What is the marketization of museums? What is its background?

With the deepening of economic system reform, the speed of economic marketization in China is accelerating day by day. How to adapt to the changes of economy and society and reposition the operation mode of museum function is an important research topic.

First, the basic conditions for the market-oriented operation of museums

(A) the commodity nature of the museum

The business of the museum includes "products", and the products of the museum belong to the category of commodities. As we all know, social products are divided into two categories: first, material products; The second is spiritual products. Under the condition of market economy, products enter the circulation field and are exchanged according to value and use value, thus becoming commodities. The exhibition of the museum, including the area, buildings and other components, and even the museum itself are spiritual products consumed by the audience. It can exchange goods through tickets or other forms. Therefore, the museum's products have the commodity attribute of market operation.

Under the traditional economic conditions, the museum industry is only an integral part of the superstructure. The social function of traditional museums does not recognize that museums have "products", let alone the commodity attributes of museum products. Under the influence of the "Left" trend of thought, the social function of the museum is limited to the ideological field and only used as a tool for political propaganda and education. Therefore, under the condition of market economy, the transformation of museum operation mode must first realize the commodity attribute of museum "products" ideologically, and then operate in a market-oriented way.

(B) the resource attributes of museums as spiritual consumption industries

Since it is acknowledged that there are spiritual products in social exchange and consumption, there should be material or intangible industrial resources to produce and process this special product. Museums are already important cultural consumption resources, showing great development value.

Tourism has two important consumption resources for tourists to enjoy: one is the natural landscape represented by famous rivers, lakes, seas and mountains; The second is the humanistic landscape that permeates human culture and retains the track of human history. Museums are an important part of the second kind of tourism resources. Museums are the epitome of history and culture. Museums at all levels mark the development history of a country, a region or an industry, and their profound cultural resources are favored by audiences and tourists. The attraction of museums has become the key resource object of tourism.

When the production of material products exceeds the period of food and clothing, people's attention to consumption begins to shift to new consumption areas. In addition to the tourism consumption brought by the above-mentioned tourism industry, a new industry is quietly emerging, that is, culture as a productive force has become a new economic resource and a new development industry. Cultural power and cultural industry have attracted the attention of economists and industry. As a kind of cultural resources, museums not only have rich cultural relics collection resources, but also have profound historical and cultural exploration resources, which are important economic resources that cannot be ignored in the future cultural industry.

The market-oriented operation of museums helps to transform their resource advantages into social and economic benefits.

(3) The commodity producer attribute of the museum

From the traditional system, the museum is a cultural institution. From the perspective of market economy, museums are commodity producers. First, museums have "assets". These assets are historical and cultural heritage, and they have value and use value, whether tangible or intangible; Second, the assets of the museum are of productive value. Through the research, development, combination and exhibition of museum managers, researchers and staff, these assets produce various spiritual products and materialized products with exhibitions as the main form; Third, there is a market for museum products. Historical and cultural products are spiritual consumer goods of great interest to modern people. Museums are the epitome of historical culture and social culture, which can provide convenience for people to fully understand historical culture and world culture. Fourth, the modern society is a society where the market economy tends to be socialized, and the equivalent exchange is the basic principle of consumption. Under this principle, the museum's "products" can create value and surplus value, so the museum's products should have commodity attributes. As the producer of this kind of "product", the museum should have the function of commodity producer. This function is not in contradiction with the traditional three functions of collection, research and education, and it is also consistent with modern market consumption, but the form of "product" exchange is different.

Second, the market-oriented operation of museums is a historical necessity and a world trend.

(A) the market-oriented operation of museums is a historical necessity.

1684, the world's first modern museum, the Ashmoline Museum, was born, which opened a new era of world museums. In the early days, the museum mainly collected historical souvenirs to cooperate with students' education. Of course, there are also visits and education open to some public scholars.

With the bourgeois revolution in the west, some sites represented by palaces and official residences have been turned into museums. Subsequently, the museum began to walk out of the closed and face the society.

Since modern times, especially after the 1960s, the western economy has developed remarkably, and the rise of tourism has made museums the target of tourists. Driven by tourism, the museum has realized its own value. The development of the industry and the management of enterprises have begun to influence and inspire the working ideas of museums. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, western museum circles began to propose and discuss the market-oriented operation of museum functions and the enterprise management of museums.

The above brief summary is a conceptual change in the birth and development of world museums, which shows that museums can not be isolated from society, but also change with the development and changes of society and socio-economy. The market-oriented operation of museums can be said to be the inevitable trend of the development of museums in the world.

After more than 20 years of reform and opening up, China has made great progress in social economy. Major changes have taken place in the fields of production, circulation and consumption. This also determines that the museum must change the traditional single closed operation mode, change the passive situation of isolation, closed doors and unpopularity, and replace it with a new operation mode that faces the society, faces the audience, actively serves the society, strives for survival and development in service. This way is the market-oriented operation of museums, which is also the general trend of reform and opening up and the historical necessity.

(2) The market-oriented operation of museums is the trend of the world.

