Open Forum

Hi all!

As a free museum, we currently keep track of attendance with a simple check-in, asking visitors for their zip code/country, affiliation to our university, and how they heard about the museum.

For our attendance reports, we are currently looking to see what other institutions are doing and how they are sharing those numbers. If anyone is inclined to share a screenshot or an example of what that may look like, it would be most appreciated! Also, what programs are you all using? We collect our data with Airtable and then transfer to Excel for graphs.

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Kelsey Chung
Visitor Services Coordinator
Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University
Stanford CA
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Chatham County Historical Museum is a small 501(c)3, all-volunteer museum.  We collect name, address, how the visitor heard about the Museum and if they'd like to join us (volunteer or become a member), their email address.  The visitor is not required to fill out the log.  The Museum volunteers write the number of visitors each day in a different log book so we have a cross check on how many visitors we have.  The Museum volunteers also make notes about the day.  For instance, 'rained all day', 'front walk covered with snow until 3 pm', 'air conditioning not working in the historic courtroom', 'political protesters outside for 3 hours' which helps with understanding the numbers.

Hope this helps.

thanks,

Cindy Schmidt

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Cindy Schmidt MBA
Volunteer Museum Coordinator
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Hi Cindy,

Thank you! This is very helpful! 

How many volunteers are part of your program? And do you provide any volunteer recognition?

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Kelsey Chung
Visitor Services Coordinator
Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University
Stanford CA
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 05-04-2026 09:51 AM
From: Cindy Schmidt
Subject: Attendance Reports - What does it look like?

Chatham County Historical Museum is a small 501(c)3, all-volunteer museum.  We collect name, address, how the visitor heard about the Museum and if they'd like to join us (volunteer or become a member), their email address.  The visitor is not required to fill out the log.  The Museum volunteers write the number of visitors each day in a different log book so we have a cross check on how many visitors we have.  The Museum volunteers also make notes about the day.  For instance, 'rained all day', 'front walk covered with snow until 3 pm', 'air conditioning not working in the historic courtroom', 'political protesters outside for 3 hours' which helps with understanding the numbers.

Hope this helps.

thanks,

Cindy Schmidt

------------------------------
Cindy Schmidt MBA
Volunteer Museum Coordinator
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Hi, we are a free museum as well that does similar.  We have a guest sign in book, but primarily count visitors by a hand clicker and then track it in a spreadsheet.  This way I have daily, weekly, monthly and yearly totals to provide to our town council.

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Kristy Prather
Town of Springerville
Heritage Museum & Casa Malpais Director
Event Coordinator
418 E. Main St. - Springerville, AZ 85938
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Hi Kristy,

Thank you for the info! For your reports, do you share them annually/quarterly to the town council? Or more frequently?

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Kelsey Chung
Visitor Services Coordinator
Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University
Stanford CA
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 05-04-2026 09:52 AM
From: Kristy Prather
Subject: Attendance Reports - What does it look like?

Hi, we are a free museum as well that does similar.  We have a guest sign in book, but primarily count visitors by a hand clicker and then track it in a spreadsheet.  This way I have daily, weekly, monthly and yearly totals to provide to our town council.

------------------------------
Kristy Prather
Town of Springerville
Heritage Museum & Casa Malpais Director
Event Coordinator
418 E. Main St. - Springerville, AZ 85938
------------------------------

Hey Kelsey,

This is a great thread. It's clear a lot of you are already doing the right things with check-ins and spreadsheets.

What we've been helping some museums with is adding a simple layer on top of that, so the data becomes useful without creating more work.

Instead of manually moving data into Excel and building reports, everything flows into a live dashboard that automatically highlights patterns: like which days and times drive visits, what channels are working, and what's actually bringing people in.

We recently created a simple demo for a client who runs events at their venue, and I repurposed it using the Cantor Arts Center as an example to better illustrate how it could look. Depending on your needs, this kind of reporting can be very simple or much more sophisticated.

Also, this doesn't have to stop at the front desk, the same approach can capture insights from your website, chat, and even phone calls, and turn that into more targeted marketing.

Kelsey, if you're curious to see the example or explore how this could fit into what you're already doing, feel free to reach out. Since this report doesn't include real data, I'm happy to share it with anyone who's interested in taking a look.

Best
Tanya
tanya.lipovich@gmail.com

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Tanya Lipovich
Fractional CMO
San Ramon CA
------------------------------

Hello Tanya,

Thank you for your post. I would like to see the attendance reports if possible.

