Creating Brand Identity in Art Museums

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ARTS MANAGEMENT18

Introduction

The combination of marketing and art has been considered ill matched, almost unthinkable. This position is based partly

on the assumption that marketing will automatic-ally degrade the inner value and distinctiveness of art and favour only the most popular and superficial. Traditional cultural curators tend to believe that a reverse association holds true between the popularity and quality of art.

However, as shown by several studies and books on arts organizations (e.g., Scheff Bern-stein, 2007), skilful marketing can contribute to cultural education and attract the interest of new audiences – in other words, upgrade the audience’s competence instead of downgrading art. People are increasingly seeking not only effortless and less committed forms of leisure but also activities that require commitment and learning (Uusitalo and Ahola, 2008; Uusitalo, 2008b). Thus consumers are interested in learning about art but have difficulty evaluat-ing the quality of museums and exhibitions. Contemporary art in particular is sometimes considered hard to understand. Therefore, people prefer museums with a known brand. In the current non-elitist culture, a renowned museum brand is becoming a sign of quality.

A further challenge to art museums comes from governments and sponsors as the com-petition for financing intensifies. This has resulted in marketing becoming necessary for public museums and other non-profit organiz-

ations. Consequently, in order to differentiate themselves from the competition and to attract non-expert audiences, art museums have to pay more attention to creating a strong brand. Marketing and branding have become neces-sary if art museums are to maintain their pos-ition among other valued cultural institutions in society.

Goals of the Study

Our main purpose in this study was to con-tribute to the discussion on branding by

applying the concept of brand identity in the art museum context and analyzing how brand iden-tity as a strategic tool can be furthered in art museums through particular management and marketing practices.

We will first discuss the construct of an art museum’s brand identity and its dimensions. Brand identity also constituted the framework for the empirical part of the study, in which the directors of three modern art museums in the Helsinki region were interviewed in order to address three questions: How important or controversial do museums view branding as a strategic tool? What dimensions and aspects of brand identity are museums exploiting? What marketing practices are being used to communi-cate brand identity?

Sofia Pusa is a doctoral student in the School of Arts, Design and Architecture, Aalto University. Previously she worked at the art gallery Kunsthalle Helsinki.

Liisa Uusitalo is professor emerita and research project leader in the School of Business, Aalto University. Her main research interests are social and environmental aspects of consumer behav-iour and cultural consumption. Her latest research project addresses consumer behaviour in the information society.

Creating Brand Identity in Art Museums: A Case Study

Sofia Pusa, Liisa Uusitalo

Marketing Management

VOLUME 17, NUMBER 1 • FALL 2014 19

Theoretical Background

Earlier Studies

The branding literature in the field of market-ing has proposed many useful concepts, such as brand equity, brand association, brand position-ing and organizational branding (e.g., Aaker, 1996; Keller, 1993; Knox, 2004; McEnally and de Chernatony, 1999; Wood, 2000; Karlsson, Salehi-Sangari and Wahlström, 2008). How-ever, very little research has been carried out on brand management in the arts and more specifically in art museums, although arts mar-keting issues in general have received consider-able attention (e.g., Kotler and Scheff, 1996; McLean, 1996; Butler, 2000; Botti, 2000; Colbert, 2003, 2009; Fillis, 2002, 2003, 2006; Uusitalo, 2008a).

Among those few who have addressed brand-ing in the arts are Scheff Bernstein (2007) and Colbert, d’Astous and Fournier (2007). The former discusses branding and brand identity of arts organizations using opera and theatre companies as examples, while the latter dis-cuss co-branding and brand extension in the arts. The majority of empirical studies on art museum branding have dealt foremost with brand associations – in other words, the kind of values and images that consumers associate with art museums (Caldwell, 2000; Caldwell and Coshall, 2002; Scott, 2000, 2008; Ahola, 2008) – or have analyzed the brand-ing orientation of management more generally (Baumgarth, 2009). The concept and content of a museum’s brand have not been addressed systematically. Consequently, museum man-agers have little awareness of the various means available to create brand identity, although they recognize the importance of branding in general terms. This article examines how brand identity can be interpreted and applied in a museum context.

The Concept of Brand Identity

In the marketing literature, brand identity usu-ally encompasses a core identity and an extended identity. The former refers to the timeless essence of the brand, whereas the latter includes char-acteristics and associations that complete the brand (Karlsson, Salehi-Sangari and Wallström, 2008; Scott, 2000). With a strong brand iden-tity, art museums can improve their ability to promote exhibitions and to perform other tasks connected to their integral core elements and long-term objectives.

