Author: Tara Miller
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The Potentials and Pitfalls of Self-Reported Data
What do surveys, interviews and focus groups all have in common? They’re all ways of collecting self-reported data. Anytime a visitor tells you about their experience, you are getting self-reported data. This means they’re sharing information about themselves without any external verification. For example, if a visitor selects their age range in a survey you…
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Mistakes I’ve Made: Surveys (Part 3)
Imagine that you’ve just written an amazing survey. The questions are clear and useful. The font size is just right. You just need people to fill it in. That’s the easy part, right? Welcome to the third, and final, blog of this series, Mistakes I’ve Made: Surveys. The goal of this series is to share…
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Mistakes I’ve Made: Surveys (Part 2)
Welcome to Part 2 of Mistakes I’ve Made: Surveys. In this series, I’m sharing what I’ve learned about surveys in the past few years so you can learn from them. In Part 1, I shared some challenges with phrasing questions, especially ones that seem like they should be simple. Today, I’ll be covering what I’ve…
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Mistakes I’ve Made: Surveys (Part 1)
Surveys are a staple in visitor studies. They are this – almost magical – tool you can use to ask deep questions that help you understand visitor’s motivations, experiences, values in addition to collecting demographics. They can be long or short. Online or in person. You can translate them into different languages and collect data…
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How Much Time Does a Visitor Study Really Take?
So, you’ve decided you want to do a visitor study. Maybe you want to gather more robust demographic data, better understand visitor motivations, or evaluate a new program. You’ve got the green light, but you’re not sure how much time you’ll need. I get asked this question a lot, so here’s what to expect. In…
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Sampling for Simple Visitor Studies
Sampling is a term that comes up a lot when working with data. You might have someone ask you “How big is the sample size?” for a study. Or you might come across terms like “random sample” or be warned against, “double-counting.” But, what exactly is a sample? A sample is a subset of the…
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The Power of Observation: Using Timing and Tracking in Visitor Studies
You can gather a lot of information about visitors, without ever talking to them. A common observation method used in visitor studies is timing and tracking which – you guessed it – involves timing how long visitors spend in certain areas and tracking where they go. This common method can appear intimidating because of the…
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To cue or not to cue?
To cue, or not to cue? It’s a question that comes up when planning a visitor study. Cueing a visitor is when the visitor is aware, before they even enter the space, they will be asked to evaluate their experience at a museum, park, aquarium, etc. For example, staff at the admissions desk of a…
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How to Start Building Visitor Studies into your Work: Lower the Barriers
So, you want to do a visitor study. Maybe you want to do this as part of planning a new exhibit, to help bring in more visitors, or because you are worried your visitors aren’t connecting with your latest interpretive product. You suggest doing some kind of evaluation, and your colleagues express some interest, but…
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First Time vs. Repeat Visitors
Museums need visitors to be sustainable. The challenge is that museums are competing with a myriad of other activities potential visitors can do in their limited leisure time (Heuken et al., 2021: 167). To build audiences, museums can reach out to new, first time visitors and/or encourage repeat visitors. Ideally a bit of both. What…
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