“I never take audio guides. I can’t stand them!”
I love that phrase. I think it encapsulates everything museums have got wrong with mobile interpretation. I’ve now heard it so often that I’ve resigned myself to producing a polite smile each time I hear it; I’m rarely able to summon the strength to follow it up with an inquiry as to the background behind such a life-changing decision.
That’s now though. Before, I use to want to explode:
“What do you mean you can’t stand audio guides? It’s just a piece of hardware. You realise that the content on them is different at each museum?
Yes, I understand that it was particularly dull the way the director droned on about the uniqueness of Seurat’s painting technique on the last one, and I’m really sorry you paid extra for it, but I promise he won’t be there next time!
And be reasonable. Did you stop going to the cinema after you watched Titanic? No, exactly. An audio guide, like the cinema, is just a platform. I agree that the content on these things can be disappointing, but that’s no reason to give-up on the platform itself.”
Recently though, I realised this kind of rant is pointless. Despite the (I hope) logic of such outbursts, I’ve come to believe that it’s not the visitor’s fault that they can’t stand audio guides. They’re actually the victims in all this; the museums are the culprits.
Let me explain how I see it. (For simplicity, I’m adopting the term audio guide to refer to all type of audio-multimedia-GPS-RFID-QR-pod-phone guides etc).
A visitor arrives at a museum and, before breaching the gallery threshold, is obliged into an early decision. “Would you like to take the audio guide?” the museum asks.
It seems like a simple question. But if we stop and look at this from the visitor’s perspective – a reasonable action considering audio guides are a visitor service – they’re probably asking themself:
“Well, why in the devil is there an audio guide, and why should I take it? Especially if they want me to pay extra for it!”
It was this museum-visitor exchange that became a major museum bug-bear while traveling. Eventually, when a museum asked whether I wanted the audio guide, I’d ask why I should want it. When this question was not by a shrug, my part of the exchange developed something like:
• “Interesting. It includes the Maharaja, the Maharini, the Prince, and the Princess talking about what its like to live in the Fort? And the Queen Mother too?! Fantastic, that sounds like fun!
• There’s not a single label anywhere?! So, if I want to know why the Roman’s built this city in North Jordan, and why its still so well preserved, I’ll need the audio guide, right?
• [Speaking clearly]. Are there any labels in English? iie? But the audio guide is in English? Wonderful. Then I’d love one please. Arigato gozaimashita.
• [As someone hands it to me as I enter]. Oh, it’s integral to the experience. Ok, thank you.”
Without such an exchange, having not yet been into the galleries, I don’t believe that I, nor any other visitor, would have the necessary information with which to make an informed decision about whether to take the audio guide.
At the Handheld Conference Online last week, when asked where they have taken a great audio tour, Alcatraz, a museum whose audio guide is integral to the experience and given without prompting to every visitor, was one of the most popular answers. I personally found that interesting because when someone tells me they hate audio guides, I think to myself, “send them to Alcatraz!” Its not that I’m advocating jail time for audio guide skeptics – the prison system would probably implode just at the prospect of so many new inmates. And nor is it because the Alcatraz audio guide delivers such an engaging experience.
Moreover, I’m thinking; send them to Alcatraz, and I bet they take the audio guide. Because, in fact, I don’t believe that these people are genuinely ‘anti-audio guides’ per say. Moreover, after some bad experiences – and to be honest, there are enough bad audio guide experiences floating around for this to have occurred – they are quite rightly fed-up of having uninformed decisions to take the audio guide backfire on them. So now they’ve decided it’s simple not worth the risk, nor the oft-require financial investment, and swear never to take one again.
But at Alcatraz, by distributing the audio guide to all visitors by default, the museum is ‘telling’ visitors that they need the audio guide: they aren’t leaving the visitor to guess whether they need it or not.