Aaker (1996) separates the concept of brand identity from that of brand image by emphasiz-ing the strategic dimension of brand identity in contrast to the more tactical nature of brand image. Another way to put it is that brand identity is how the organization defines itself and what it strives for, whereas brand image refers to consumers’ image of the organization and its products. This means of describing the difference between brand identity and brand image is widely used in consumer research and is also applied in this article.

Though often associated, brand identity and brand image are not necessarily related. For example, a museum can have a distinct iden-tity as defined by its strategists but fail to pass this identity on to consumers; consequently, the museum’s brand image – how consumers perceive it as distinct from its competitors – is unclear or missing altogether. It is therefore important that a museum actively manage its brand identity instead of letting the brand image – that is, how the brand is perceived by audiences – dictate the brand.

Brand identity gives the brand meaning and purpose; it helps to build brand equity and reap financial benefits. Brand identity can be

This article discusses branding and ways to create brand identity in art museums. Brand identity can be

constructed using museums’ core products and services, persons, symbols or organizational properties. The

authors discuss in detail these main dimensions of the concept and give examples of each. They also analyze

interview data from three museums of modern and contemporary art to determine which aspects of brand

identity are applied by museums and the extent to which they are used in everyday practice. The article

concludes that the concept of brand identity – thus far familiar only to marketing scholars – can also be useful

in non-commercial fields by offering managerial ideas on how to improve a museum’s distinctiveness and

attractiveness.

Art museum, brand identity, symbol, consumer, marketing

A B S T R A C T

K E Y W O R D S


evaluated on the following dimensions: prod-uct, person, symbolic and organization-related. Each identity dimension leads to an emphasis on different aspects of the museum. A descrip-tive model of art museum brand identity is presented in Figure 1. The four general brand dimensions described by Aaker (1996) – prod-uct, person, symbol and organization – will be analyzed, focusing on what they refer to specif-ically in the context of an art museum.

Not every aspect needs to be employed equally in constructing brand identity, but these four perspectives can be useful in defin-ing strategic tools. Unlike global business enterprises, art museums seldom have a world-wide, well-known corporate brand. Therefore, considering several aspects can be useful in increasing brand awareness among audiences. Also, in museums with a well-known existing brand, paying attention to the various aspects of brand identity can provide the brand with new texture and depth.

Museum as product

When the museum is perceived as a product, attention should be paid to both the core product and the augmented product. Collections and exhibitions form the core product of a museum, whereas the augmented product comprises museum services, such as the museum shop or educational programs. From an art consumer perspective, the museum product consists of a holistic museum experience. Based on Aaker (1996), we can identify different product-related aspects that play an important role in brand identity: the museum’s scope and focus, premises and services, and perceived quality or value. Sometimes the main target audiences, as well as target markets such as a country or region, can be seen as typical product features of a museum.

When Aaker’s classification is applied to museums, it can be seen that the art context differs from the traditional consumer goods market in many ways. Concerning quality or value, as Schroeder (2005) notes, the relation-ship between artistic value and branding is stronger in the art market than perhaps any other. The perceived quality of an exhibition greatly depends on the artist’s reputation – in other words, on the artist as a brand. In the long run, however, a museum can also be per-ceived as of high quality because of its specific collections or because it often exhibits valued artists or artistic styles or presents interesting theme exhibitions.

Moreover, other core features, such as a focus on or specialization in certain genres and art movements, the premises or building, exhib-ition architecture, directions, signs and supple-mentary material, all have an impact on how customers perceive the quality of exhibitions. However, in the end it all boils down to sub-jective preferences and holistic impressions that the customer constructs in her mind (Gilmore, 2003; McLean, 1996). In the augmented prod-uct, the holistic approach is especially relevant, as all services and facilities should support the museum’s main mission and present customers with a coherent image of the museum.

Museum as person: Creating a personality for the museum

Since differentiation of brands on the basis of functional attributes is often not enough to attract customers, producers have begun to asso-ciate imaginary aspects with their brands, such as by creating a brand personality through refer-ences to specific persons or user groups.

