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Burke Museum
Empowering Women Exhibit
Digital Marketing Plan
March 14, 2013
Prepared by
Amy Rainey, Kendall Barnett, Meng Yao & Ranjan Mestri
COM588 Marketing and Branding in Digital Communication
University of Washington
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Introduction
The Burke Museum is the premier museum of natural history and culture in the Pacific
Northwest. Located on the UW campus. The Burke Museum creates a better understanding of
the world and our place in it by inspiring people to value their connection with all life—and act
accordingly. In addition to long-term exhibits, the Burke Museum also presents special exhibits
that rotate several times a year.
The special exhibit this summer is "Empowering Women: Artisan Cooperatives that Transform
Communities.” Empowering Women will run from June 15 – October 27. We have developed a
digital marketing plan for the Empowering Women exhibit. The goal of this plan is to drive
attendance to this exhibit, particularly during the summer, which is a slower time for the
museum.
This plan is focused on the digital marketing to support the Empowering Women exhibit as the
Burke Museum has a variety of efforts planned for its traditional marketing, and these tactics
have shown to be successful in the past.These efforts include print and graphic design work for
posters that will be hung around the University District and the UW campus. The museum also
creates and sends printed invitations to spread initial buzz about the new exhibit. The museum
sends mailers and brochures to its members. The Burke may also utilize KCTS radio for
promotions, as well as bus advertisements.
Situational and Environment Analysis
SWOT Analysis
The Burke Museum possesses many strengths and weaknesses. It is the official museum of
Washington state and houses many research collections that are unique to the Burke. The staff
at the Burke is friendly and knowledgeable about all the exhibits that both travel through the
Burke or are birthed from their own walls. All special exhibits are contemporary and relevant to
various current events around the globe. While the Burke Museum has a very strong reputation
within the greater Puget Sound area, the institution faces some challenges. The museum’s
location on the UW campus and the cost of parking on campus are a struggle for many visitors.
As a smaller museum, they also have to be concerned with budget constraints. While the Burke
hosts very diverse exhibits, it has made marketing to a target audience difficult. In recent
months, the Burke has gone through some senior leadership changes. While this brings in a
fresh perspective, it also makes marketing a challenge as the new staff has less experience with
launching new exhibits.
Looking externally, there are many opportunities available for the Burke. Being housed on the
UW campus allows for potential partnerships within the academic community. Seattle has a
thriving artistic community and as such it presents an array of relationships that the Burke
could utilize in their marketing strategies. To be efficient in its marketing and engagement
strategy, the Burke needs to target an appropriate audience to make this exhibit unique and
successful. Since the Burke museum is close to the Henry Art Gallery, the museum also needs to
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plan for the possible proximal competition of the summer tourist community. Additionally, the
Seattle Art Museum (SAM) recently hosted a similar exhibit focused on women artists. This is
both a strength – strong interest in the subject from Seattle’s arts community – and a weakness
– this topic has recently been covered by a peer that could be considered a competitor.
The Burke has many positive things on which to focus. Its knowledgeable staff, user-friendly
website and traveling exhibits draw visitors in. For this exhibit, the museum needs to effectively
market to a target audience that will maximize attendance, therefore enriching knowledge
about entrepreneurial grassroots of women around the globe. To compete with local museums,
the Burke needs to partner with organizations around the Seattle area to spread the word
about the exhibit.
Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning
The Burke’s audience can be segmented based on demographic attributes, as well as behavioral
and psychological attributes. The Burke should target women’s groups and social justice groups
that focus on empowering individuals. The museum should also reach out and target Seattle’s
successful artisan community. By focusing on these two groups, the Burke can increase
attendance and spread the message of transformation through communicative art. Artisans
and women/social groups give back to the community in a variety of ways. By sharing the
exhibit with them, they can help promote the exhibit and bring in attendees.
We recommend a primary target audience of college educated people who are between the
ages of 25 and 40 and live in the Puget Sound region. Because this exhibit will take place in the
summer, we recommend reaching parents and new visitors within this target audience. As the
summer fades, the Burke should also focus on a secondary target audience of UW faculty,
students and their families.
