Define: “Audience Development”
ByWhat is your organization’s best one-sentence definition of the term “audience development”?
Chances are good that the phrase ”audience development” appears somewhere in your organization’s strategic plan – or in a recent grant application – or in the minutes of a Board meeting – or in a marketing analysis – or possibly in all of the above.
But how do you concisely DEFINE the term “audience development”?
Does the phrase mean substantially different things depending on the size or type of organization you are – or by the type of art you produce or present?
Let’s compare notes! What is YOUR ORGANIZATION’S best one-sentence definition of “audience development”? Please post it here: http://notes.allianceforaudience.org/2010/08/26/define-audience-development/ (Scroll down to “Leave a Reply.”)
For Alliance for Audience & ShowUp.com, here’s our best definition (so far):
“Audience development” is the on-going process of diversifying and cultivating audience participation in which all arts and cultural organizations must engage in order to ensure long-term viability.”
Audience development presupposes understanding your existing and potential demographics and then working to create theater experiences that nurture both.
“Audience Development is the long-term process of attracting and engaging target arts participants, audiences, and markets and retaining them by establishing and maintaining strategic, dynamic, and sustainable relationships.” – Australia Council for the Arts
“Sustaining and expanding existing or regular audiences or visitors, creating new attenders and participants, and enhancing their enjoyment, understanding, skills and confidence across the art forms.” – Rick Rodgers, Audience Development: collaborations between education and marketing, Arts Council England 1998