Who is in your Audience?

It is important to know who is regularly engaging with you through your ongoing activity.  These patrons are your advocates – they value what you bring to the community and may, in their “day jobs” be potential partners in engagement or be able to connect you to others in the community who are potential partners for community engagement activity.  Most importantly, once you have a firm grasp on who is in your audience, you may find it is quite obvious who isn’t. 

If you choose to conduct a simple “We’d like to know a little more about you” audience survey, your questions should help you gain knowledge of their age, ethnicity, geographic location, other recreational interests and employment type. At the end of the survey have a statement expressing your interest in creating new community partnerships to bring arts into the community and seeking their help in reaching out.  Have a place they can fill in their name and contact information (that is optional).

Geodemographic/Lifestyle Analysis

Undertake a geodemographic/lifestyle analysis of your patron data base utilizing a system like the PRIZM system used by Environics. (Presenters in Ontario have access to these reports through their service organization, Ontario Presents.) The report will give you a full community profile so you can easily see who is not engaging with you now but is in your community.

Compare and Contrast

Community engagement is about making art inclusive for a broader cross-section of the community.  Once you have built your community profile and the profile of your audience, you can compare the two. Can you see groups of constituents who are not represented in your audience?  Can you imagine connecting to them outside of the traditional artist/audience relationship?  Are you interested in learning more about them and how arts can be a factor in their lives?