The exhibit should be positioned with the following statement: From Africa to Asia to
theAmericas, female artisans are creatinggrassroots cooperative to reach newmarkets, raise
living standards, andtransform lives. Empowering Women explores the work of ten such
enterprisesin ten countries.
Recommendations
The objective is to drive attendance to the museum’s Empowering Women exhibit. With this
objective at the forefront, our strategies focus on driving word of mouth through creating
sharable digital content and leveraging the networks of other groups.
Our key recommendations for the Empowering Women exhibit are:
Develop partnerships with organizations focused on the empowerment of women and
girls and local artisans to reach the networks of these groups
Focus content on the museum’s social channels on female empowerment, artisans and
collaborative communities
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Integrate digital content creation and social sharing into the experience at the exhibit,
helping drive word of mouth and start online dialogue
Better leverage the museum’s position on campus and as part of the UW community
Recommended tactics
Develop partnerships with organizations focused on the empowerment of women and girls,
as well as local artisans, to reach the networks of these groups
The Empowering Women exhibit ties in to important issue areas, such as women’s
empowerment, the role artisans and social justice. With these issues in mind, we recommend
conducting outreach and forging partnerships with groups in these areas. We recommend the
following partners and have provided background information as well as recommendations for
the partnership and potential contacts for outreach.
Gates Foundation/Catapult
Background: The largest philanthropic foundation in the world, the Bill & Melinda Gates
Foundation focuses heavily on the empowerment of women and girls in its global health and
global development work. In April 2012, Melinda Gates announced that family planning would
be a priority issue for her and the foundation going forward. In September, the foundation
helped launch Catapult.org, a crowdfunding platform for projects that help women and girls
around the world. In 2012, the foundation also opened its Visitor Center, an interactive space
that educates visitors about the foundation’s history, mission and work.
Recommended partnership: The Burke could ask the Gates Foundation and Catapult to co-
sponsor a panel at the museum about the empowerment of women through arts and
entrepreneurship. The foundation could promote the event on its Facebook page with a post
targeted at fans that are within 20 miles of Seattle.
As part of the partnership, the Burke Museum could help promote visits to the Gates
Foundation Visitor Center. It could recommend the Visitor Center to tourists who visit the
museum and link to it from its website. Additionally, the Burke could help promote the funding
of projects on Catapult that are related to the countries and artistic approaches featured in the
Empowering Women exhibit. There are also several smaller requests that may be lighter lifts.
For example, Catapult could retweet a post from the Burke Museum about the exhibit.
Contact information
Tyler LePard, senior digital strategist for Catapult and former member of the
foundation’s new media team (Amy Rainey can make an introduction)
Melissa Milburn, senior communications officer for Gates Foundation and MCDM
advisory network member (MCDM Director Hanson Hosein could likely help broker
connection)
Pike Place Market Tours
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Background: Pike Place Market features nearly 200 artists and craftspeople and attracts
thousands of visitors every day. There are two popular tours that feature the artists of Pike
Place: Public Market Tours and the Pike Place Market Food & Cultural Tour.
Recommended partnership: The museum could partner with these two market tours and
provide cross-promotion opportunities. For example, visitors on the tour could receive a
coupon that offers half off admission to the museum and promotes the artistry of the
Empowering Women exhibit. This would offer additional value to people on the tour at no cost
to the tour company. Likewise, the Burke Museum could promote the Pike Place tours on its
website and attendees of the Empowering Women exhibit could receive a coupon for a
discounted tour, highlighting the promise of seeing local Seattle artisans. This partnership
would help the museum reach both the secondary audience of resident and non-resident
tourists who are interested in the arts.
Contact information
Public Market Tours:
http://www.publicmarkettours.com/
http://www.publicmarkettours.com/contact/
Pike Place Market Food & Cultural Tour:
http://www.savorseattletours.com/tours/pikeplacemarket/
http://www.savorseattletours.com/contact/
Girl Power Hour
Background: Girl Power Hour is a professional women’s networking group in Seattle. In
addition to promoting networking, the group also sponsors relevant causes that support
women.
Recommended partnership: Girl Power Hour could promote the Empowering Women exhibit
on its social media profiles and email listserv. The Burke could return the favor by promoting
Girl Power Hour events among its networks. The Girl Power Hour audience is in line with
primary audience for the event – college educated Seattle residents ages 25-40.
