Some time ago – in 2005 – Archives & Museum Informatics launched a survey of museum web activities. We noted then that:
Each financial cycle museum Webmasters struggle
to justify their budget requests. Whenever statistical reports are
circulated someone asks, "How do we compare?" When exploring the
benefits of a new function, Web teams ask themselves "Is it worth the
investment?" Answers to these questions are hard to come by.[see http://www.archimuse.com/research/mwbenchmarks/index.html for the full background]
This survey – the results of which are written up at http://www.archimuse.com/research/mwbenchmarks/report/mwbenchmarks2005.html – was designed to help fill some of the voids in our knowledge. As a first stab at the problem we realise that it wasn't perfect. And things have changed since 2005!
We've been asked to update the survey for a client-group of museums, and thought we'd use the opportunity to ask for input from the community as well. If we're going to launch it again more broadly, we'd like it to be useful to you ...
So, please, take a look at the questions – available as a PDF from http://www.archimuse.com/research/mwbenchmarks/MW-Survey05.pdf – and post your thoughts on revisions or additional questions here.
Thanks!
jennifer
Comments
great survey suggestions
thanks so much for all the ideas about things that we can probe in a new edition of the museums and the web benchmark survey.
we'll be updating the questions this fall. feel free to add any other suggestions you might have to this thread.
/jt
Broader Web Presence
I'd be interested to know how museums today are dealing with a broader web presence (similar to what others above have mentioned. Do they have a blog? How many blogs? Do they produce a regular podcast? Who is responsible for the content of the blogs and podcasts? Do they have someone dedicated to social networking/social media (Facebook, mySpace, twitter, Plurk, reaching out to other blogs, etc.)? Do they have a strategy for dealing with social networking and social media? I second frankieroberto's question about mobile devices.
I'd also be interested to see how the museum types break down... history vs. art vs. other. Of course, my main interest lies in historic sites, so that's where the interest comes from.
multimedia content?
I'd like to see what types of multimedia content museums are putting on their sites, what formats they're using, who is responsible for creating that content, and where the content "lives" on their site (is it collections related, education, marketing -- or is there a special area for visitors to access it?)
Museum Web Benchmark Survey Report 2005
The report is also available online in a summary form. see http://www.archimuse.com/research/mwbenchmarks/report/mwbenchmarks2005.html
it might spur some thoughts on possible revisions too.
/jt
j. trant archives & museum informatics www.archimuse.com
museum content on other sites too
One thing that I thought about your questions is that you assume each museum only has one website.
We have a main website for our service but in addition we also have a separate presence on our council website, we have a number of partner
websites which showcase our museum objects which we have produced in partnership with other museums and our local archives, we have two sites
on MySpace and we use YouTube and Flickr to post content.
All in all it makes it very difficult to give an accurate picture of how many people engage with us online.
Perhaps the survey could include a section about what other websites people have and also about use of websites like Flickr, YouTube, GoogleVideo etc to give some information about how many museums are branching away from the traditional website
Web 2.0
Many of us are responsible not just for publishing to our own Web sites but also to joining the social Web, posting information on Facebook, YouTube, and blogging, podcasting, etc. It would be interesting to find out how much of our time is going to these activities that are not part of our "core" sites and what kind of return we're seeing from these activities.
I think it'd be worth
I think it'd be worth including something on Creative Commons content (or other free content licences).
Also, perhaps a question on support for mobile devices (N95, iPhone/iPod Touch) would be apt.
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