I don’t use this example to advocate the free and universal distribution of audio guides at all museums. Audio guides most certainly are not a universal pre-requisite for all museum experiences. And just distributing them free doesn’t actually provide much information to visitors as to whether they are useful. Rather, I use this example to highlight where a museum is taking the initiative in helping the visitor decide whether or not to take the audio guide. By contrast, if we provide no information, and simply advertise to visitors that ‘audio guides are available’, we’re actually encouraging visitors to draw on personal notions of whether they like audio guides in order to decide whether to take it or not.
And from my experience, this is what we’re doing. I’ve illustrated this post with a selection of images of audio guide distribution desks and marketing materials, but this was barely a selection: I find these to be the norm. Museums rarely provide much information that tells visitors why there is an audio guide, or why they might want to take it. At my most cynical, I’d say this is sometimes because a lot of museums aren’t too certain themselves, (or because they don’t want to tell visitors that the audio guide was installed first and foremost as a risk-free opportunity to make money), but I’ll save that for another day.
It is ironic that within the museum tech. community we agree that ‘it’s not about the technology’. Yet, with audio guides, we make visitors opt to take them or not based solely on the technology.
For years now audio guides have been advertised simply as the hardware, and in doing so, we’ve implicitly reinforced the idea that the experience these technologies deliver is similar at each site. We can’t therefore now blame the visitor if they’ve concluded that they don’t like audio guides, whatever the site.
If someone asks if you want to go to the cinema, before you agree, you ask “what’s showing?”
Like the cinema, the audio guides itself is not, and should not be presented as, the deal clincher. I know that ‘sexy’ technologies like multimedia tours, and IPodTouches/IPhones currently act as deal clinchers, but like an I-Max, after a couple of experiences, I’m sure the novelty will wear off. And then what? Find a new sexy technology in which to package the audio guide? Or give visitors the information that will help them see beyond the technology, and so make an informed decision on whether its offering the type of experience they’ll enjoy?
Whilst the techie device stuff is absolutely fascinating and I love it, I think we need to dedicate more attention to the latter. Its here, rather than the technology itself, that I believe we’ve the greatest ground to make up!
This post is an adaptation of a presentation I delivered at AAM conference 2009, entitled “Visitors just want to know ‘why?’” available on SlideShare at http://tr.im/m5Gt
June 11th, 2009 04:18
Great post Loic, brings everything together nicely. I especially like the point that when most insitutions adviertise audio guides they never say what is on them. I hadnt thought about it in that way before….content is king! Something we will definitely try and remedy with our guides….when they are done!
Cheers
Sarah
June 13th, 2009 05:18
Hi Loic. Nice post. Glad to see your blogging – thought you were a skeptic! And as the last post said content is king as is choosing the right medium for the message.
June 13th, 2009 06:12
Hi Loic – good report, as always.
I couldn’t agree more with almost all..
Nobody watches a TV except the family cat. It’s what’s on TV that matters.
Same with audio tours. As long as you can turn the handheld gadget on and off, pause it and rewind, and make it louder and softer, who cares! Let content win or lose the day. It does anyway. Which is why we must improve improve improve, and keep the pedants at bay.
I’ve always thought it was asking visitors to make a large leap of faith to buy an audio tour without knowing what they were buying,
To fix that, at places where it’s an option, we’ve started giving visitors a free nibble so they can
‘Hear it before you buy it.’
That seems fair and smart. I pass it along to all in case it’s a help.
Robert
Btw, the Alcatraz tour is actually optional, but it doesn’t look it. It’s a great tour and almost everyone does and should take it.
go to http://www.nps.gov/alca/planyourvisit/feesandreservations.htm
There is no entrance fee to visit Alcatraz Island. However there is a charge for the ferry service to and from the island which is supplied by a private company under contract with the National Park Service. For additional information on schedules, prices, and to purchase tickets in advance (tickets are made available about 60 days in advance) please visit the Alcatraz Cruises website.
The price includes the cellhouse audio tour, which is available in English, German, French, Italian, Japanese, Mandarin and Dutch. If you do not wish to do the audio tour you can receive a refund by contacting a supervisor in the cellhouse bookstore.