From a global perspective, it is the current trend for museums in developed countries, including many famous museums, to operate in an enterprise and market-oriented manner and develop themselves in operation. The Royal Museum in Britain, the Louvre in France and the Pompeii Ruins Museum in Italy are all supported by the state and developed and operated as important cultural and tourism resources. These world-famous museums have brought rich benefits to the country and museums, whether it is direct income or indirect income to support tourism projects, some of which have become key projects of national pillar industries.

The number and level of American museums can be said to be the highest in the world, and its theory and practice have always been in the forefront of the world, representing the development trend of world museums. From the late 1970s to the early 1980s, the international museum community began to introduce market research and other market tools, and the Metropolitan Museum of America began to learn from market management ideas, and further introduced market concepts in the 1990s, regarding the audience as "consumers" and introducing concepts such as "customer care" into public services. Today, American museums, regardless of size, account for 75%; Regardless of the 59% national museums or private museums, they have learned from the enterprise management concept and achieved successful experience in fund raising, exhibition development and innovation, personnel organization, audience attraction and development measures.

Influenced by the traditional system, the overall level of museums in China is small and sophisticated, which is quite different from that in developed countries in Europe and America. Therefore, keeping up with the world trend and seizing the time to carry out market-oriented operation can also catch up with the time gap of western museums.

Third, some suggestions on the marketization of museums.

The marketization of museums must adhere to "people-oriented". Organize the audience in a market-oriented way; Do a good job of exhibition innovation according to the needs of the audience; Focus on the adjustment of internal management structure and the reform of operating mechanism, and change the traditional mechanism.

(a) do a good job in the museum's market network construction and marketing.

The primary job of modern museums is to organize the audience. There are no or few spectators, let alone creating economic and social benefits, and even the traditional functions of museums cannot be realized. If the audience organization wants to be efficient and effective, it is necessary to learn from the way of modern enterprise market operation and do a good job in museum market network construction and marketing advertising promotion.

1. Do sufficient market research to determine the target audience.

The exhibitions of traditional museums basically rely on administrative channels to organize audiences. In recent years, some museums have begun to go out of their homes and actively organize audiences from the perspective of generating income and solving the shortage of funds. This is just a primitive and irregular market behavior. If the museum wants to organize the audience scientifically, it must first do a good job in market research and know where the museum audience is; What is the audience size; What kind of interests and consumption characteristics they have; Their work characteristics and leisure time; What is the best way to attract them into the museum and so on. The museum must find out the details of the audience and their consumption directly or indirectly in some way. For example, according to the different social organization structure, the industrial structure, industry structure and occupation structure are vertically divided; Horizontal age structure, gender structure or regional structure, etc. It is the most basic work of museum market operation to establish scientific audience files by classification.

On the basis of investigation, through analysis, research and processing, the target audience of the museum is determined in order of priority, which is an important basis for the museum to face the market and organize the audience scientifically. Without this, museums may fall into blindness if they organize social audiences in a loose way.

2. Select key audiences and establish a stable audience market network in a certain way.

In order to get twice the result with half the effort, it is also very important to select key audiences and establish the audience market network in addition to doing the above market research and determining the target groups. What are the key audiences? In my opinion, generally speaking, it refers to the characteristics of large quantity and single concentration. For example, students are subdivided into big, middle and primary school students; PLA soldiers; Government civil servants; Enterprise employees; Community residents and so on. These audiences have strong characteristics and are easy to organize. According to their consumption demand, we can organize professional exhibitions for them. For such an audience, it is necessary to establish a solid connection in a certain way. For example, for PLA soldiers, military and civilian construction can be carried out; Can establish a quality education base for schools; For enterprises, it is possible to engage in linkage between libraries and factories; For government civil servants, propaganda positions can be established in the form of policies through administrative channels. Such a network can play a very convenient and effective role in organizing museum visitors.

3. Borrow social forces such as the media to promote museums.

Borrowing newspapers, magazines, radio stations, television stations, information internet and other important modern media organizations for publicity, advertising and marketing is the most important way to rapidly improve the popularity and reputation of modern society. The marketization of museums is no exception. The key to effective advertising lies in good planning. Planning should include overall image planning and "one exhibition and one strategy"; Choose the right "selling point" and be targeted; Advertising methods, including TV channels, masthead positions, time slots and other technical measures. In addition to organizing its own planning organization, museums should also pay attention to using and borrowing professional organizations to plan social advertisements, and the effect may be better.

In addition to the media, there is another way that can not be ignored, that is, using and borrowing word-of-mouth publicity from social people, especially social celebrities. Pay attention to social celebrities, such as officials, experts, scholars, entrepreneurs and other social celebrities. Their influence on society can not only help museums organize audiences, but also help museums play a role that the media can't play in social fund-raising, exhibition organization, creative planning and expanding social influence. This point should be seriously mentioned and cannot be ignored.