Potential contacts
Corrie Westmorelaid-Vairo (Amy can make an introduction)
Focus content on the museum’s social channels on female empowerment, artisans and
collaborative communities
The Burke Museum needs to increase online awareness of the Empowering Women exhibit. To
do so, the museum should create relevant digital content with the help of creative storytelling.
The museum should distribute this content through their existing social media channels to
create engagement. Therefore, the objective is to find new ways to communicate, engage and
share that will help drive target audiences to the Burke Museum and the Empowering Women
exhibit.
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The Burke Museum is actively involvedon Facebook and Twitter accounts. Currently, the
museum has 4,474 likes on Facebook and 5,296 followers on Twitter. When promoting exhibits
on its channels, the museum typically shares photos, facts and information from the exhibits.
To promote the Empowering Women exhibit, the Burke Museum should create compelling
online content, distribute the content through relevant social channels and regularly engage
with its fans.
Twitter hashtag campaign
The Burke Museum needs to take advantage of their active Twitter account to promote and
engage their audience for the “Empowering Women” exhibit. Currently, the Burke has 5,300
followers.The Burke should create a simple hashtag to use in all tweets about the exhibit. For
example, the museum could use the hashtag #burkeempowering. We researched the user of
other hashtags – such as #empoweringwomen – but found that they were being used for a
variety of other conversations. As a result, we recommend creating a branded hashtag that has
“Burke” in it.
The museum should leverage its healthy Twitter community by starting a dialogue on the
platform to spread the word about the Empowering Women exhibit. The museum should
promote this hashtag on all materials about the exhibit, including fliers, webpages and posters,
as well as signage in the museum.
Content curation
We also recommend that the Burke curate existing blog and video content related to the
empowerment of women and girls, the role of entrepreneurship, and the rise of collaborative
communities. This will provide a healthy amount of content for its Twitter and Facebook
channels and help seed the #burkeempoweringhashtag on Twitter.
Pinterest
The Burke Museum's Pinterest account has 301 followers and a variety of pinboards. To utilize
Pinterest for the “Empowering Women” exhibit, the museum should enable a team of
volunteers to contribute pins to a specific board. This board will focus on the depth of
grassroots cooperatives and artistic creativity. By pulling relevant images found online and also
going out into the Seattle community and capturing snapshots that represent the exhibit, the
museum can appeal to an emotional element that will encourage people to visit the exhibit.
Blog content creation
The Burke Blog has been an effective tool for promoting the museum’s exhibits and events,
receiving 6,500 monthly visits in 2013 thus far. If the Burke forges partnerships with
organizations such as the Gates Foundation/Catapult and Girl Power Hour, as well as UW
organizations (described below), it should seek guest blog content from these partners. The
content can focus on sharing personal perspectives about the importance empowering women
to improve their communities, particularly in developing nations.
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Facebook Advertising Campaign
In addition to organic engagement on Facebook, we recommend that the Burke leverage
Facebook’s promoted posts to help boost interactions with content related to the Empowering
Women exhibit. We recommend that the Burke set aside a budget of at least $1,000. With this
budget, we recommend that the Burke promote 10 posts for a lifetime budget of $100 each.
Facebook has an advanced system that allows the advertiser to select a target audience. We
recommend that the Burke promote high-priority posts to the following audience: friends of
current fans who are age 25-40, living within 20 miles of Seattle and interested in
charities/causes and crafts/DYI. This will ensure that the advertising is reaching an audience
that is likely to be interested in the exhibit. We recommend targeting one post a week for the
first eight weeks of the exhibit. Then, in late September, we recommend targeting two posts at
UW students and faculty.
Integrate digital content creation and social sharing into the experience at the exhibit,
helping drive word of mouth and start online dialogue
Instagram contest
The Burke Museum should encourage its visitors to create and share digital content during their
visit to help drive word of mouth about their experiences at the exhibit. This generates
increased awareness and engagement as visitors share and discuss their content with their own
networks.
We recommend that the Burke Museum hold an Instagram photo contest during the exhibit.
The contest theme could ask participants to take a photo of the art or artist that most inspired
them during the exhibit and to post the photo with the hashtag #burkeempowering. This
contest should be promoted online and through signage throughout the exhibit.