Cet article examine l’image de marque et les manières de créer une identité de marque dans les musées d’art. Il est possible

de construire l’identité de marque en recourant au noyau des produits et des services du musée, aux personnes, aux

symboles ou aux biens organisationnels. Les auteures décrivent en détail les principales dimensions du concept d’identité

de marque et donnent des exemples de chacune d’elles. Elles analysent également les données recueillies au cours d’entre-

vues menées dans trois musées d’art moderne et contemporain en vue de déterminer quels aspects de l’identité de

marque sont mis en œuvre par les musées et dans quelle mesure ils s’inscrivent dans les pratiques quotidiennes. L’article

conclut que le concept d’identité de marque – que les spécialistes du marketing ne sont pas les seuls à bien connaître –

peut aussi s’avérer utile dans des domaines non commerciaux en offrant des idées de gestion sur la façon d’améliorer le

caractère distinctif du musée et son attractivité.

Musée d’art, identité de marque, symbole, consommateur, marketing

R É S U M É

M O T S C L É S


User or audience imagery is one way to per-sonalize museums. This refers to typical or ideal visitors. Through user imagery, it is pos-sible to emphasize a particular group – for example, artists, intellectuals, art enthusiasts, designers, art students – with whom consum-ers may identify. In many art museums, certain artworks, artists or genres have become cultural icons that bring together art lovers with similar tastes. This way, museums, through their own brand, contribute to both the construction of customers’ self-identity and their social integra-tion (Aaker, 1996; Uusitalo, 1998).

However, it has been found that museums differ very little as to the kind of consumers who are perceived as typical visitors (Ahola and Uusitalo, 2008). This tells us that museums do not apply segmentation based on predefined customer groups and therefore their user imageries tend to be identical and vague.

In addition to typical visitors, successful art-ists can be considered as brand creators act-ively promoting both themselves and their art as a brand. In some cases, the artist’s fame has been gradually reinforced over time. Many

En el presente artículo se aborda el tema del desarrollo de marca y las maneras de crear una identidad de marca en los museos

de arte. Dicha identidad puede forjarse mediante los principales productos y servicios, personas, símbolos o virtudes de la

organización. Las autoras exponen en detalle los principales aspectos de este concepto y ofrecen varios ejemplos relacionados.

Se analizan también datos recogidos durante entrevistas realizadas en tres museos de arte moderno y contemporáneo para

determinar qué aspectos de la identidad de marca estos museos aplican y en qué medida los utilizan en la práctica diaria. Se

concluye que el concepto de identidad de marca – con el cual están mucho más familiarizados los especialistas en mercadotecnia

- puede también ser útil para el medio no comercial ya que contiene ideas de gestión que pueden contribuir a mejorar el carácter

distintivo y el poder de atracción de los museos.

Museo de arte, identidad de marca, símbolo, consumidor, mercadotecnia

R E S U M E N

P A L A B R A S C L A V E

BRAND IDENTITY IN ART MUSEUMS

F I G U R E 1

BRAND IDENTITY IN ART MUSEUMS

Brand as productCollections, exhibitions Scope Perceived qualityServices and premises

Brand as personPersonalityUser imageryArtistsMuseum managerProfessionals

Brand as symbolVisual imageryMetaphorsBrand nameBrand inheritanceBuilding

Brand as organizationOrganizational characteristicsOrganizational associations

BRAND’S VALUE PROPOSITIONS: FUNCTIONAL, EMOTIONAL, SELF-EXPRESSIVE AND SOCIAL BENEFITS

MARKETING PRACTICES

ART MUSEUM IMAGE


artists, however, owe their brand identity to the media and today’s cult of celebrity. Art is predominantly interpreted and mediated by experts such as critics. These experts strongly influence the artist’s reputation. For example, the role of art criticism is essential for the fame of contemporary artists. The museum’s own public relations department can seldom influence the critics. Still, having a powerful museum brand can serve to reduce the impact of negative art critiques.

Many contemporary artists create brand image and star status through non-conformist behaviour, which makes them almost myth-ical personalities. This romanticized view of the artist has a long history, with such legend-ary examples as Salvador Dali and Vincent Van Gogh. In this way, artists become public figures, which in turn advertises their art. One benefit is that art becomes less elitist, lead-ing to increased interest in art and artists and consequently increases the number of museum visitors. Furthermore, a renowned artist can upgrade the quality of a museum in the mind of the customer. The reverse is also true: if an artist is shown by a well-known museum, his or her position in the art world improves (Gibbons, 2005; Bendixen, 2000; Botti, 2000; Gibbons, 2005; Jyrämä, 1999).

