More on Dutch cultural heritage and audience understanding

Last week I wrote about the lack of online audience understanding at Dutch cultural institutions.

Jos Taekema, director of Digital Heritage Netherlands, provided me with some further insight:

“For sure Dutch heritage institutions could do a lot more on understanding the needs, ideas and desires of their audience, but it is not correct to think that they are entirely on a different planet. The bigger institutions (like the National Library, the National Archive, the Rijksmuseum, Naturalis, the Van Gogh Museum, the National Museums of Ethnology and Antiquities) do indeed conduct online research, mainly through Ruigrok/Netpanel. The Dutch Association of Archives provides a sector arrangement on web usability tests via a specialised consultancy. The Museum Association in collaboration with TNS/NIP is the main provider of audience research of physical visitors via the museum monitor.”

“During the conference next year though it will be useful and interesting to put a stronger emphasis on qualitative research and the appropriate methodologies.”