Buttercrumble‘s founders, Chloe and Abigail sketched more than 100 bespoke portraits at the Arts Marketing Association Conference, Leeds, 2026. And Community Manager Dr Alex Gapud, a trained anthropologist, was watching closely. In this piece he unpacks what he observed: novelty draws people in but it’s genuine attention and connection that makes them stay.

A monthly series on AI trends, news and tools with our guest columnist and digital marketing maestro Andrew Davis. Expect a go-to, monthly roundup to help you stay on top of what’s happening in AI. Dip in to understand the trends that actually matter for work and creativity and simple guides to genuinely useful tools that ... Read more

Internal culture and external trust aren’t separate conversations – they’re the same one. In this Think Piece, Arts Marketing Association’s CEO Cath Hume reflects on themes from their 2026 Conference in Leeds, exploring how internal communication and cross-team collaboration shape how audiences trust an organisation. Drawing on speakers from Turner Sims, Revoluton Arts and Tobacco ... Read more

However new or experienced we are, imposter syndrome affects many of us, creating cracks in our self-confidence and stopping us move forward. Melissa Marney helps us navigate the doubt and challenge the negative stories we tell ourselves.

Kids in Museums guide us through the types of data you could capture about your family visitors to better understand and support them.  It covers why family audience data matters, how to plan and collect it, through visitor surveys, tally counts and audience segmentation, and how to analyse and present the findings, including guidance on ... Read more

Paul Blundell, AMA’s Head of Digital Research & Development, put a follow-up question to 180 cultural professionals live at the AMA conference in Leeds, 2026: what will you do with AI in the next two weeks? The five themes that emerged echo the concerns in his companion piece with policy, leadership and personal judgement far ... Read more

How does your email marketing compare to the rest of the arts and culture sector? Spektrix‘s 2026 Email Benchmark Report, produced with Capacity, analyses over one billion email sends from arts, culture, and in-person experience organisations worldwide. Inside you’ll find global and country-level benchmarks, sector comparisons, and practical recommendations for improving open, click, and bounce ... Read more

Paul Blundell, AMA’s Head of Digital Research & Development and Carol Jones, Editor of AMA Culturehive asked more than 150 cultural professionals ‘What troubles you most about AI at work?’ live at the Arts Marketing Association’s conference in Leeds, 2026. Five concerns stood out and here Paul takes us through them in reverse order of ... Read more

How do you build trust and loyalty with disabled audiences? This case study, adapted from a live tour at the AMA Conference 2026, takes you inside Leeds Playhouse with All In access specialist Lilit Movsisyan. Discover how the venue communicates access with confidence from detailed online information and familiarisation tours to accessible programming. And what ... Read more

Most venues aren’t short on data – ticketing, web analytics, email, social, it’s all there. The trouble is that reporting often stops at describing what happened, rather than shaping what happens next. In this piece, Ticketsolve shares practical guidance on choosing metrics that are genuinely actionable, pairing numbers so they tell a fuller story, and ... Read more

Theatre audiences are more fragmented and digitally engaged than ever, and a single email blast no longer fills a house. This cheat sheet from AudienceView, developed in partnership with TheaterMania, WhatsOnStage and Audience Republic, sets out eight practical strategies for building full-funnel campaigns – from layering email and social to geo-targeting, gamification and mobile-first design. ... Read more

Not sure where to start with paid social? This Paid Social Ads Recipe Book from Oh So Social, shared at AMA Conference 2026, breaks down exactly what you need for a full sales funnel – from awareness and consideration through to conversion, plus carousel, UGC, influencer and event adverts. It also covers brand assets, tone-of-voice ... Read more

Thinking about refreshing your organisation’s visual identity? Before you brief a branding agency, it pays to get your brand strategy straight first. In this toolkit, brand and audience specialists Fly a Kite share four practical steps for building a brand strategy that gives your rebrand real foundations, from getting staff on board early to defining ... Read more

A perfectly executed marketing campaign means nothing if your website buckles the moment sales go live. Here’s why it happens, and five steps to stop it happening to yours. A CultureSuite resource by Matt Yau for Together – AMA Conference Leeds 2026.

Although arts marketers and journalists belong to the same broad genus of communications specialists, there is a world of difference between the two species. Ruth Hogarth, editor of Arts Professional, has some tips on how to work more effectively with one another, from the point of view of a journalist.

Membership schemes are a mainstay of arts and cultural fundraising, but do they actually deliver what audiences want? Indigo‘s Membership Matters report, an Indigo Share: Hot Topic, investigates. The research uncovers a clear disconnect between why organisations run membership schemes and what audiences actually value from them – from pricing and benefits to “loyalty anxiety.” ... Read more

AI search is changing how audiences find organisations like yours. This report by the agency Numiko is a practical guide to responding. It sets out what’s shifting, why it matters for purpose-driven organisations, and the concrete steps that keep you part of the answer.

Keeping a theatre or museum website secure, fast and GDPR-compliant is easier said than done, especially with tight budgets and stretched teams. In this piece Lily Houston, Splitpixel rounds up the tools and habits that make WordPress maintenance manageable, from DDoS protection and plugin audits to uptime monitoring and image optimisation. If your site handles ... Read more

Community engagement supports museums to develop relationships with audiences, generate visitors, become more relevant, build trust with local people, and give audiences a sense of ownership over a museum and its collections. Art Fund’s Community Engagement toolkit is designed to help you plan, deliver and evaluate community engagement work in museums.

Creative studio Buttercrumble worked with Museum Development Midlands to close out its Sense of Place Programme, using creative facilitation and visual notetaking to capture the region’s museum impact. Through a co-produced memory map, practitioners reflected on their communities’ past, present and future, turning intangible themes into something visible and memorable. The session created space for ... Read more