
devoted to a helpful discussion of the pros and cons of various means of data
collecting, such as surveys, focus groups, and direct observation.
Chapter 3
centers on ways a museum can be a good neighbor through service to its larger
audience, the surrounding community. Barbara B. Walden cites the Kirtland
Temple, in Kirtland, Ohio, as an example of a small museum that was able to
garner support for and from the wider community while using its own resources
to meet the needs of that community. The temple was the centerpiece of a
substantial nineteenth-century Latter-day Saints community. Modern residents of
Kirtland viewed the building as a historical remnant that mattered little to
them, even though the temple received National Register recognition in 1977 and
drew visitors from around the world. After the reputation of temple and town
was sullied in the late 1980s due to an unrelated tragedy, staff of the
Kirtland Temple worked with townspeople to correct unwarranted negative
perceptions of the temple and the neighboring community, enabling their
building to become a symbol of strength and unity. Walden tells how this
amazing turnaround was accomplished.
In chapter 4, Kat Burkhart writes about ways of making museums
accessible to all. She addresses the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and
how small museums can comply. She thoughtfully describes why accessibility is
important and how it can relate to a museum’s mission. Burkhart recommends that
a museum perform an accessibility audit and notes areas that must be included.
Small museums may feel they don’t have the resources to accommodate a diverse
audience, but Burkhart shows that they can welcome many, including blind or
low-vision visitors and those who are deaf or have some hearing loss. At the
end of her chapter, Burkhart offers checklists, references, and other materials
that will help open the small institution to everyone.
Tamara
Hemmerlein writes in chapter 5 about good visitor service. As she says, “It is
the interaction between the visitors and the site that creates meaning and
makes our sites relevant” (121). Hemmerlein believes that good service depends
partly on knowing your visitors, and she mulls over why people choose to visit
museums. She concentrates on the ins and outs of visitor service training and
provides a checklist for improvements in this endeavor. Two of her textboxes
detail both problematic and successful visitor scenarios. Hemmerlein asserts
that with training and thought, good visitor services will become second nature
for everyone in the museum. In chapter 6 Candace Tangorra Matelic writes about
new roles for small museums. She notes that museums are transforming
themselves to become more relevant to their communities, and she tells exactly
why such change is desirable. Matelic gives examples of five different history
organizations that used community engagement effectively to change their
operations in an inspirational manner. She investigates the components of
community engagement and supplies a helpful table that lists what it is and is not.
Another table supplements her extensive discussion of nine steps toward
community engagement.
Adapted
from Carol Bolton Betts, “An
Introduction to The Small Museum Toolkit,”
Illinois Heritage Association, Technical Insert 177 (May-June 2012). As a
volunteer, Ms. Betts has done editorial work for the Illinois Heritage
Association (illinoisheritage.org) since 1982. She was an editor at the
University of Illinois Press for twenty years, working primarily on books about
art and architecture, film, women’s history, and subjects related to the
history of Illinois. Earlier she served on the staff of the Philadelphia Museum
of Art and taught art history at Villanova University and at California State
University–Los Angeles.
After a brief overview of the series, each
contributor will share tips or next steps in 5 minute presentations: 