The museum could select winners throughout the exhibit, highlighting the winning fan/photo
on its Facebook and Twitter pages. The winner could receive small prizes, such as Burke
Museum T-shirts. If the museum partners with Catapult, the winner could receive a gift card to
donate to the Catapult project of their choosing.
Leverage visitors’ experiences
The museum should also create digital video content featuring real-life stories of people who
attended its exhibits. This content will help encourage participation from and engage
audiences. For example, the Facebook comment below about Artifact ID Day could be turned
into a video story. The Burke should monitor conversation about attendees’ experiences on its
social channels, as well as the rest of the web, to identify interesting stories to tell.
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Monitor review sites
We recommend that the Burke Museum pay additional attention to consumer-to-consumer
reviews and discussions on networks such as Yelp, Foursquare, TripAdvisor and Citysearch as
visitors are often discussing specific exhibits in these reviews. Additionally, people seek each
other’s opinions online, and review sites are a great resource for potential visitors.
Currently, the Burke Museum has 8 tips on Foursquare, 34 reviews on Yelp, 10 reviews on
TripAdvisor and 14 reviews on Citysearch. The Burke is ranked #74 out of 183 attractions in
Seattle by TripAdvisor. Its rating on Yelp has drastically fallen from 5 stars to 2 stars in less than
5 months.
Better leverage the museum’s position on campus and as part of the UW community
UW communities are crucial to Burke Museum. The majority of the museum’s attendance
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comes from UW students and faculty members each year. Therefore, we recommend shifting
focus to campus promotions in late September, when the school year begins. Because the
exhibit will be in its final month, we recommend using the scarcity approach to highlight that
students and staff should see the exhibit before it’s gone.
We recommend that Burke Museum increase the awareness of the Empowering Women
exhibit on campus through the following strategies:
Media relations
The Burke Museum has developed strong relationships with UW campus media through past
exhibits. It is reasonable to continue using on-campus media resources to increase the media
exposure among the UW communities. We researched UW students’ experiences with the
museum and discovered that many students were not aware of the Burke’s exhibits, even
though they are interested in such exhibits. A lack of media exposure holds back the goal of
increasing museum attendance among UW communities. Therefore, the Burke Museum should
employ various ways to increase the awareness of its featured exhibit. As the most influential
media outlet on campus, the UW Daily is key for promoting the Empowering Women exhibit.
UW Daily has formed a mature online platform that integrates news reporting with photo
galleries and videos. The UW Daily is also very active on social media channels. It has more than
3,500 fans on Facebook. The UW Daily reported on the Plastics Unwrapped exhibit, successfully
bringing more student visitors to the museum. Therefore, the Burke Museum should make the
UW Daily its first priority to promote the Empowering Women exhibit on campus. The museum
should provide the UW Daily with video and photo content to facilitate the creation of their
story. The Burke should aim to place the story in the UW Daily the week of September 25, when
classes begin.
Collaboration across departments
Collaboration across departments at UW will also help Burke to reach its secondary target
audience for the Empowering Women exhibit. We recommend partnering with the UW
Department of Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies. This department regularly holds lectures
on a variety of women’s studies topics. This represents a good opportunity for the Burke to
partner with the department and offer a lecture about women contributing to their
communities around the world. They can bring in experts from the Burke anthropology division
to talk about the exhibit during the lecture. The Burke Museum could also offer field trip
activities for undergraduate classes that related to women’s studies, such as GWSS 440:
Reading Native American Women's Lives and GWSS 251:Introduction to Gender and Culture. A
field trip for these students would provide supplemental learning materials for the class while
also increasing attendance to the exhibit. It is a win-win strategy.
On-campus organizations
Student organizations also have great impact among the student groups on campus. In order to
increase the awareness of the exhibit, the Burke Museum should seek assistance from student
organizations that target women, anthropology students, as well as the international student
groups. We recommend reaching out to the UW Women’s Center, FIUTS (Foundation for
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International Understanding through Students), the Partnership for Community and Diversity,
Circle K and the American Indian Student Commission. All of these student organizations have
email lists and some have social networking platforms to interact with their members. The
Burke Museum should contact these organization and ask them to help promote the exhibit.