I am working on Data Analytics and my Museum Credential and this would be very useful for me.

I also sent you an email from galtgallery@gmail.com.

Thank you,

Geen

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G Tomko
chicago AR
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 05-05-2026 12:25 AM
From: Tanya Lipovich
Subject: Attendance Reports - What does it look like?

Hey Kelsey,

This is a great thread. It's clear a lot of you are already doing the right things with check-ins and spreadsheets.

What we've been helping some museums with is adding a simple layer on top of that, so the data becomes useful without creating more work.

Instead of manually moving data into Excel and building reports, everything flows into a live dashboard that automatically highlights patterns: like which days and times drive visits, what channels are working, and what's actually bringing people in.

We recently created a simple demo for a client who runs events at their venue, and I repurposed it using the Cantor Arts Center as an example to better illustrate how it could look. Depending on your needs, this kind of reporting can be very simple or much more sophisticated.

Also, this doesn't have to stop at the front desk, the same approach can capture insights from your website, chat, and even phone calls, and turn that into more targeted marketing.

Kelsey, if you're curious to see the example or explore how this could fit into what you're already doing, feel free to reach out. Since this report doesn't include real data, I'm happy to share it with anyone who's interested in taking a look.

Best
Tanya
tanya.lipovich@gmail.com

------------------------------
Tanya Lipovich
Fractional CMO
San Ramon CA
------------------------------

Hi Green,

I sent you the link by email. Let me know if you have any questions.
Tanya

------------------------------
Tanya Lipovich
Fractional CMO
San Ramon CA
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 05-06-2026 08:08 AM
From: G Tomko
Subject: Attendance Reports - What does it look like?

Hello Tanya,

Thank you for your post. I would like to see the attendance reports if possible.

I am working on Data Analytics and my Museum Credential and this would be very useful for me.

I also sent you an email from galtgallery@gmail.com.

Thank you,

Geen

------------------------------
G Tomko
chicago AR
------------------------------


Original Message:
Sent: 05-05-2026 12:25 AM
From: Tanya Lipovich
Subject: Attendance Reports - What does it look like?

Hey Kelsey,

This is a great thread. It's clear a lot of you are already doing the right things with check-ins and spreadsheets.

What we've been helping some museums with is adding a simple layer on top of that, so the data becomes useful without creating more work.

Instead of manually moving data into Excel and building reports, everything flows into a live dashboard that automatically highlights patterns: like which days and times drive visits, what channels are working, and what's actually bringing people in.

We recently created a simple demo for a client who runs events at their venue, and I repurposed it using the Cantor Arts Center as an example to better illustrate how it could look. Depending on your needs, this kind of reporting can be very simple or much more sophisticated.

Also, this doesn't have to stop at the front desk, the same approach can capture insights from your website, chat, and even phone calls, and turn that into more targeted marketing.

Kelsey, if you're curious to see the example or explore how this could fit into what you're already doing, feel free to reach out. Since this report doesn't include real data, I'm happy to share it with anyone who's interested in taking a look.

Best
Tanya
tanya.lipovich@gmail.com

------------------------------
Tanya Lipovich
Fractional CMO
San Ramon CA

Hi Kelsey - Right now we use a hand clicker for counts. We also ask whether or not our visitors have been to our museum before, and because we're connected to a university, we ask if they have any affiliation to the university as an alum, student, staff or professor. Seprately, we encourage them to join our email list and for that we require first/last name, email and zip. I'm hoping to get a CRM on board this year. We're looking at a couple of options. Happy to connect at any point to discuss. 

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Mandi Gonzales
Assistant Director of Marketing and Communciations
Irvine CA
------------------------------

It looks like our mid-sized museum is doing pretty much the same thing as everyone else, with the exception of a small line to indicate why (school groups, nearby event that might draw in or keep away...). I'm gonna steal that! 😁 Thanks.

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Mel Glover PhD
Director
Churchill County Museum and Archives
Fallon NV
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 05-04-2026 11:42 AM
From: Mandi Gonzales
Subject: Attendance Reports - What does it look like?

Hi Kelsey - Right now we use a hand clicker for counts. We also ask whether or not our visitors have been to our museum before, and because we're connected to a university, we ask if they have any affiliation to the university as an alum, student, staff or professor. Seprately, we encourage them to join our email list and for that we require first/last name, email and zip. I'm hoping to get a CRM on board this year. We're looking at a couple of options. Happy to connect at any point to discuss. 

