IWM Duxford Visitor Tracking & AnalysisCase StudyOctober 2015

About

Michael and Partners (MandP) are a leading consultancy specialising in culture, media and the experiential economy. We work with clients to enable them to plan, test and launch new ventures, deliver challenging projects or navigate through periods of development or high growth.

www.michaelandpartners.co.uk

Imperial War Museum (IWM) is a global authority on conflict and its impact on people’s lives. We collect objects and stories that give an insight into people’s experiences of war, we preserve them for future generations, and we bring them to today’s audience in the most powerful way possible at our five branches (IWM London, IWM Duxford, IWM North, Churchill War Rooms and HMS Belfast) and across our digital channels. By giving a platform to these stories, we aim to help people understand why we go to war and the effect that conflict has on people’s lives.

www.iwm.org.uk

The Challenge

IWM are in the process of a developing a masterplan for their IWM Duxford site with the objective of further enhancing the visitor experience for their 450,000 annual visitors.

As part of this ambitious planning exercise, IWM needed to better understand how visitors were moving around the existing site:

• What display spaces were they visiting, for how long, and which were being missed, and why? • What routes were being taken? • How did the shop, cafés and other services fit into the visitor journey? • How long were people spending on site?• And how did these things change based on differing visitor types, weather conditions and other

variables?

Our Solution

MandP combined four methodologies to ensure we gained a full understanding of visitor behaviour over an intensive 5 week period:

1. GPS Tracking – we deployed our SmartTrak GPS trackers to map actual visitor movement around the site at 60 second intervals, thus gaining insights and a level of precision that would not have been possible through traditional methods of research. We analysed 300 visitor journeys resulting in a substantial data set covering multiple audience demographic and visit types.

2. Visitor Interviews – we worked with IWM to identify a range of useful survey questions and deployed field researchers for 12 days to meet with visitors. This enabled us to understand visitors’ reasons for engaging or not engaging with various aspect of the on site offer.

3. Visitor Observation – we analysed visitor flow, dwell times and other key metrics by observing visitors at key locations around the site over defined periods of the day.

4. Transaction Data Analysis – in conjunction with the other activity, we deployed our commercial expertise to analyse transactional data from Admissions as well as the shop and cafes.

Data Processing and Conversion

MandP processed vast amounts of GPS customer journey and survey data and converted this into clearly understandable tables and info-graphics. Combining the GPS data set with the findings from visitor observations, visitor interviews and transaction analysis resulted in an incredibly rich and multi-dimensional data set.

Records: XXX

CU15 XX% XX% XX%

Rep Vis XX% XX% XX%

Limited Mob XX% XX% XX%

F or AP XX% XX% XX%

Site Dwell (m) XX XX XX

Distance XX XX XX

Stops XX XX XX

OL Time (m) XX XX XX

Visit Rate XX% XX% XX% Visit Rate XX% XX% XX%

Dwell (m) XX XX XX Dwell (m) XX XX XX

Route XX XX XX Route XX XX XX

Priority XX XX XX Priority XX XX XX

Visit Rate XX% XX% XX% Visit Rate XX% XX% XX%

Dwell (m) XX XX XX Dwell (m) XX XX XX

Route XX XX XX Route XX XX XX

Priority XX XX XX Priority XX XX XX

Visit Rate XX% XX% XX% Visit Rate XX% XX% XX%

Dwell (m) XX XX XX Dwell (m) XX XX XX

Route XX XX XX Route XX XX XX

Priority XX XX XX Priority XX XX XX

Visit Rate XX% XX% XX% Visit Rate XX% XX% XX%

Dwell (m) XX XX XX Dwell (m) XX XX XX

Route XX XX XX Route XX XX XX

Priority XX XX XX Priority XX XX XX

Visit Rate XX% XX% XX% Visit Rate XX% XX% XX%

Dwell (m) XX XX XX Dwell (m) XX XX XX

Route XX XX XX Route XX XX XX

Priority XX XX XX Priority XX XX XX

Visit Rate XX% XX% XX% Visit Rate XX% XX% XX%

Dwell (m) XX XX XX Dwell (m) XX XX XX

Route XX XX XX Route XX XX XX

Priority XX XX XX Priority XX XX XX

Visit Rate XX% XX% XX% Visit Rate XX% XX% XX%

Dwell (m) XX XX XX Dwell (m) XX XX XX

Route XX XX XX Route XX XX XX

Priority XX XX XX Priority XX XX XXV

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Findings and Recommendations

Detailed analysis of this data enabled MandP to provide IWM with a raft of vital insights, including:

- Precise total site visit metrics (dwell time, distance travelled, average routes taken) and an

understanding of how these metrics are affected by weather conditions, time of day, visitor type

and other variables.

- Metrics by display space (visit rate, dwell time, route features) and detailed reasons for non-visit

where applicable together with a clear understanding of how each behaviour changed for each

different visitor type and due to other variables.

- A clear understanding of visitors’ use of wayfinding, visitor transport and other support services.

- Detailed information about conversion rates and dwell times for IWM’s shop and café outlets.

MandP was also able to make a range of recommendations to direct IWM towards ways of

responding to the project’s findings, informing both immediate actions as well as the longer term

masterplanning exercise.

IWM’s Assessment

“Michael and Partners used a highly innovative approach combining GPS tracking, transactional analysis, visitor interviews and visitor observation to create an extremely rich data set and report. Their findings quantified and evidenced some of our existing perceptions but also revealed new and significant insights into how visitors move around the site and how they currently interact with our display spaces, shop, cafes and other facilities.

We were extremely pleased with the outcomes from the project which are proving very significant as we plan how to refine and improve the visitor experience at IWM Duxford.

Michael and Partners were great to work with; flexible, communicative, knowledgeable and efficient and we would have no hesitation in recommending them to others.”

Alicia Gurney, Head Of Masterplanning and Engagement, IWM Duxford

Further Information

For further information about this project, or to discuss how Michael and Partners might be able to support your organisation, please contact:

Stephen MichaelDirectorMichael and Partners

talk@michaelandpartners.co.uk

+44 (0)1692 535367

Visit: www.michaelandpartners.co.uk