NEMO survey on museums and COVID-19: Museums adapt to go online

A person is taking a photo of the exhibition display with their smartphone

Based on data collected before 3 April in the first round of NEMO’s survey, it is clear that museums have had to make many changes to their daily work due to the current situation. A creative solution has been to shift staff tasks to provide services online. 30% of museums have changed staff tasks while 13% have added resources to online activities.

What are museums doing?
58% of museums are holding the same online activities as usual but 37% have increased activities and 23% have even started new online activities. Increased online services is most prominently seen in the use of social media to communicate with their audience. Museums have also increased the features of their collections online, have added new digital objects to the online repository and developed new online exhibitions and tours.

Chart illustrating the changing staff tasks in museums due to Covid 19. One bar indicates the museums that have shifted staff responsibilities to suit online services. The other, smaller bar, indicates the percentage of museums which have increased their resources for online services.

Not surprisingly, museums who reallocated staff tasks are most active in the start of new online services, most prominently virtual tours and online exhibitions.

Museums wanting to expand online services are considering live content, podcasts, virtual tours, quizzes and podcasts.

It is important to note that a third of museums in the survey already provide a rich diversity in online services including podcasts, YouTube programs, special newsletters and quizzes.

24% of museums reported an increased in web traffic, and this was largely significant, most prominently in Austria, Romania, and Spain.

Considering that over 82% of Europeans are online (75% in social media), yet only 42% of Europeans visited museums at least once last year, the current situation brings museums the great opportunity of making new friends.

 

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