June 13th, 2009 12:45
PS
This is what you want your visitors to say::
(It’s about the audio tour of the Lobkowicz Palace in Prague; the tour is included in the entry price and is in eight languages.)
The first two long comments are from Tripadvisor. The short ones are from the visitors comment book.
brikis98
Massachusetts
Jun 23, 2008
….inside is a charming look into the life of the Lobkowicz family and some Czech history.
….(the) entrance includes an audio guide which will guide you through the entire museum. The audio (at least, the English) is narrated by the current Lobkowicz prince, with occasional cameos from other family members and friends.
The exhibits include portraits of family members (wonderfully described in the audio guide), a beautiful china collection, various gorgeous artifacts, an arms & armor collection, works of art, and more.
The audioguide is brilliant at walking you through the museum and explaining the importance and background of the various items. You really get an appreciation for a painting you otherwise might have walked by without a second glance.
One of my favorite exhibits had original manuscripts from Mozart and Beethoven – both of whom were funded by the Lobkowicz family – including corrections, edits and the like. Moreover, the audioguide features a good deal of their music, really adding to the experience.
This may not be the richest or largest museum you’ll visit …. but it’s a unique, lovely and memorable experience. Go there now, before everyone else finds out!
tequilatamm
Sydney, Australia
Sep 24, 2008
We are in Prague for 3 days. We spent the first two around Old Town, Jewish Quarter, etc.
My husband wanted to go to the cathedral, but the line was pretty long and it looked like a 2 hour wait, so we satisfied ourselves with photos of the outside, and continued on to the low side of the complex where the Lobkowicz Palace is located.
I was telling my husband the whole time that it sounded from the reviews I’d read that this was the one thing worth seeing… he was suitably unconvinced and sort of rolling his eyes.
The cost was about 275 each, which didn’t help his attitude. However, from the moment we put the included audio guide on and the current heir to the Lobkowicz estate, William Lobkowicz, who grew up in the US, began to tell the family’s story, it was magical!
The family was exiled from their home in the Czech republic twice: Once by the Nazis and once by the communists, and finally have had their rightful things restored to them, and opened their palaces as museums to display their collections.
I’m not one to spend long hours in museums, I tend to get bored and so just glaze over things and look for the most relevant ones. The audio guide at this palace draws your attention to the numbers in red as the main relevant things to look at and punch into the guide if you are short on time (or have a short attention span like I do), but in this case, I found myself slowly punching in more and more of the non-red numbers…
The tour started on the second floor with paintings of various ancestors and the family tree, loaded with marriages between the Lobkowicz line and several royal lines, including Austrian, Spanish, etc. ….
All-in-all, as others have said here on Tripadvisor, the Lobkowicz Palace is #1 for a reason… it is truly a find. I would recommend if you only have time or inclination to visit one place in-depth on the castle grounds, this is the one. Truly a find!
Others:
“By far the best audio guided tour I have enjoyed anywhere in the world.”
“I was moved to tears by the rich musical heritage displayed here.”
“The audio guide is excellent. And as I looked at the original orchestra parts with Beethoven’s own corrections, my hand was shaking.”
“The lives of the family come alive. It is so tender…”
“Loved it. What a brilliant walk through time and a well told story of family history.”
“The best stop yet! Thank you to the Lobkowicz family for this collection. It brought chills & tears to us many times. Lovely narration!”
“Your museum will be a great success – it has the WOW factor!”
“This is one of the most wonderful museums I have ever visited in Europe.”
“Absolutely amazing. A fantastic collection which was beautifully described with the audioguide.”
“One of the most moving visits I have ever had – truly wonderful. Particularly the music room which made me cry! Thank you.”
“A remarkable and thrilling tour through a marvelous family history and Czech culture and history.”
“The most lucid and elegant introduction to Czech history since we’ve arrived. So wonderful it made me cry.”
