If you’re planning an art exhibition, you will no doubt be asking yourself whom to invite, whom to market to and what type of art to exhibit.
Questions you might be pondering: Will the exhibit be aimed at a general audience or a specific group of people? Should you advertise online or hire a PR agency to promote the exhibition? Should you focus on social media or print media?
Once you know who your target audience is, you can begin to answer these questions and create marketing strategies and plan events that will attract the right audience to your exhibition.
In this article, we will discuss who the target audience for an art exhibition can be and discuss some marketing strategies to reach them.
Who can be the Target Audience for an Art Exhibition?
One of the best ways to understand the target audience for an art exhibition is to understand what gravitates people toward art and why they would take the trouble to go to an art exhibition.
Once we understand people’s needs and their motivations for seeing and being close to art, we can use a process called needs-based segmentation to carve the target audience into different customer segments.
By classifying people based on their needs, we get the following segments of the target audience for an art exhibition:
- People who appreciate art
- People who want to learn about art
- People who want to be seen at an art exhibition
- People who want to buy art
- Friends of artists featured in the art exhibition
- School groups on a field trip to the art exhibition
1. People who appreciate art
Segmenting the target audience for an art exhibition by their appreciation for art is the most obvious way to go about it.
People who are passionate about art and visit exhibitions frequently are a good target market for an art exhibition.
They can be approached through arts organizations, social media platforms, and email newsletters.
2. People who want to learn about art
This segment includes people who want to learn more about art, whether it is for personal enrichment or professional development.
People who are new to the art world and want to learn more about it would be interested in attending an art exhibition.
The risk here is that different people find different types of art appealing. Some people might want to see abstract art while others might prefer landscapes.
The key is to target a specific group of people with a particular type of art that you are confident will appeal to them.
3. People who want to be seen at an art exhibition
There are some people who see art exhibitions as a status symbol and want to be seen at one.
They may not have a deep appreciation for the art but attending an art exhibition allows them to rub shoulders with the right people and be seen in the right places.
All they need is a glass of wine in their hand while they try and find meaning in the art that even the artist may not have imagined!
4. People who want to buy art
This segment of the target audience for an art exhibition includes the commercial buyer.
Art buyers often go to art exhibitions to look for new artists to invest in.
They may be interested in the art but their primary motivation is to look for a deal and buy art if it is also available for sale at the exhibition.
This segment can be difficult to target as they are often already part of the art world and have their own channels for finding new artists.
5. Friends of artists featured in the art exhibition
An easy audience to get to your art exhibition are the friends and family of the artists featured in the exhibition.
They are likely to be interested in seeing their friend’s or daughter’s work on display and may even be willing to help promote the exhibition.
This group of people is a target audience for the artist as much as the art exhibition.
6. School groups on a field trip to the art exhibition
School teachers are always looking for interesting and educational field trips for their students.
An art exhibition can be a great learning opportunity for students of all ages.
This segment can be targeted through ads in teacher magazines and online banner ads on education websites.
Another easy way is to simply pick up the phone and call. Simple outreach of this kind can work very well with schools that are always on the lookout for educational activities for students out of their schools.
Now that we have discussed some of the different segments of the target audience for an art exhibition, let’s review some marketing strategies you can deploy to attract crowds to your art exhibition.
Marketing Strategies for an Art Exhibition
The different segments of the target audience for an art exhibition can be reached in different ways. In most cases, you will need to reach each segment through at least two different channels at two different points in time.
Having said that, the top marketing strategies you could deploy to attract audiences to an art exhibition are:
- Publicize through arts organizations
- Promote on Social media
- Use email marketing
- Place ads in newspapers and magazines
- Place ads online
- Get mentioned in high-end lifestyle magazines
- Outreach to schools and art education institutes
Let’s look closely at each of these.
1. Publicize through arts organizations
Members of art organizations are almost always interested in arts of all kinds and are very open to visiting new art exhibitions.
They will also have a good network of their own that you can tap into to further promote your exhibition and reach a wider audience.
The downside is that they may already have a lot of options to choose from and you will need to make sure your art exhibition stands out.
2. Promote on Social media
You can publish articles on social media and then promote these directly to audiences who have expressed an interest in art and especially the type of art you are planning to exhibit.
Using social media you can really narrow down your target audience and make sure you are reaching the right people who can easily get to your exhibition.
You can also use social media to create a sense of urgency and excitement around your art exhibition.
3. Use email marketing
This is a great way to reach past attendees of your art exhibitions as well as people who have shown an interest in similar exhibitions in the past.
Of course, this assumes that you already have an opt-in email list. If not you could try and work with other art exhibitions or even museums to promote on their email list.
4. Place ads in newspapers and magazines
Placing ads in newspapers and magazines is a tried and true method but it can be expensive. You will need to target the right publications that your target audience is reading.
You can also target specific neighborhoods with more localized publications. This could be a good strategy if your art exhibition is only open to the public for a limited time.
5. Place ads online
This is a great way to reach people who are already searching for art exhibitions online. You can use Google AdWords or even Facebook Ads to target people in your city who are searching for art exhibitions.
Online ads can be extremely targeted, much more the print ads, and using retargeting techniques, you can also target people who have visited similar websites in the past.
6. Get mentioned in high-end lifestyle magazines
If your art exhibition is truly unique or has something special about it, you could try and get it featured in high-end lifestyle magazines.
You may want to work with a PR agency that specializes in getting exhibitions featured in these types of magazines.
It can be a great way to reach an entirely new target audience and generate a lot of buzz for your art exhibition.
7. Outreach to schools and art education institutes
Schools and art education institutes are always looking for educational opportunities for their students. If your art exhibition is relevant to what they are teaching, you could get some great word-of-mouth marketing.
You can also offer free or discounted tickets to students and teachers as an incentive for them to visit your art exhibition.
This is a great way to reach a target audience that might not otherwise be aware of your art exhibition.
If you host exhibitions regularly, you could also develop relationships with these institutes and they may start to recommend your exhibitions to their students on a regular basis.
As you can see, there are many different ways that you can target the right audience for your art exhibition. It is important to think about who you want to target and then choose the marketing strategies that will reach them.
Summary
It is important to remember that the target audience for an art exhibition can be segmented in many different ways and each segment can be reached through different marketing channels.
This audience can include those who love art, those who buy art, those who want to learn about it, and those who simply want to be seen at an art exhibition.
The target audience also includes schools and educational institutes looking for additional educational opportunities for their students.
Marketing strategies that an art exhibition can deploy to attract an audience include publicity through art organizations, schools, social media, in print media – both in the form of advertisements as well as information or news articles.
So if you’re organizing an art exhibition, make sure you understand your target audience’s needs and motivations so that you can attract them to your exhibition by following marketing strategies that are going to be the most effective.