For example, these campus groups could help by distributing fliers about the exhibit, posting on
their Facebook page or including a promotion in their email newsletter.
Timeline
Phase 1
Pre-launch
April 1 - June 14
Conduct outreach to build partnerships
Begin creating social content
Begin promoting Twitter hashtag
Phase 2
Exhibit launch
June 15 – September 15
Launch Instagram contest
Launch Facebook advertising
Curate Pinterest board
Begin posting regularly on Twitter and Facebook
Conduct outreach with UW groups and departments
Phase 3
UW focus
September 15 – October 27
Media relations with UW Daily
Begin promotions focused on UW
Budget and Resources
Given the budget constraints, we have worked to keep our ideas fairly low-budget. The biggest
requirement is time and talent from the museum’s staff. Otherwise, our plan requires a $1,000
budget for Facebook advertising. If the museum decides to partner with other groups and
provide related discounts, there would be associated costs in order to lower the price of
admission. Additionally, our plans call for signage to promote the Twitter hashtag and
Instagram contest; however, we believe this signage can be included in the graphic design and
printing work that will be done to prepare for the exhibit.
Recommended Metrics
We recommend the following metrics for measuring the success of the digital marketing plan:
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Museum
Number of museum attendees
Website/Blog
Number of visits to exhibit webpages
Number of views of exhibit webpages
Number of visits to blog home page
Number of visitors to relevant blog posts
Number of page views of relevant blog posts
Number of social shares of relevant blog posts
Referral traffic to site and blog
Twitter
Growth in Twitter followers
Number of relevant tweets sent
Number of retweets of relevant tweets
Number of replies to relevant tweets
Number of favorites of relevant tweets
Number of tweets using #burkeempowering hashtag
Potential impressions of tweets using #burkeempowering hashtag
Facebook
Growth in Facebook fans
Number of relevant posts
Number of interactions (likes, comments and shares) on relevant Facebook posts
Instagram
Number of Instagram photos using #burkeempowering hashtag
Pinterest
Growth in Pinterest followers
Number of relevant pins
Number of repins
Appendix A: SWOT Analysis
SWOT (STRENGTHS, WEAKNESSES, OPPORTUNITIES, THREATS)
STRENGTHS WEAKNESSES
o Expert status and credibility (“The o Location
Washington State Museum”) o Cost and availability of parking
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o Strong reputation o Budget constraints
o Resources for marketing and o Exhibit is solely focused on women-
promotions how is this relatable to all peoples?
o New user friendly website o Admission Fee
o Research collections that are o Target audience is broad
unique to the Burke o Infrastructure is dated
o Exhibits have timely and relevant o New leadership/team members-
content on a global and local scale the process of creating an exhibit is
o Contemporary exhibits a new frontier for them
OPPORTUNITIES THREATS
o Heightened focus on collaborative o Seattle Art Museum recently had a
communities similar exhibit
o Potential partnership with UW o Competition with other Seattle
departments/UW institutions museums and tourist attractions
o Potential partnerships with Seattle o Proximity of Henry Art Museum
businesses and museums
o Interactive content
o Always changing the exhibit- lots of
things to learn at all times
o Internet usage to reach new
audiences
Appendix B: Behavioral/ Psychological Segmentation
Social • I am interested in learning about other people in other cultures
• To go to a research based museum
• A knowledgeable/constructive way to pass the time
• Nice place to meet and spend time with friends/family
• To visit the shop/café
Intellectual • Encourage children’s interest in culture and dynamics of artistry
• Improve knowledge and global understanding of art and culture
• Academic/professional interest in the subject
Emotional • To support woman-kind
• Appreciate present situation of being in a developed and relatively safe
country
• Take a small walk in someone else's shoes
• Introspection
• To be connected to those in another part of the world
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• Personal interest in the subject
Spiritual • Stimulate my own creativity
• For peaceful, quiet contemplation
Appendix C: Positioning map
Cost of
admission
Convenience of
location
Burke
Pacific Science Center
EMP
Seattle Art Museum
Appendix D: Survey results
We conducted three surveys to help guide our research for this digital marketing plan. These
surveys focused on what motivates Seattle residents to attend museums; men’s interest in
women-focused issues; and awareness of the museum on the UW campus.