“Makes me proud to be Czech.”
The last three say nothing about the audio tour and everything about its impact – on the visitors and also on the owners and manager of this site who can go to the galleries at almost any time and find people in tears.
PPS, Commercial point: Do you know how much a visitor who is moved to tears will spend in the shop? To preserve the moment? Answer: Two to three times as much as is spent at museums whose audio tours have no impact. A lovely byproduct of a great tour. Something to think about.
Point 2 of 3:
The above site has eight languages.
Another site of ours started with four languages and now has 13; each new language is a business builder which they use to generate (with intelligent marketing) new potential visitors. With them it’s not a question of Who’s here, it’s a question of, Who would we like to be here.
Last point: Great audio tours don’t grow on trees. Nor do Spielberg or Ken Burns. You have to pay for the good stuff. But what a waste to produce and provide the drudge we’ve all heard so often. And what a treat for all to do it right.
June 13th, 2009 06:28
Mr. Tallon,
You remain one of the few clear voices in the wilderness!
Lenore
June 16th, 2009 09:31
Hi Loic, interesting article and I couldn’t agree more. Nearly all my experience of audio tours as a developer is with web-based downloadable trails for mp3 players, iPods, etc in countryside locations. Which means its very difficult to get feedback as there is no collection point to return headsets where we can trap visitors to obtain feedback. Attempts to get feedback by online incentives hasn’t worked yet.
As a museum or art gallery visitor I tend to avoid the audio tours especially if I’ve already paid to enter and the tour is an extra cost.
As with all interpretation media a tour must be written by a trained or experienced interpretation specialist in partnership with the venue and te venue’s specialist staff. As an archaeologist until 3 years ago and an interpretation officer now I’ve been both the specialist wanting to get as much information across and the writer trying to create engaging interpretation. A museum curator with a dull voice trying to show how clever he/she is is a big turn off for visitors. Do companies such as Antenna have good interpreters on board to turn the specialist content into engaging content?
Of the audio tours I’ve visited my favourite is the actor-led tour of the SS Great Britain in Bristol which really animates the spaces of the ship to give a sense of place and convey historical information in an interesting way.
I’m currently working on an audio tour of Castleton Centre Museum for VIPs – visually impaired people – in the Peak District National Park. This is proving to be an interesting experience. I’ve been working with a blind colleague during development and will soon be testing the draft audio with him. We’re also hoping to get a Sheffield-based partially sighted walking group to test it if ever they return our contact.
Cheers, Bill
Cheers, Bill
June 20th, 2009 10:18
Hi Loic,
Great post, a challenge we wrestle with over and over…how to communicate what is on the guide and the value of the experience in small bookmarks, signage, teasers etc when the decision timeframe is so short and the visitor is looking at a lot of things.
Clearly the was interpretive content is offered (marketed and merchandised) needs to be transformed. Interestingly, adoption rates online are typically higher than onsite (when people are doing online ticketing that is). i’ve got several theories about why that is but at least here the decision timeframe can be longer and people can sample more of the content in a non threatening, self directed way. “listening stations” serve to meet this need inside the museum but not all of them have them, and then you face the challenge – how do i communicate what’s on the listening station….and so on…
A note of clarification for Mr Cutler, the audio tour at Alcatraz is indeed included in the price of admission, and has been for the past several years. It is true that it was previously an optional extra and at that time the usage rate was very high.
Cheers, Sarah
June 20th, 2009 10:24
oh, and ps, i still want to explode when i hear this, most often from people who have never used an interpretive guide. but you are right, it points to a failure to engage visitors effectively (which frankly does not reside with institutions alone – i see it ultimately as our joint responsibility!).
Cheers, S
June 23rd, 2009 01:51
Thank you to all those who have posted to the blog with their experiences, and to those that sent me comments via. email: its great that the post struck a chord. Particularly interesting to get to get the views here from Robert Cutler, MD of Narrowcasters and a man who’s been developing audio guides since the 1960s – even if his comments included verged towards Narrowcasters-promotion
– and from Sarah Dines, MD of Antenna Audio.
