hi Christina,

I second all that Russell has written. We purloined the empty tag and went with #emptyBod #emptyPitt, etc. We certainly needed someone who was ‘in’ the Instagram world to know which users to identify and approach. As they won’t necessarily know each other, the orientation at the start was important as well as the crisps, glass of wine etc. We also had light background music playing as silent, empty galleries after hours can be a bit disconcerting. I was really surprised when some of them turned up with SLRs - I had naively assumed it would all be smartphones but as Russell says, some of them go away to edit, and won’t post for several days.

Although the photos we got were good I must admit I was slightly disappointed we didn't get more - we had 10 Instagrammers and very few images of the Museum (but this might have also been down to the multi-venue approach - see below) and we didn’t see a great spike in followers. We also needed to brief them more thoroughly on the more adventurous shots we might hope for as, although we gave them free reign, in the end we had nice photos but from the usual tourist vantage points and of the usual high footfall displays/exhibits. Some of the other participant museums were able to open up back-of-house (e.g collection storage) areas and this was great as some of them got very excited about Victorian cubby holes and antiquated specimen drawers.

In terms of the wrap-around care we decided to go the whole hog, especially as we’re a group of museums and realistically it would take about a whole day or even two for the Instagrammers to go round all of them. So we hooked up with Trainline and Experience Oxfordshire to offer free or discounted travel, meals and accommodation so they had an ‘Oxford experience’ over a whole weekend (the deal was they also posted about the venues they stayed in/ate at) and asked them to supplement the #emptyVENUE tag with #VisitOxford.

It’s something we’d do again but possibly with more participants and a clearer understanding of what we wanted out of it.

All the best,

Helen

On 1 Aug 2017, at 15:41, Russell Dornan <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Hi Christina,

The only challenges were:

Making sure we could give the Instagramers the entire museum to photograph (we did that by positioning the event as a “press type” event, allowing the group to take photos even in temporary exhibitions that usually don’t allow photography).
Knowing how to organise the event. I worked closely with an Instagramer who was involved in previous “emptys” and who was very valuable in putting me in touch with her network of other high profile Instagramers (and corralling them a little) and talking through the best time and way to do it.

In terms of recommendations, I’d reiterate the points above: giving them as much freedom as you can will help and work with someone in that community to be your inside contact. When they’re there, one of Wellcome Collection’s amazing front of house team gave a 5 minute overview of the museum and I followed that with 3 minutes on why they had been invited. Keep it short, but give them a little bit of background before they start. And give them a drink and a snack to enjoy when they arrive/during the intro. Most previous museums chose not to and the group were surprised and grateful that we did. It’s worth noting that the group hung out in our café afterwards too (at their own expense) to catch up.

You can’t force the group to post or use certain hashtags, so keep it simple: in your short intro make sure you mention (and repeat) your handle and the hashtag you want them to use. Try to keep it to one hashtag. Make it as easy for them as possible. Give them structure, but make it loose. I decided on 20 minutes per floor and we met at the central staircase after each 20 minute period before moving up. Give them free reign within that, but you’ll have to herd them (Wellcome Collection is fairly small museum, so it was a bit easier).

My final bit of advice is that it may be several days until you see any of the posts come through. Our first one came through 20 minutes in and I got very excited, but then it was 3 days until the second one appeared! Over that following week, over 20 more were posted, but you have to be patient (they’ll have a backlog of projects they’ll be posting). Also, most will only post one picture, despite taking dozens, though some posted a second one a year or more later.

Keep in touch with them afterwards and bear them in mind for other things to keep that relationship alive.

Hope that’s helpful. Let me know if you have any more questions (I’m at [log in to unmask]). In case it’s of interest, I mention the “emptys” in a wider Instagram + Museums article.

Thanks,

Russell

From: Museums Computer Group <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of LINDNER CHRISTINA <[log in to unmask]>
Reply-To: Museums Computer Group <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Tuesday, 1 August 2017 at 15:10
To: "[log in to unmask]" <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: INFLUENCERS in the Museum Space: Looking for Participants

Hi Russell,

The insight to the Wellcome Collection's 'empty' event is fascinating -- going off of what Tony asked, could I follow up with asking if there were any specific challenges when working with the Instagrammers/Influencers for the event? And if you have any recommendations for other museums who are looking to do the same types of events? 😊

Best,

Christina

From: Museums Computer Group <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of Russell Dornan <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: 01 August 2017 12:28:29
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: INFLUENCERS in the Museum Space: Looking for Participants

Hi Tony,

In this case “success” to me meant a few different things:

1. The number of images posted: you can’t control that and had the Instagramers not been that bothered, they wouldn’t have posted anything.
2. The quality of images: this was expected, but it was still a joy to see and we have been able to use some of the images since in different ways online.
3. Their perspective: seeing your museum in a different and unique way and understanding how pro/amateur photographers see it was fascinating and useful, especially in a purely creative context (as opposed to standard press images, etc.). They took and shared images in a style that we perhaps couldn’t or just hadn’t thought of yet.
4. The reach of the Instagramers: their followers consisted of many, many people who would likely be interested in Wellcome Collection, but who may not be aware of the museum, so it was great for reaching those audiences as well as raising our profile on Instagram (we’d only been on there for about a year at this point).
5. Their feedback: we gave them coffee and breakfast, which they hadn’t received at the previous “emptys”. We also gave them more freedom; they were more restricted in other museums. Making those connections was great and the way we did it helped our reputation (we’ve had the Instagramers in since).
6. It was very cheap
7. Nothing got broken
8. They photographers didn’t think we were lame :D

This was done as a fun, dynamic thing, to try something a bit different. It didn’t replace the Press view for example. As an aside, Wellcome Collection also organises Instagram meetups with members of the public. I think there’s huge value in doing something special with an elite set of pro-Instagramers, using their skills and large followings in a mutually beneficial way. But it’s also important to offer similar opportunities to everyone else. When I still worked there, I organised 45 members of the public to come in before we opened for breakfast, a tour and then a photo walk. I believe this happened again just after I left. Both tied into photo projects we were running as part of temporary exhibitions. Some of the above points can be achieved using members of the public, but some of them need “influencers” and their audiences (whether that’s in terms of volume or demographic) so it’s good to do both if you can.

I hope that’s somewhat useful. It was a couple of years ago now…

(

On 01/08/2017, 11:56, "Museums Computer Group on behalf of Tony Crockford" <[log in to unmask] on behalf of [log in to unmask]> wrote:

    > On 1 Aug 2017, at 11:32, Russell Dornan <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
    >
    > Hi Christina,
    >
    > Following on from Helen’s mention of the “empty” style event, you can read about Wellcome’s one here:https://next.wellcomecollection.org/articles/emptywellcome
    >
    > It was fun, easy and successful ☺
    >
    > Russell

    Can I ask, out of curiosity, how you measured successful?

    i.e.

    a spike in paying visitors?
    a spike in Website visitors, attributed to instagram image sources?

    some other metric?

    (or nothing got broken [1] and the instagrammers didn't eat too much?)


    Would it have been *as* successful or *more/less* successful if you'd invited a random group of people by offering free passes on Twitter?

    Is it cheaper than inviting 'the press' ?

    Again, just curious from an influencer point of view.

    :o)


    [1] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jul/14/selfie-woman-causes-200000-dollar-damage-artworks-la-gallery

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