Content in museums where theory becomes practice. The best-laid plans of mice and curators are exposed to visitors. Then the visitors wander through the installation spaces like pinballs. Anyone who has wasted serious coin on pinball machines knows that winning the jackpot is equal parts skill and luck. Frankly, good interpretation is similarly a bit of both as well.
Hedging Your Bets
First probably, organizations will develop more content than visitors will consume, because visitors are a complicated and varied bunch. You can use some tools to help you develop the scope and goals for your content, but you will basically still be developing a bigger net than you need. Overall, you are giving more visitors will consume because this approach is the best way ensure there will be something for everyone.
But, producing more content than you need doesn’t mean that you should produce content indiscriminately. Instead, like a good poker player, you need to be strategic about what you need and what is out there. You need to think about what content works best on each platform, and what content is most necessary onsite. Basically, you need to find ways to parse out the idea based on the visitor’s needs.
The map about is an idealized, though fairly common, content journey map. Most people will receive content about the museum on social. (Some visitors might use the website or an app, but they are in the minority). Once they are onsite, visitors will be bombarded with content. There are labels, audiotours, tours, interactives, classes, and catalogs. Most visitors will engage with a small amount of this content. An interested visitor might then return home to engage with a bit more content, like flipping through the catalog or looking at the museum’s facebook posts.
Why do this?
Content mapping is a useful tool for everyone working on content. This tool helps the whole organization understand how interpretation overlaps many functional areas. Visitors don’t see the silos in museum organizations. In fact, when there are disconnections between social media text and labels, this can be confusing for visitors. The visitor experience is improved considerably when everyone sharing ideas with visitors works together.
Mapping also helps museums understand the role of each type of content. Interpretation is usually focused on onsite content, most often formal tools like labels and catalogs. But, other departments are instrumental in interpretation. Social media, for example, is an incredibly important content delivery device. Social media is often relegated to solely marketing. But, social media also serve important roles in engaging with installation interpretation. Social media can hit a casual humorous tone that can entice and charm visitors. Social media can help onboard people to the ideas about collections, helping visitors learn interesting kernels of information that scaffold deeper understanding. Social also plays an important role in changing people from casual to regular visitors. Social media is an engaging and regular tool to invite people to continue to engage with the collection after a visit. Also, casual visitors are most likely to share their feedback about their museum experiences over social.
Conclusion
Content mapping is a tool that helps museums understand how visitors actually use content, both onsite and offsite. This type of tool can help different functional areas think collectively about interpretation and their visitors. Tools such as this are essential to creating a cohesive customer experience.