In smaller organizations in particular, the museum’s manager, curator or, in some cases, founder can project their own personal charac-teristics and artistic taste onto the museum. A charismatic director may end up personifying the museum and acting as a figurehead for the organization. The manager’s own art exper-tise and broad network – in Bourdieu’s (1984) terms, cultural and social capital – are often decisive in gaining respect within the art field (e.g., Jyrämä, 1999). Strategic and other man-agement skills alone – although important as such – are not sufficient for a museum manager to become a part of the museum brand.

Creating brand identity through symbolism

When the meanings associated with a brand become widely accepted, the brand can be said to represent something beyond itself: it becomes an icon or symbol. Museums provide numerous intangible, symbolic benefits for communities (e.g., Scott, 2008). In addition to broadening knowledge through education, they appeal to the senses and foster creativity and innovation

in society. Furthermore, museums can contribute to visitors’ well-being in many ways, such as by offering perspective, encouraging reflection, and developing awareness and insight. In addition to direct use value, the non-use benefits are many, especially the museum’s role in heritage transfer to future generations, and in advancing the stock of intellectual capital – important for art and design industries. Moreover, through their prac-tices, museums can reinforce cultural and ethical values in society. These long-term benefits are used to promote museums among policy-makers and funding agencies (Taalas, 1995; McEnally and de Chernatony, 1999; Uusitalo, 2008a, 2010; Scott, 2008).

In addition to highlighting the social values and benefits common to the field, art museums need more concrete individual symbols to gain recognition. A symbol can be anything that embodies the brand, such as visual imagery, a logo, a slogan, a metaphor or a meaningful herit-age story. Moreover, the museum’s brand name plays a major role in attracting customers and creating associations. A distinctive brand name such as Louvre, Hermitage, Guggenheim or Reina Sofia contributes more to brand iden-tity than National Gallery or Staatsmuseum. An easily recollected museum name increases brand awareness and helps in advertising and word-of-mouth communication, including on social media. The power of name associations is that they contain a great deal of information and provide continuity (Aaker, 1996; Caldwell, 2000; McLean, 1996).

The museum building and its architecture can also become a renowned symbol for the brand and serve as a source of national or local pride. For example, the Guggenheim’s New York museum designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and its Bilbao museum designed by Frank Gehry have become a part of Guggenheim’s brand identity. Likewise, the Neue Nationalgalerie in Berlin designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe is closely associated with its architecture.

New modern or postmodern museum buildings use architecture as a metaphor for the contemporary art forms they exhibit. All over the world one can find examples of recently constructed art museum buildings with dis-tinctive postmodern architecture that attracts visitors. Some of the most striking are the new additions to the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto and the Denver Art Museum, both designed by Daniel Libeskind; the Rosenthal


Contemporary Arts Center in Cincinnati by Zaha Hadid; the Osaka National Museum of Art by Cesar Pelli and Associates; the Museum of Middle East Modern Art in Dubai by the Dutch UNStudio; and the Groeningen Museum by Philippe Starck, Alessando Men-dini and Coop Himmelb(l)au. There might be some truth in the claim that modern museum buildings have replaced the churches of past centuries in terms of some of their symbolic societal functions.

Old industrial buildings redesigned as art venues, in turn, capitalize on the factory image in order to lower the threshold of attending art exhibitions. In European cities and regions that have gone through an intense period of de-industrialization can be found innovative retailoring of old factory and harbour prem-ises (e.g., the entire Ruhr region in Germany, Gasometer Oberhausen in Germany, Antwerp harbour in Belgium and the Finlayson factor-ies in Tampere, Finland). Even new museum buildings located on former industrial sites are often designed to remind people of their his-tory; for example, the MAS museum located in the former harbour of Antwerp resembles a heap of containers piled on top of each other.

Although the building’s architecture now plays a key role in constructing a museum’s identity, museums should allow for adequate conservation of the collections, ensure secur-ity for artworks borrowed from elsewhere, and provide convenient facilities to meet the various needs of visitors (Caldwell, 2000; McLean, 1996). It is also challenging if all financial resources are invested in spectacular architecture and its maintenance, with none left for the museum’s core product: mounting interesting exhibitions or improving upon its collections.

Museum as organizational brand

In marketing commercial products, product attributes are often easily copied and therefore organizational characteristics that are more com-plex are frequently considered to be a more sus-tainable basis for differentiation. The museum field, however, is different in that the core prod-uct, a museum’s area of specialization and the quality of the art cannot easily be copied. Nevertheless, certain organizational character-istics can play a role in creating brand identity in museums. After all, it is the whole organization,

with its unique set of values, culture, norms, people, behaviours, programs, assets and skills, that delivers the museum experience for the customers. In addition to expertise in art, museums require leadership – that is, the ability to integrate a wide variety of professional com-petencies that contribute to the quality of the museum experience.