------------------------------
Mandi Gonzales
Assistant Director of Marketing and Communciations
Irvine CA
------------------------------

Hi Mandi,

I heard about the new museum at UC Irvine! Exciting! I would love to discuss more since you are also with a university museum. Feel free to shoot me an email!

------------------------------
Kelsey Chung
Visitor Services Coordinator
Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University
Stanford CA
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 05-04-2026 11:42 AM
From: Mandi Gonzales
Subject: Attendance Reports - What does it look like?

Hi Kelsey - Right now we use a hand clicker for counts. We also ask whether or not our visitors have been to our museum before, and because we're connected to a university, we ask if they have any affiliation to the university as an alum, student, staff or professor. Seprately, we encourage them to join our email list and for that we require first/last name, email and zip. I'm hoping to get a CRM on board this year. We're looking at a couple of options. Happy to connect at any point to discuss. 

------------------------------
Mandi Gonzales
Assistant Director of Marketing and Communciations
Irvine CA
------------------------------

Hi Kelsey,

I think this really depends what you want the data to be used for. Is it to show that you reach a minimal threshold of visitors, to help university officials understand the importance and relevance of your museum? Is it to show board members and donors that you are a good steward of their trust and their funds? Or is it to derive actionable information on how to promote, how to attract, do the right market segmentation, figure out which exhibits work and which don't, etc? The data you want to collect, and the way you would report it, would look quite different for all these scenarios, so I think it's important to start by defining what you need the attendance data for.

We collect both operational data (billing zip code, number of people in the party, distribution of time of day, distribution of day of the week, etc) and experiential data (NPS, motivation for visiting, changes in values and attitudes), but we have a different revenue model than yours... however, there are plenty of free museums that collect and synthesize advanced and actionable aggregate visitor information. Hill Aerospace Museum in Riverdale UT (just north of Salt Lake) is a great example. Here is an interview of their operations Director, Elizabeth Najim, explaining how they collect and use data.

I hope you're planning on coming to the WMA conference in Salt Lake in September (shameless plug), Hill Aerospace Museum and I are collaborating on a session called "from data to decisions - harnessing the power of numbers". Hope to see you there!

------------------------------
Axel Estable MBA
Director of Operations
Natural History Museum of Utah - University of Utah
Salt Lake City UT
------------------------------

Hi Axel,

Thank you for your clarifying questions! As of now, our data is used to determine our programming needs through a marketing standpoint. But we are also collecting information to determine our overall visitorship (what days are the busiest, are there certain events on campus that bring more people to the museum, etc.)

We are also looking into overall reporting and what that looks like visually. Right now we are offering some graphs, but nicer visuals with punchy numbers are always welcome!

------------------------------
Kelsey Chung
Visitor Services Coordinator
Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University
Stanford CA
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 05-07-2026 12:17 AM
From: Axel Estable
Subject: Attendance Reports - What does it look like?

Hi Kelsey,

I think this really depends what you want the data to be used for. Is it to show that you reach a minimal threshold of visitors, to help university officials understand the importance and relevance of your museum? Is it to show board members and donors that you are a good steward of their trust and their funds? Or is it to derive actionable information on how to promote, how to attract, do the right market segmentation, figure out which exhibits work and which don't, etc? The data you want to collect, and the way you would report it, would look quite different for all these scenarios, so I think it's important to start by defining what you need the attendance data for.

We collect both operational data (billing zip code, number of people in the party, distribution of time of day, distribution of day of the week, etc) and experiential data (NPS, motivation for visiting, changes in values and attitudes), but we have a different revenue model than yours... however, there are plenty of free museums that collect and synthesize advanced and actionable aggregate visitor information. Hill Aerospace Museum in Riverdale UT (just north of Salt Lake) is a great example. Here is an interview of their operations Director, Elizabeth Najim, explaining how they collect and use data.

I hope you're planning on coming to the WMA conference in Salt Lake in September (shameless plug), Hill Aerospace Museum and I are collaborating on a session called "from data to decisions - harnessing the power of numbers". Hope to see you there!

------------------------------
Axel Estable MBA
Director of Operations
Natural History Museum of Utah - University of Utah
Salt Lake City UT
------------------------------