Museums in Seattle
The goal of this survey was to determine what motivates Seattle residents to attend museums
and to measure the importance of certain characteristics of museums. The Burke Museum has
weaknesses when compared to other local museums – its location is on the University of
Washington campus, far from the primary tourist destinations in downtown Seattle. Because of
this location, we believe it is less well-known. Additionally, the cost of parking on campus is
often a complaint among visitors, who have to pay $10 most days to park on campus.
This survey received 18 responses. Among the respondents, 89% had a bachelor’s degree or
higher while 11% had some college education. All by one respondent fell within the target age
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range of 25-54. The age group of 25-34 was the most prominent at 67% of respondents.
Respondents were 61% female and 39% male.
Two-thirds of respondents had visited a museum in Seattle one to three times in the past 12
months. Four people – 22% - had not visited a museum, and two people had visited museums
four to six times.
When asked to choose the three Seattle museums they were most likely visit, Seattle Art
Museum was the top choice, drawing 21% of responses. The Museum of Flight was second at
13%. Museum of History and Industry and Pacific Science Center both received 10% of
responses. The Burke Museum received 6%.
Which Seattle area museums
are you most likely to visit?
The Center on
Seattle Asian Art Contemporary Art
Museum (CoCA)
4% The
2%
Children's
Burke
Museum
Museum
6%
6%
Seattle Art Museum EMP Museum
21% 8%
Frye Art Museum
4%
Pacific Science Center Henry Art Gallery
10% 4%
Museum of Flight
Olympic 13%
Sculpture
Park Museum of
8% History and
Industry
10%
Northwest African Nordic Heritage
American Museum Museum
2% 4%
When asked why they typically visit a museum, seeing a new exhibit was the top answer, at
61%. Likewise, 61% of respondents said special exhibits were very important when deciding to
visit a museum, followed the museum’s collections at 44%. This is an important result, as we’ll
be helping the Burke Museum promote a new exhibit for our final project.
One-third of respondents said the cost of admission was a very important factor to consider.
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However, two-thirds of participants said that discounts/deals and the cost of parking were not
important factors to them.
When deciding to attend a museum in
Seattle, how important are the following factors?
Not important Somewhat important Very important
Hours of operation 33%
Discount/deal 67%
Cost of parking 67%
Cost of admission 17%
Museum’s location 33%
Museum’s collections 6%
Special exhibits 11%
Empowering Women exhibit
The goal of this survey was to determine the emotional/social/psychological attributes that will
drive men to support women and visit the Empowering Women exhibit. The target audience of
the survey was men who are interested in art, culture and design with a primary audience of
those 20 years and older. King County, Washington was the target geography, with a
preference toward the University District and nearby areas. The secondary audience for the
survey was male UW students under the age of 20.
This survey sampled 15 men. The target audience was responsive and interested but lacks
initiative. The audience needs to be updated and engaged on a consistent basis. The group is
interested in contributing and participating in womenkind, art and culture and is eager to learn.
The survey respondents showed a keen interest in growing their understanding of womankind
and learning about cultures from other parts of the world. However, they did not proactively
seek information about the subject matter. Therefore, a “push” marketing strategy needs to be
employed to reach out to men of all age groups. We recommend that the museum launch a
compelling direct marketing strategy with an altruistic message inviting men to visit the exhibit
and a social media campaign that discusses altruistic deeds toward women.
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UW students and the Burke Museum
This survey aimed to find out more about UW students who attend the Burke Museum in order
to help us target the right audience for the Empowering Women exhibit.
Five of the students surveyed had visited the Burke Museum prior to the survey while the
remaining 11 had never been there. About half of the participants stated that they would be
interested in attending an exhibit at the Burke that focused on the empowerment of women
while the other half said no or were undecided.
According to the survey results, which are directional, UW students do tend to have an interest
in attending the museum’s Empowering Women exhibit. Most women were interested in
attending the exhibit while a few women and most men are undecided or not interested. With
this in mind, we will consider the best ways to reach men and get them interested in the
exhibit. We can also conclude that we need to target social clubs, sporting, and academic
events for advertising the upcoming exhibit.