For the museum’s corporate brand, which is synonymous with the organization, it is important that all aspects of the organization be in line with the identity and all stakehold-ers perceive the museum in the same way. The museum should be able to communicate the same message and brand identity to all stakeholders: customers, media, employees and funders. This points to the importance of organizational qualities such as coordina-tion of the different aspects of the museum organization (Aaker, 1996; Baumgarth, 2009; McEnally and de Chernatony, 1999).

Communicating Brand Identity

After the museum’s brand identity has been specified, parts of it can be selected for active communication – for example, brand position statements. Bitner and Booms’s (1981) exten-sion of the marketing mix to include processes, physical surroundings and people has become widely accepted in the services marketing lit-erature and is traditionally used in brand positioning. From a customer’s point of view, a strong brand may also considerably reduce the perceived risk involved in using up time for a museum visit. Therefore, decisions about marketing mix should be considered strategic (Ahmed and Rafiq, 1995; Karlsson, Salehi-Sangari and Wallström, 2008; McLean, 1996; Wood, 2000).

Fillis’s (2002) literature review of arts mar-keting found that, as to marketing competen-cies, many arts organizations have been stuck in the rut of defining marketing too narrowly as a synonym for advertising/promotion. Thus, many other important aspects of arts mar-keting are not planned but carried out on an ad hoc basis, if at all. These include long-term exhibition programming, statement of focus, market and competitor analyses, targeting of segments for special exhibitions, and man-agement of sponsor and funder relationships. Although this situation has changed recently, much remains to be done.


Technology can be exploited in relationship marketing and in interactions with customers, such as by keeping them updated about com-ing events. Furthermore, membership schemes for museum Friends can be beneficial for museums, as they usually generate loyal cus-tomers and attract new people to the museum (McLean, 1996). Marketing in art museums should never be viewed as a sales-based activity or as promotion, but should instead be treated as a philosophy that builds long-term relation-ships with the various publics, media and other key actors in the arts field.

In communicating their brand identity, museums should capitalize on their core prod-uct, the unique collections and programs that differentiate museums from other leisure attractions. This means that museums should be made as attractive as possible compared with other leisure or cultural activities.

As to the place aspect of the marketing mix, accessibility plays an important role in art museums. In addition, a visitor’s orienta-tion inside the museum should be made easy. The bottom line is to keep visitors informed through leaflets, posters and courteous signs. The location and quality of services such as the café or the museum shop should be care-fully considered (Colbert, 2003; Luksetich and Partridge, 1997; McLean, 1996).

Promotion of museums, as part of market-ing, is important in order not only to attract audiences but also to build relationships with employees, sponsors and other interest groups. However, most museums cannot afford to undertake large-scale advertising campaigns. More and more, therefore, customers and sponsors are being approached directly. Many museums concentrate on promoting vari-ous exhibitions. However, it is also crucial for museums to use part of their resources to pro-mote the museum brand (McLean, 1996).

Museum managers should seriously consider museum branding. Their task is to encourage both artistic and management creativity. It is worth pointing out, however, that creativ-ity alone is no guarantee of success; it must be directed at serving the museum’s mission and building a coherent brand identity (Fillis, 2002, 2003; Fillis and McAuley, 2000; Pitta, Wood and Franzak, 2008).

Data and Methods

The objective of our empirical study was to explore the content of brand identity in

three museums and identify various means to create brand identity in practice. The data were gathered via in-depth semi-structured interviews conducted at the Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma, the Espoo Museum of Modern Art (EMMA) and the Didrichsen Art Museum. These museums were selected for the study because of their interesting profiles and their different types of ownership and background. Kiasma displays contemporary art and is part of the state-owned Finnish National Gallery. EMMA, a museum of modern and contemporary art, is run by a foundation owned by the city of Espoo. The Didrichsen Art Museum is a private art collection and foundation. Although all three museums operate in the Helsinki metropolitan area, their physical surroundings are very dif-ferent. The three museums are described in Appendix 1.

The director and the marketing manager of each museum were interviewed, except in the case of Kiasma, where only the head of market-ing and sponsorship was available. Hence, the total number of interviews was five. The analy-sis was supplemented with other material, such as that found on the museums’ websites and in newspaper articles.

