News

In this lab 31 participants from 19 different European countries had the chance to meet cinema practitioners from a diverse range of national contexts and exchange expertise in building audiences for films at the cinema and beyond. Led by Madeleine Probst (Vice-President of Europa Cinemas and Cinema Producer, Watershed, Bristol, United Kingdom) together with Javier Pachon (President of Cineciutat and Cinearte, Palma de Mallorca) and Erika Borsos (Programmer, Budapest Film, Budapest, Hungary), it is a great opportunity to share current thinking and practical solutions.

The focus has been on how to make the most of your biggest asset; the people within your organisation. We explored ways of optimising resources in order to build more sustainable and dynamic relationships with audiences in a context of ever increasing abundance of content and platforms. Expect practical solutions to getting to know existing audiences better and overcoming barriers to engagement working towards more responsive and inclusive strategies to develop audiences for a diverse range of cinema experiences.

Headline topics included:

• Building relationships; from community design to data analysis and customer relationship management

• Making the most of your resources from organisational development to involving volunteers and fundraising

• Better understanding barriers to engagement from pricing, accessibility to discoverability issues

• Developing responsive and holistic communication and editorial strategies on and offline

• Closer co-operation and exchange of practice between European cinemas and distributors

• Learning about/from the Bulgarian context; exploring the challenges and opportunities for small cinemas in a small country, dominated by big players

To read the full report please click here

To find out more about the Lab check out the Wakelet Story and the Lab programme.