The Arts Council of England developed a definition that attempts to embrace this broad term:
“The term Audience Development describes activity which is undertaken specifically to meet the needs of existing and potential audiences and to help arts organisations to develop on-going relationships with audiences. It can include aspects of marketing, commissioning, programming, education, customer care and distribution.”
Emphasis is also placed on the strong relationship audience development has with marketing, as audience development is also involved with building market share. It also focuses on finding audiences outside the mainstream –i.e. “new audiences” or “audiences from socially excluded groups”. Audience development also reflects the relationship with audiences that develops over time with a focus on the long term.
Different types of Audience Development activity are suitable for different types of organisations, from the large scale concert hall to the small scale arts centre.
As a process, audience development employs a range of marketing tools such as research, publicity, communication and customer relationship management. As an ethos, audience development places the audience at the heart of everything the organisation does.
Famous quotes containing the words audience and/or development:
“The audience is the most revered member of the theater. Without an audience there is no theater. Every technique learned by the actor, every curtain, every flat on the stage, every careful analysis by the director, every coordinated scene, is for the enjoyment of the audience. They are our guests, our evaluators, and the last spoke in the wheel which can then begin to roll. They make the performance meaningful.”
—Viola Spolin (b. 1911)
“Fascism, the more it considers and observes the future and the development of humanity, quite apart from political considerations of the moment, believes neither in the possibility nor the utility of perpetual peace.”
—Benito Mussolini (1883–1945)