The interviews were conducted in November 2008 at the interviewee’s workplace. They var-ied in duration from 45 to 90 minutes. They were recorded and later transcribed. The ques-tions were based on themes emerging from the literature review and e-mailed to the interview-ees beforehand. Questions concerning the vari-ous dimensions of brand identity could not be posed directly but were identified during data analysis and interpretation.

In the analysis, the methodological approach of induction was found to enable unanticipated issues to emerge from the material and to avoid letting theory dictate the results. However, the theoretical framework on brand dimensions was later used to categorize the ways of cre-ating brand identity that emerged during the interviews.

Although the three museums were carefully selected to represent typical present-day art museums, and members of their top manage-ment were interviewed to ensure reliability, the small number of cases and limited number of


interviews do not allow for any generalization in a statistical sense. However, the qualitative interview data helped us to determine whether various aspects of brand identity are valid in practice, and thus to evaluate the usefulness of the brand identity concept as a strategic tool in museum marketing.

Dimensions of Brand Identity in Practice

The interviewees did not see any contradiction between marketing and the arts as such.

They regarded marketing as essential in serving customers and enabling the museum to carry out its activities. However, the museums made their decisions about the content of exhibitions independently of audience or sponsor opinions, on the basis of topicality, artistic quality, and how well the exhibitions conformed to the museum’s profile. In terms of their core product, the museums seemed, on average, to be more product-oriented and autonomous and less demand-oriented than commercial service organ-izations. However, marketing – defined in a narrow sense as promotion only – was considered useful in making the museum and its services more accessible.

Brand as Product

Brand identity in the museums under study was based above all on the scope and type of collections. Permanent collections appear to be somewhat less important in museums of con-temporary art than in museums concentrat-ing on more traditional art. In the early years, permanent collections were important for EMMA (modern Finnish art) and Didrichsen (modern international art and ancient ethnic art from, for example, Mayan culture). Kiasma’s collections, in contrast, are very limited and have played a minor role from the beginning. Later on, EMMA and Didrichsen also began to profile themselves foremost through specific and imported exhibitions covering modern and contemporary painting, sculpture and video installations, and the role of their permanent collections has diminished.

The focus and scope of exhibitions are thus being used to differentiate the museum from other museums and from other leisure activ-ities. Kiasma, in particular, had benefited from the fact that contemporary art makes a greater contribution to public discussion than modern

art, because it evokes strong feelings, positive or negative. Thus, as a mirror of society, con-temporary art comes closer to its audience, yet it is often perceived as strange and difficult to understand.

Brand as Person

The reputations of renowned artists are also used in creating a museum’s brand personal-ity – for example, by featuring established foreign artists or presenting retrospectives of well-known domestic artists. This is less true for contemporary art exhibitions, because museums concentrating on contemporary art wish to introduce new and often unknown artists and styles.

The name and renown of a museum’s dir-ector or curator seem to be less important for brand identity than those of the conductor of an orchestra or the director of a theatre, for example. In all the museums covered in the interviews, however, the directors were important cultural mediators since they raised awareness of the museum through their own networks. Therefore, a museum is, to some extent, associated with the director’s persona. Not only is the director’s personality in the role of leader reflected in its activities, but the director also represents the museum in public. Sometimes the name of the founding family can represent the museum brand through brand inheritance, as in the case of Didrichsen.

Conscious diversification of exhibitions, or creating brand identity though particular user groups, was apparently rare in the exam-ined museums. EMMA emphasized its unique position as the only art museum in the city of Espoo, whereas the other two museums tried to encompass the whole metropolitan area.

Brand as Symbol

As we have pointed out, museums have a com-mon interest in attracting people away from other leisure activities and persuading them to spend more of their time on cultural pursuits. Several interviewees stated that their main task was to have people consume more culture as a whole, because consumption of culture tends to feed on itself. Thus, many symbolic aspects, such as psychological and physical accessibility, location, the museum’s name and the building, have become important in brand identity.


The majority of the interviewees high-lighted their museum’s accessibility and brand positioning. Kiasma emphasized the “meeting place” metaphor by exploiting its central loca-tion and conveying an urban impression of the brand name through its symbolic associations: the name Kiasma is derived from the Greek word chiasm, meaning intersection. Important brand symbols are also the renowned architec-ture of the building designed by Steven Holl and the script-like logo, together with the slo-gan commenting on contemporary art: “I don’t quite get it.”

