Your heritage project needs people to share their experiences of the place you’re investigating. Your audiences aren’t just consumers; they are partners. It’s a two-way process because heritage is about specific places, and the people that know them best are the people that live there. Involving local people from the outset is vital: earn their trust, treat their stories with respect, and you will create the audience you need.
The Nitty Gritty
Process phase
Discover
Suggested time
Project duration
People
As many as you can spare, volunteers can help sustain relationships with participants and each other.
Steps
01
Who do you want to engage?
Look at the demographics of people that make up your area: age, gender, ethnicity, economic group. You’ll find this on your local council’s website. Think about what voices have already been heard. In King’s Cross, we focused on older people, Bangladeshi and unemployed people; significant groups in the area who were largely underrepresented in local history.
02
How do you find the people you want to engage?
Use the connections and networks you established during the project planning phase. Key individuals, community groups, and local organisations will be easier to target, and they’ll help to reach those who speak other languages, or who are isolated or excluded.
03
Involve people throughout your project
Creating opportunities for people to come together, meet each other and share their memories will create a sense of excitement and ownership. Heritage workshops, walks, sharing tea and biscuits and encouraging new social connections amongst your participants is a good way to keep them coming.
04
Sustain individual relationships
You will need to sustain relationships with individuals and groups by keeping them involved if you want them to stay engaged. You may feel under pressure to deliver your outputs, but your work depends on your community. Stay in touch with people: sometimes, a phone call or email is all that’s required.
05
Curtains up!
At the end of the project, all the people you’ve involved along the way will make up your audience, whether for exhibitions, walks, talks, workshops or publications. Get them to bring along their friends and families. You can reach more audiences by snowballing.Word of mouth marketing is the most successful. You’ll probably also need to use a standard marketing approach and produce leaflets, posters and social media content.