Picking-up on Robert’s link to comments in visitor books, I don’t doubt that a visitor’s experience can be ‘made’ by the audio tour: I’ve lost count of the visitor evaluations I’ve read that ‘prove’ a particular audio tour improves the visitor experience. The difficulty is in encouraging visitors to decide to take-it in the first-place; this involves getting the audio tour marketing and distribution ‘right’. (And I find Sarah’s experience with selling audio tours online vs. on-site v.interesting here).
But the above needs to take into account the fact that visitors’ motivation for visiting a museum vary greatly. This motivation affects the type of experience they are seeking, and hence implicitly, whether they will want the audio tour or not. Its rare (impossible?) to find a site where every visitor will want the audio tour, or where the audio tour would be suitable for them.
I think it’s important therefore that museum take the time in to identify which type of visitor would be best served by the audio tour, and to then ensure that it is marketed in a way that directly speaks to that visitor type.
But I’m going to pick-up on this again in a next post…
Loic.
June 23rd, 2009 05:33
Hello Sarah – Many thanks for the update that your great Alcatraz tour is included. That’s the way it should be. Everywhere.
Having said that, I do think sites offering audio tours, whether included or hired, should give visitors a free nibble before they have to commit to something that is often, sigh, a total dud. It can wreck a nice day at the museum, at least until you give up on it. We must provide better content!
If hired, the nibble would save visitors spending money on something they found tedious, and possibly dumped on later to their friends, and if free, they would be spared from lugging around (that’s what it feels like when the tour is a bust) a machine which even though as light as most are now, has become a dead weight for them. More dumping. They understandably say, Oh forget those things. They’re no good. That doesn’t help the industry, which can hardly be called young after lo these 50 years!
Good use of one’s time: spend 30 mins every three weeks standing at an audio tour desk, selling and dressing visitors. You learn a lot, including how far we have to go. Loic: try it. You’ll see. Especially if you’re selling them. And especially if the site has provided useless signs and the tour doesn’t have a handle. (‘It’s by Meryl Streep.’ ‘It’s by the prisoners.’} How do you sell an invisible abstract concept? ‘Taint easy.
That’s why I love universals.
Best,
Robert
PS, Shouldn’t the The Park Service update its website which even now says the Alcatraz tour is refundable? Can an included tour be refundable? Maybe. But is a curiosity, no?
June 28th, 2009 05:31
After careful thought about content and audience, the Bagatti Valsecchi Museum (Milan, Italy), where I have been working since early 2000, now has easy-to-use audioguides in Italian, English, French and Japanese for adults, and in Italian for children. We’d love to add more languages (as funding permits). It was decided to offer the audioguides free-of-charge, as part of the entrance fee because the apparent simplicity of understanding the museum–filled with the Italian Renaissance art and decorative arts collections of the Bagatti Valsecchi brothers, and which is one of Europe’s most important and well-preserved historic house museums–can mean that many visitors might not think to scratch below the “homey” surface to reach the deeper significant aspects of our museum, for example, that it is an authentic “time capsule” of the taste and collecting of a newly created noble Milanese family in the patriotic period right after the creation of the Italian nation. Special attention was paid to tailoring the foreign language texts to make up for any lack of knowledge presumed by locals. The current baron recorded some childhood memories for us, and, finally, even physical stamina was taken into consideration, so that the visitors can choose to listen “just” to the general treatment of the room and its masterpieces, or they can choose to learn more about some of each room’s objects. The curator kept a tight hand on the production process, and a quality product (or, at least we think so!) is the result. It’s very rewarding to see visitors using it and enjoying it! It’s heartening, too, to know that, after listening to the audioguides, the visitors will truly understand the importance of the museum, and not just take it at face value.
Star Meyer, promo@museobagattivalsecchi.org
Bagatti Valsecchi Museum, Milan, Italy