NEMA Stats participating museums send monthly reports on their on-site attendance, which we collate, compare, and send back again in a confidential compilation. What is the afterlife of all those numbers? We asked several current participants in NEMA Stats, from small to large organizations, to share their methods of data collection and analysis, from Stats reports to any other demographic or programmatic information.

How do you collect attendance information at your museum?

Connecticut Science Center: Our point of sale system tracks daily attendance by type (member, adult, child, school group, etc) and our Visitor Services department distributes a daily summary to everyone. I use this daily report to confirm that the numbers I pull for official reporting purposes from the ticketing system are on point. Attendance for events that do not go through the ticketing system are provided to me on a regular basis from respective staff. 

Currier Museum of Art: We use Altru from Blackbaud to process admissions at the Currier. We went live with that system in August 2015.

Newport Restoration Foundation: We collect attendance for all tours at our three museum sites and for all programs. In general we make note of the following categories: adult, child and comp (and the reason for the comp—employee, NEMA member, etc.). Most of our attendance tracking is done with pencil and paper on program or tour-specific attendance tracking sheets and then entered into our computer system. For some of our big programs where we have attendance in excess of 200 and lots of people arriving all at once we have a clicker we use and then transfer that number to our computer after. 

Old State House/Bostonian Society: Through a retail pop package that we also use for gift shop sales.

Woodlawn Museum, Gardens & Park: We have our guest attendant note our attendance daily. We also note the weather each day.  It is documented hourly, how many adults and children come in each hour. This is helpful for staffing purposes.

How do you use the NEMA Stats reports at your museum?

Connecticut Science Center: We will periodically review the reports for benchmarking, peer comparisons and trends.

Currier Museum of Art: We compare trends to other museums within the region.

Newport Restoration Foundation: It is shared with our education, financial, and executive departments. We look to see how our trends compare with other institutions in our area.  It’s always good to know if we’re experience the same thing as other Newport museums.  If our numbers are up or down and no one else’s are then we need to ask ourselves why think about whether we need to offer different sorts of programs or change our marketing strategies.

Old State House/Bostonian Society: To see how we are doing relative to other sites and museums.

Woodlawn Museum, Gardens & Park:  Our director reviews the monthly NEMA stats report, but we don't actually use the information in house.

What additional information do you collect from visitors to your museum? Please explain how this information is used.

Connecticut Science Center: At ticketing we ask where they’re from and collect email addresses when we can. Zipcode data is used to track visitor/brand awareness across geography and tells us where our visitors are coming from – highest concentration to lowest.

We also participate in a monthly secret shopper program that evaluates experience – including use of website, staff interaction, exhibits, cleanliness etc. This data is used for improvements. We encourage visitors to fill out comment cards which are collected, reviewed and used for improvements. 

During the summer we conduct a more extensive visitor exit survey that captures information outlined below.  This information helps us to better understand our audience and how to improve/change awareness, marketing and mission among others:

• Length of visit / number of visits in the past 3 years / Number adults and children in the group
• Ages of Children
• Highlight of their Science Center Experience
• Perception of Value for the cost
• How likely visitor would recommend the science center, return to the center or purchase/renew membership
• Quality rate as an education experience
• Quality rate as an entertainment experience
• Deciding factory to visiting
• Was visit more educational or entertaining
• Whose idea was it to visit
• How far ahead did they plan to visit
• What was used to help plan the visit
• How do they prefer to get information
• Gender / racial or ethnic group / highest level of education

Currier Museum of Art: Zip code information is used by PR & Marketing to analyze the effectiveness of various campaigns (i.e.: was there an increase in attendance from Massachusetts during a certain period).

Old State House/Bostonian Society: We occasionally ask where people are from, primarily for grant applications.

Newport Restoration Foundation: We have a number of ticketing partnerships around the city so we keep track of where people purchased tickets.  If they purchase through us we keep track of whether it was on site or online.  Heretofore we’ve done surveys a couple times to capture demographic data and visitor feedback on their experiences.  Going forward, we’re making more of a concerted effort to regularly capture this sort of information to better inform how we do our marketing and also to insure we’re meeting visitor expectations. 

Woodlawn Museum, Gardens & Park:  This past summer/fall we participated in the AASLH Visitors Count program.  The survey was lengthy, 3 full pages of questions.  We collected 200 surveys...and were very good...we did not read any of them!  We put them in envelopes and sealed them immediately as required by the program. We are certainly excited to learn how our visitors rated their Woodlawn experience, their comments and the suggestions they offered.  We will be getting our results/report the first week of April and I will be traveling to Nashville TN for a full day workshop on April 11th with the people who collated the results (Center of Nonprofit Management) and staff from the other nine historic properties that also participated this past season. I will also have a 1 hour, one-on-one session with Debb Wilcox, CNM Visitors Count! Evaluator/Director of Evaluation and Data Analyst who will answer any specific questions and suggest next steps for us.  Based on the findings, we will determine if there are changes we would like to make to improve our visitor experience here at Woodlawn.  There were also questions on our survey that will provide insight for others in our community and we plan to share our findings with them, through meetings and publications with entities like the area Chambers of Commerce of which we are a member and other organizations to be determined based on our report.

We would like to thank the following for responding to our short survey:
Carey Cahoon, Database Administrator and Strategist Currier Museum of Art
Chuck Gordon, Director of Marketing and Commercial Operations, Old State House/Bostonian Society
Lisa Mottola, Chief Financial Officer, Connecticut Science Center
Liz Spoden, Coordinator for Visitor Services & Education Programs Newport Restoration Foundation
Phyllis A. Young, Marketing and Development Coordinator, Woodlawn Museum, Gardens & Park