EMMA, situated in a former printing plant, communicates accessibility through the mes-sage of a casual and convivial museum that welcomes everyone. EMMA’s symbolic asso-ciations refer to simplicity and clarity and are a mixture of the logo, the slogan (“EMMA takes art seriously but serves it casually”) and the brand name. In fact, the acronym EMMA is also a female name, which encourages people to identify with the museum and also expresses its casual style. Didrichsen, situated in a former private home, takes advantage of the intimacy of a family house with courtyard.

The building and its architecture as well as the location apparently form the major part of brand identity. This might result from the fact that a museum experience is to a large extent a visual one, for which the building and its architecture set the scene. For example, in Kiasma the brand is so strongly identi-fied with the building that the museum has to work hard to rid the brand as being con-sidered equivalent to the building. The public

controversy around Kiasma’s architecture and location may be another reason why the build-ing plays a larger than average symbolic role. Even before the opening, there was a public debate over whether the building was put in the wrong place and too close to the equestrian statue of Marshal Mannerheim, commander of the Finnish troops in the Second World War (Uusitalo and Ahola, 2008).

In the case of the Didrichsen Art Museum, the harmony of the building and the homey experience of visiting the museum and the pri-vate garden are the essence of the brand, whereas at EMMA the robust architecture of the former printing plant combines with the forest scen-ery through the glass walls to give visitors an opportunity to communicate with artworks in anonymous surroundings close to nature.

Brand as Organization

While organizational characteristics, such as values, people, professional expertise, global versus local orientation, and network associa-tions, are all important, they seem to be less emphasized in brand identity. For example, the organization’s age and history can somewhat influence its brand personality. In relatively new museums such as Kiasma and EMMA, the identity is more youthful than in estab-lished museums such as Didrichsen.

All the museums express their community orientation through a wide range of educa-tional projects. However, community orien-tation does not seem to play an essential role

KIASMA MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART, HELSINKI

F I G U R E 2


in the museums’ brand identity; rather, it is built into their mission. Therefore, although educational programs are surely appreciated by the public and bring the brand closer to its audience, they are unlikely to differentiate museums one from another.

Marketing Tools in the Construction of Identity

As to the marketing practices available for brand management, several traditional elements of the marketing mix (product, place, physical sup-port, promotion and price) are used, but they do not usually bring much competitive advan-tage. Instead, network associations abroad and at home, experimental relationships with, and direct marketing to, consumers, together with new, creative promotion schemes such as show-ing collections online, are considered better ways to assert identity. For example, in terms of accessibility, a distant location raises the psych-ological threshold, especially if the museum is in “another city,” as in the case of EMMA, or “almost in the country,” as in the case of Didrichsen – even if in reality the museum is only a 10-minute bus ride away. Taking this into account, the museums give directions for how to get there by public transport or car.

As in many other cultural organizations, in these museums the marketing role consists mainly of promotion, and promotion consists largely of traditional exhibition-based adver-tising. Outdoor advertising is often used – for example, on public vehicles such as buses, trams and the metro, as this form of advertising reaches a wide audience. Every museum has a website, and the role of social media is expand-ing due to their cost-effective and powerful nature. The ways in which the three museums employ media do not differ markedly. They use a traditional media mix of brochures and radio and newspaper advertising. However, the museums’ ability to advertise depends on their partnership arrangements. For example, the leading Finnish national daily, Helsingin Sano-mat, is a sponsor favoured by many cultural organizations and is a major asset in terms of visibility. Many museums cannot afford tele-vision advertising without sponsorship deals.

Of the three museums under study, brand management seemed to be practised most con-sciously at Kiasma. In fact Kiasma was the only museum where brand management was recog-nized as a permanent activity of marketing.

This may partly be a result of Kiasma’s long-term collaboration with advertising agencies and cultural agents seeking sponsorship deals for the museum. The other museums found it useful to hire an advertising agency from time to time, but this was considered too costly to be used on a regular basis. Also, in some respects the views of advertising agencies were regarded as incompatible with a museum’s identity. It was believed that the museum brand should not be created by outside experts alone but should come mainly from within the organization.

ESPOO MUSEUM OF MODERN ART (EMMA)

F I G U R E 3

DIDRICHSEN ART MUSEUM, HELSINKI

F I G U R E 4


In addition to the marketing mix, relation-ships and network marketing are essential tools for museum brand management. Each museum had a voluntary Friends associa-tion, which hardly consolidated the museum’s financial support but did spread awareness of the museum through word-of-mouth. Like-wise, the marketing of events such as exhib-ition openings played an important role in network management. In addition, all the museums had a customer database to keep track of loyal customers.