There is also a forward-looking suggestion for the present and the future. In the marketization of museums, we should pay special attention to the use of information internet, online learning information, online learning and online music. Not only teenagers, but also some middle-aged and literate people are interested in dabbling. Museums can grasp this new consumption psychology and habit, so as to promote themselves and transmit business information, and the effect will be very obvious. From 2003 to 2004, the "Animation Art Exhibition" held by Qingdao Museum for two consecutive years transmitted information to the public through the network system. The exhibition was held in just four days, attracting 50,000 to 60,000 people, causing a sensation in the island city and achieving very good results.

(2) Museums should take the needs of the audience as the first goal and constantly realize exhibition innovation.

Any social product, whether material or non-material, which remains unchanged and lacks innovation, will lose its display in city museums because it reduces the interest in consumption, and it is no exception. Since the reform and opening up, there has been an embarrassing situation in which museums are neglected and business is depressed. One of the important reasons is that the exhibition is single and outdated.

Museums have resource advantages, but how to turn unique resource advantages into market advantages lies in innovation. Museum managers should organize scientific researchers and staff in the museum from the perspective of opening up the audience market and attracting the audience. They should innovate constantly and create scientific research achievements and exhibitions that the audience likes through self-development and introduction, using various methods and advanced technical means, which is the key to the prosperity of the museum market.

How to realize rapid and effective exhibition innovation? The author believes that besides strengthening scientific research strength and increasing investment in scientific research and development, a very important idea is to borrow social forces.

First of all, we should make full use of the advantages of museum system resources. Taking management as a means, using market transactions to effectively introduce exhibitions. Exhibitions in local museums may become outdated "products" and lose their market over time; But for another local museum, it may be an innovative "product" that will bring new markets. In this sense, the museum system should not only enjoy cultural relics and information resources. Exhibits and exhibitions should also enjoy resources. Doing so can not only save investment in scientific research, but also save time. It is a win-win situation for the delivery hall and the input hall. In 2003, Qingdao Museum introduced more than 20 exhibitions from other provinces and cities. In particular, the "Entering the Masters-A Series Exhibition of China Artists' Classic Works in the 20th Century" was organized and planned by using the resources of the Brother Pavilion, which lasted for one month and was launched continuously, causing strong repercussions in the island city. At the same time, Qingdao Museum also transported five exhibitions of cultural relics and artworks developed by itself to foreign museums. This not only broadens the market scene, but also realizes new income generation.

Secondly, borrow social forces to develop new exhibits. Although the museum is a professional protection unit for collecting historical relics, it is impossible for historical relics and precious artworks to be completely concentrated in the museum. For some works of art with historical and artistic value scattered in society, borrowing and renting exhibition halls and venues of museums can also attract audiences and achieve considerable social and economic benefits. In the past two years, Qingdao Museum has held exhibitions in conjunction with the efforts of social folk collectors, which not only generated social benefits and income, but also improved the visibility and reputation of the museum, deepened the public's understanding and impression of the museum, and received good results.

(3) In order to realize the marketization of functions, museums must do a good job in supporting the internal organizational structure and reforming the operating mechanism.

The marketization of museums intensifies the work on the social audience market, which inevitably requires changes in internal work efficiency and frequency.

The functions of traditional museums are mainly collection and exhibition, and are basically "production-oriented". The marketization of museums requires museums to be not only "producers" but also "operators"; Not only the external market work should be standardized, but also the internal management work should be matched. Just like modern enterprises under the condition of market economy, not only the external market work of enterprises should run quickly, but also the internal management work should run efficiently.

First, the institutional setup of museums should be reformed and matched. In the past, the institutional setting with exhibitions as the main line should be changed to the institutional setting with market audience demand as the main line. In 2003, Qingdao Museum carried out a large-scale institutional reform, canceling the original research department and establishing a planning research department focusing on exhibition project development and market planning; In view of the heavy work of market audience network channels, the Ministry of Industrial Development was newly established to increase marketing efforts; The original exhibition department was changed to the exhibition collection department, mainly to increase the collection of cultural relics scattered in the society for exhibition renewal. Other traditional institutions have also made corresponding adjustments around the development of the market and the innovation of exhibits. After the adjustment, import exhibitions and export exhibitions have increased substantially, attracting more than 200,000 visitors each year, changing the passive situation of single exhibitions and few visitors in the past.

The second is to improve work efficiency and enhance the enthusiasm, initiative and consciousness of the staff in the museum. Qingdao Museum has an appointment system for its staff and researchers, including managers. The staff in the museum are highly motivated and highly mobilized, with the flexible mechanism of setting posts according to events and selecting people according to posts. The work of the museum has changed the inertia of the past and a new dynamic situation has emerged.

The third is to rectify and change the traditional work style and establish a good external image. Qingdao museum, in appearance dress, language standard service, work coordination, all-round visual rectification. Not only well-known experts from domestic museums were specially invited to give lectures, but also etiquette training classes were specially held. In just half a year, we have achieved excellent results.

To sum up, the market-oriented operation of museums is the only way to do a good job in all aspects under the conditions of market economy. As long as we are brave in innovation and exploration, we can create a new situation in museum work in the new period.