CRZ asked me if the museum I work for has a Flickr page, and it happens that I am planning to set one up. I'm also planning to make a MySpace, and Facebook page in time for our Oregon Sesquicentennial exhibit starting in February.
I want to give visitors a way to interact with the museum and leave feedback through already established sites. We do have a website, but I'm trying to focus on creating community, and using easy familiar interfaces.
Are there any other sites that I should think about using?
Is there a major problem I'm going to run into other than spam and inappropriate (off topic, lewd, etc.) postings?
I do monitor Yelp, but currently there aren't even any reviews there. Is it bad form for me to add one? Or would it be bad to ask a friend who will be seeing the museum for the first time and uses Yelp regularly to add one after her visit?
Would anyone even add a museum to their friends if they saw an "add us on MySpace and Facebook" sign?
Lise, I am no expert, but I would think some would add a museum as a friend - I mean people have 300 bands as friends, so a museum - there have to be museum folks.
I think a review on Yelp is in order, and a good article, blog or something that is promoted to the various Digg, Delicious, and the rest (see the bottom of any thread on This Very Website).
I don't know what the numbers are, but register (or ask me, I am registered or ask cranlsn ) and ask a question about it on Askville, Yahoo Answers, Answerbag and see what kind of numbers you get.
We'll be back right after order has been restored here in the Omni Center.
“That the universe was formed by a fortuitous concourse of atoms, I will no more believe than that the accidental jumbling of the alphabet would fall into a most ingenious treatise of philosophy” - Swift
I do monitor Yelp, but currently there aren't even any reviews there. Is it bad form for me to add one? Or would it be bad to ask a friend who will be seeing the museum for the first time and uses Yelp regularly to add one after her visit?
It's probably bad form to do it yourself, though it's certainly been done. But I think it's ethically fine to (strongly) encourage people to go contribute their own thoughts.
I think if there was cool on a museum Facebook/myspace, people would friend just like if there's cool stuff on it. But the big first step is going to be making sure people know it's there.
The only other addition I can think to suggest is a micro-blogging site like Twitter or FriendFeed, but it seems more more promotional than feedback-orientated.
I really want people to put their own thoughts up and plan to encourage that.
I want to do some sort of blog, but I want to do something more than just upcoming exhibits. What sorts of things do people want to know about museums other than the typical price, hours, accessibility things?
One thing I've thought of is featuring one object a week or every two weeks (can't be too often, I'm stretched thin already) and putting up a picture and information about it. Like most museums we can only display maybe 8-10% of what we have at any time.
Originally posted by LiseI really want people to put their own thoughts up and plan to encourage that.
I want to do some sort of blog, but I want to do something more than just upcoming exhibits. What sorts of things do people want to know about museums other than the typical price, hours, accessibility things?
One thing I've thought of is featuring one object a week or every two weeks (can't be too often, I'm stretched thin already) and putting up a picture and information about it. Like most museums we can only display maybe 8-10% of what we have at any time.
I think raiding the "hidden backstock" would be a great feature for a museum website.
Put some kind of feature up somewhere that talk about the people who run it; the curators, the historians, and anything of the like, but don't make it like a typical boring interview. Make it fun! Find out, as an example, why the do what they do, but at the same time, who they cheer for in the NFL, how they met their significant others, and what they think is the coolest, (no, not most interesting or fascinating...COOLEST) parts of the museum.
Maybe people will respond to the people behind the museum.
well, the people of the museum would be a very short running feature, but I might be able to use it to encourage people who would be interested in volunteering.
Originally posted by Lisewell, the people of the museum would be a very short running feature, but I might be able to use it to encourage people who would be interested in volunteering.
Well, it's not like you can run a bio on everyone one at one time; do a monthly feature. Each month, interview someone.
And the volunteer idea is really good; there's no better way to get word out than by having people volunteer and spread word about the museum and its' artifacts.
We have a pretty big location (a 1905 courthouse) and a lot of objects, but not a lot of staff.
I am also the youngest staff member or volunter (if you exclude Aaron) by a few decades. So I can't do anything real wild or crazy. So as much as I'd like to post little tid bits about how I was composing a "Moose in a Box" song (to the tune of "Living in a Box") to myself as I was... well looking for a Moose in a box, that sort of thing probably isn't going to fly.
Lise, One of the things that I do is put together cultural groups with limited resources with young talented filmmakers to pad their CVs.
If you have a little bit of money to spend I can get a filmmaker to make some professional short films about your collection which you can use as content on your web-site and I can also get the video up on about fifty web-sites to hopefully drive some traffic back to your web-site.
Originally posted by LiseWe have a pretty big location (a 1905 courthouse) and a lot of objects, but not a lot of staff.
I am also the youngest staff member or volunter (if you exclude Aaron) by a few decades. So I can't do anything real wild or crazy. So as much as I'd like to post little tid bits about how I was composing a "Moose in a Box" song (to the tune of "Living in a Box") to myself as I was... well looking for a Moose in a box, that sort of thing probably isn't going to fly.
Now see, I think leveraging that would be excellent. Much of the content will be purely serious (the word "stodgy" comes to mind), to make the "older generation" members happy. And beside that, you have "Lise's Corner", which has exactly that kind of stuff. Which demonstrates that the museum isn't just all about boring, stodginess. There's an interesting, fun side to the whole enterprise, which would appeal to a younger audience.
He could've stayed at 130 and fought the winner of Corrales-Casamayor II. I used to think Freitas was great, but he went through some marital stuff and his dad died and it seems as though he's not the same in the ring anymore.