Management of networks was perceived as an important part of each museum’s brand management. It covered building and main-taining relationships with other art museums and cultural organizations and with art critics, sponsors, financial bodies, advertising agen-cies, artists, schools and journalists. All three museums cooperated with other art museums and therefore customers were encouraged to visit other museums as well. Networking with various actors in the field is fundamental for museums to be able to operate at all. A strong museum brand essentially facilitated network-ing both in Finland and abroad. Many well-known museum brands abroad also served as benchmarks. In networking, museum dir-ectors played a major role through their own personal contacts.

By using creative new approaches museums can strengthen their brand identity and gain visibility. Creative marketing can comprise any type of innovative marketing. All three museums had been making use of various cross-over events such as lectures, concerts, films, plays, DJ evenings, and even skateboard-design competitions and the like. Also, collab-oration with wine importers and restaurants and the planning of theme exhibitions helped to tailor museum services to different customer groups. Creative marketing seems to be most efficient when it is built on the unique features of an ongoing exhibition and, at the same time, supports the museum’s brand identity.

Conclusion

In this article we have discussed branding and the brand identity of art museums. Based on

the traditional branding literature, we have pre-sented a descriptive model of various dimensions of brand identity. A museum brand can be

developed using (1) core products, such as collec-tions and exhibitions; (2) persons, such as typical or ideal users, artists or the museum’s manager; (3) symbols, such as visual imagery, metaphors, the museum’s name, building and architecture, or heritage; and (4) the organization – its values, professionalism, managerial style and network associations.

Although many of these aspects were applied in the marketing of the art museums represented in the interviews, systematic and conscious brand management was rare. The main interest of the museums seemed to lie in developing audience accessibility rather than in differentiating the museum’s brand and personality.

The brand identity of each museum was based mainly on the scope and type of its col-lections and exhibitions. This suggests that museums – as with many other cultural organ-izations – act fairly autonomously in planning their core product, if one compares this field with others involved in consumer services. Exhibitions are meant to “surprise” visitors by providing art experiences thus far unknown to them. This proactive strategy is particu-larly true for museums of contemporary and modern art.

Artists’ reputation was also used in the marketing of exhibitions, except for those that concentrated on contemporary, experi-mental art by artists as yet unknown. In this case, new artists will benefit from a renowned museum brand, whereas usually it is the other way around and museums benefit from well-known artists’ brands. All three museums also relied on several symbolic elements, such as the name, architecture, history, slogan, location and style of premises, without, however, neces-sarily recognizing these as means of creating brand identity.

The implications are that museums could broaden their perspectives and, in their market-ing activities, progress from exhibition-based promotion towards a more comprehensive brand-identity marketing. Museums also seem to benefit from the success of other museums, because consumption of culture feeds on itself. Hence, in addition to branding themselves, museums should cooperate with other art museums and should emphasize the import-ance of the field as a whole. This would help them to compete with other cultural and leisure activities.


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DESCRIPTION OF THE THREE MUSEUMS

The Kiasma Museum of Contemporary Art, opened in 1998, is part of the state-owned Finnish National Gallery. It is located in the centre of Helsinki and of modern architecture designed by Steven Holl. Kiasma’s exhibitions, theatre and other activities enable visitors to experience contemporary art in all its various forms. Its main focus is exhibitions of contemporary art, such as large international contemporary art shows as well as smaller displays of Finnish and Nordic contemporary art. Its own collections are thus far limited and are not displayed on a permanent basis.

The Espoo Museum of Modern Art (EMMA), opened in 2006, is a combination of private and public ownership: a private foundation and the city of Espoo. The museum is located in the WeeGee cultural centre in the garden city of Tapiola and is run by the city of Espoo. The building is a former printing plant, with robust interior walls made of concrete and exterior walls made of glass with an unobstructed view of the surrounding forest. The city of Espoo collection and the Saastamoinen Foundation collection form the cornerstone of EMMA’s operations. In addition, EMMA displays exhibitions of contemporary and modern art from Finland and around the world.

The Didrichsen Art Museum is a private-home museum, founded by Marie-Louise and Gunnar Didrichsen, located on an island in the western part of Helsinki. The founding family started collecting art in the 1940s and moved to Villa Didrichsen in 1958. In 1965 the museum wing of the Villa was opened to the public. The museum’s collections consist of approximately one thousand artworks ranging from modern paintings and sculptures to artifacts from Pre-Columbian and Asian cultures. In addition, three to four exhibitions are mounted annually, on themes linked to the collections.

A P P E N D I X 1

Creating Brand Identity in Art Museums

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