A New Approach for Mobile Apps for the Arts Rob Greig, Chief Technology Officer, Royal Opera House

Supported by the Digital R&D Fund for the Arts - Nesta, Arts & Humanities Research Council and public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England

Context Traffic YoY 2011/12 – 2012/13

50% increase in visits to site

Source – internet world stats

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By 2015 the internet will be 50 times bigger than it was in 2006

97% of consumers now use online media when researching products and services in their local area

1 trillion devices will be connected to the internet by 2015

Source – Gartner

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Global opera and ballet audiences

Cinema and broadcast audiences

Younger audiences

Mobile audiences

Who Extend website and product to foster further relationships with opera and ballet audiences globally – specifically those who don’t physically come to Covent Garden.

Patrons &Friends

(30k)

Occasional Ticket Buyers /Cinema Audience

(400k)

People with little or no regular contact with ROH

Regular Ticket Buyers

(100k)

Engage new audiences

What Mobile application as a sustainable means of surfacing rich content online/offline

Platform to test methods of deepening engagement, increasing spend and broadening reach

Research, disseminated and synthesized into an arts sector toolkit Project Goals

Digital programme for cinema and broadcast audiences

Digital content that evolves over time

Compelling method for mobile audiences to engage with the ROH

Enhanced platform for buying tickets, digital content and making donations

Sustainable model for mobile app development in the arts sector

Native applications

Limited life

Limited integration

Why a Hybrid App? Sustainability

Usability guidelines or trend in best practices is for device/delivery-specific, and therefore transitory, app design

Our Approach 1. Competitive Audit

(King’s College) 2. Prototype

(POP) 3. Usability Testing

(King’s College) 4. Designs

(Royal Opera House)

5. Technical Specification

for Responsive Checkout

(POP)

6. Specification for Responsive

Checkout (POP)

7. Co-Development (Royal Opera House & POP)

8. Post-Launch Analysis (Royal Opera House)

Goal: Synthesis of usage analysis and usability heuristics for mobile apps

Methodology: Procedural research engaging with POP and ROH throughout the project lifecycle

Outcomes: Citable, evidence-based guidelines for effective and sustainable application development

Our Approach Competitive Audit

Mobile websites • Of 67 institutes surveyed, only 25% offer a mobile website: Rijkmusem’s (Amsterdam) &

Baltimore Arts Museum (US)

Native apps, not mobile web • Majority run on Apple’s iOS platform: Tate and Victoria and Albert Museum

Mobile ticketing • Very few organizations support it: ICA & the Natural History Museum, Museum of Contemporary

Arts in Sydney

Mobile donation • Only a small minority of mobile websites facilitate mobile giving: Institute of Contemporary Arts

(London)

7 scenarios • Purchase a guide

• See new guide content

• Make donation

• Buy tickets

• Listen to radio broadcast

• Purchase guide for cinema

• Buy guide with promo code

Our Approach Prototype in Axure

Our Approach Design

Mobile first in responsive retrofit

Prototype using existing code

Best available

Payment

Results • Dwell time up (Dwell gap halved to 52 seconds)

• 363 Guides sold in the test period –to date 1000 paid 1000 free

• More than half were new registrants

• Cinema audience giving low

• Number of cinema and broadcast patrons reached

• Ticket sales forecast to achieve £500K per month

• 34% growth in mobile

Post-Launch Analysis