History

Where we started 

Audiences London was set-up in 2002 as a resource supporting audience development for the cultural sector in the capital. Colleagues from around 40 arts organisations worked over a number of years to establish an agency for London (under the banner of "LAMP"). Audiences London is one of a number of regional audience development agencies around the UK which make up Network.

Our philosophy 

Audiences London considers audience development to be:

A planned activity to develop the range of relationships between a cultural organisation and identified audiences as an integral part of its mission. It is both a process and a philosophy. Essentially, audience development is all the activities an organisation delivers that aim to engage with audiences, visitors or participants. It covers everything that is done proactively to:

• Retain and increase the frequency of existing audiences or visitors.
• Attract new audiences to existing performances, exhibitions or events.
• Develop audiences to experience different types of performance, exhibit or event.
• Develop new types of performance, exhibit or event to meet the needs of new audiences.

Audiences London supports good practice in audience development and seeks to develop this through its relationships with its clients and the projects it initiates. The key elements are:

• Recognising audience development's importance at leadership level and ensuring that it is an organisation-wide mission and relevant to all staff roles.
• Audience development should be planned and clearly lead by the organisation's core objectives.
• Appropriate resources of time and budget allocated to achieving audience development objectives.
• Audience development activity is most effective when based on sound market intelligence so that it is 'audience focused', and shaped by evidence about what audiences want and need.