1. Introduction12
Art galleries are critical components of many societies in the contemporary world. They embody multi-dimensional aspects such as the art prowess of various artists, historical accounts of society, and the fundamental, cultural, or societal pillars of a given people. Further, the exhibition spaces in the form of art galleries act as excellent interaction points between artists and the public. The above is achievable by displaying the various artworks at a central place (art gallery) for the public to interact with (Chernev, 2020). Therefore, it is sufficient to state the ability to attract many people to view the different artworks and displays defines any art gallery's success. For example, the above directly increases revenue for artists for artworks sold (Perreault et al., 2021). Equally, there is more revenue for an art gallery when many people visit it. As such, having robust, clear, pragmatic, and effective marketing plans is the centerpiece of a successful art gallery.
Modern Art Gallery is a renowned art gallery in the country, and excellent marketing plans are needed to enhance its visibility, business, and returns. The gallery is located in Manhattan and offers multifaceted products on display, such as paintings, images, and wooden and marble sculptures. The increasing competition from other art galleries and evolving dynamics, such as new methods of accessing and interacting with clients, have threatened the quest of Modern Art Gallery to achieve some of its objectives (Setiyawati et al., 2021). For instance, the recent trend of decreasing the number of clients visiting the gallery monthly and related revenues generated by such reduced visits have raised significant concerns for its management. Equally, the rising discontentment among the artists who have partnered with Modern Art Gallery vis-à-vis the relatively low earnings from the gallery has also further increased the need to review some of the gallery's strategic elements, notably its marketing plan.
Having straightforward, robust, pragmatic, and working marketing plans is at the heart of Modern Art Gallery for various reasons. First, the marketing plans would enable Modern Art Gallery to correctly identify, analyze, and understand its target market (Perreault et al., 2021). For instance, it would assist in getting and utilizing the intricate demographic details of its target market. Second, marketing plans would enable the gallery to craft new strategies for attracting, penetrating the market, and appropriately addressing customer needs (Ferrell et al., 2022). Identifying the correct marketing plans would help Modern Art Gallery enhance customer retention and overall client satisfaction. Therefore, Modern Art Gallery must determine the proper marketing plans to benefit from the above and many more benefits.
This paper delves into research on the core marketing plans for Modern Art Gallery. It begins with a review of existing literature to purposely get other writers' and researchers' contributions and views on the topic. Importantly and pertinent to this research, the review would enable the researcher to identify the existing gaps and how to address them to achieve the research objectives.
Then, the research delves into its substantive elements, i.e., finding the relevant marketing plans for Modern Art Gallery and their importance. The paper aims to research and explain how various marketing plans would assist Modern Art Gallery in achieving multiple objectives. Besides, the findings give a direction on the future of the practitioners and stakeholders in the field. It is sufficient to state that this research's findings are helpful and valuable to Modern Art Gallery and other pertinent stakeholders such as learners, cultural departments, and researchers.
2. Literature Review
Zollo et al. (2022) defined an art gallery as an art center where various artworks by different artists are on display for multi-dimensional purposes. Such objectives include monetary gains for artists, business purposes such as revenues for art galleries, and promulgating a given society's cultural tenets, elements, or aspects through various displays such as sculptures and paintings. On the other hand, Taormina and Baraldi (2023) define an art gallery as an interface between artists and the public. The above implies that an art gallery is where the different works of artists in the form of paintings, carvings, and general art designs are displayed or available for the public or customers to see, interact with, or even purchase and source for critical details about them such as origin and implications or essence for a society.
Stone et al. (2020), in research on modern art forms, related activities, and implications on society, explored the various importance and impact of art galleries in society. Stone et al. (2020) state that art galleries preserve society's culture and fundamental elements. Multiple artists' drawings, paintings, and sculptures precisely embody people's lives, cultures, and general practices in a society at a given time. For example, a painting on the people's mode of dressing, greetings, or interactions depicts how a given society defines and advocates for its people to dress or communicate. The above helps in preserving the culture of a given society. The above is, in turn, passed on to various generations, thus being critical in maintaining and giving society's culture its correct identity.
Blakeman (2023), In similar research, identified additional importance or implications of art galleries. In addition to the role of art galleries in culture preservation, the writers explain the importance of art galleries from an economic/financial perspective. Blakeman (2023) explains that many artists earn from displaying their artworks in such galleries. Therefore, The above helps them benefit financially through rewards such as payments and referrals to customers who can engage them for further artwork and related business. Huang and Rust (2021) support The above findings by explaining that art galleries not only act as an interaction point between artists and the public but also help to reward the artists and their hard work.
Schama (2023) researched how art galleries can improve their operations and businesses and recommended several pragmatic and evidence-based approaches to realizing the above. According to Schama (2023), art galleries need to conform to emerging dynamics and realities to keep up with the pace and needs of the clients. For instance, they advocate for enhanced digital visibility instead of relying on conventional approaches such as focusing on customers' visits to the physical location and space of the art galleries. The above recommendation is important because of its target customers' increased prevalence of using modern technology such as laptops and smartphones. Therefore, art galleries must invest in digital marketing, expansion, and availing their products and services on various digital platforms.
The findings above receive further support from Eagle et al. (2020), who argue that art galleries must invest more in understanding their clients and needs. According to Eagle et al. (2020), the growing competition from the increasing number of art galleries and enhanced visibility of an artist's work on their own imply that art galleries cannot afford to relax and not put more effort towards proving their worth (Sahir & Rosmawati, 2020).
For instance, in the contemporary world, artists can invest in marketing their artwork through digital capabilities, platforms, and abilities. Further, they can set up their exhibitions online and in physical spaces and earn high revenues with caveats such as copyrights against any art galleries displaying or using their products. Such limitations could hinder the ability of art galleries to benefit from some artists' outstanding artworks that could otherwise fetch significant revenues and attract many customers.
Therefore, Eagle et al. (2020) urge that there is a need for art galleries to invest significantly in increasing their visibility, acceptability in the market, and ability to attract many customers, make more revenues, and reward highly the various artists whose works are in such galleries.
Park (2020) further reiterates the above assertions, explaining that art galleries must embrace the most effective approaches to enhancing their businesses. They include realistic marketing approaches, partnering with high-profile artists, and offering quality products. Additionally, according to Park (2020), art galleries need to invest in emerging trends such as digital presence and timely addressing the needs and concerns of clients to avoid customer dissatisfaction and losing significant business due to poor services from the customer service department of a given art gallery.
From the above review, it is evident that most researchers and scholars have focused significantly on the following main aspects of art galleries. Their importance to society, types, the purpose of establishing them, services offered, and economic/financial benefits, especially to the artists. However, there is less focus on improving the activities of such organizations through appropriate marketing plans. Therefore, stakeholders must fill the gap through explicit and effective research and findings. The essence of the above would be to enhance such art galleries' business and customer satisfaction. Moreover, it would help improve the monetary gains of art galleries through improved services, better customer identification, satisfaction, and many other benefits of having an effective marketing plan.
Table 1: Summary of the Literature Review
3. Methodology
This section outlines the methods, strategies, and approaches used in conducting this research. The comprehensive outline of all the methods and methodologies is to promote the replicability of this study by other scholars or researchers or to provide a professional and scholarly basis to review the study to improve it in the future.
3.1. Research Design and Method
The researcher systematically reviewed the sources that met the inclusion criteria. The objective was to get the correct insights about other scholars' contributions and perspectives. Per Siedlecki (2020), a systematic review enables a researcher to get a detailed account of the findings of other publications. Further, they used a descriptive design to explain the findings, as is evident in the findings section. According to Köhler et al. (2023), a systematic approach asks fundamental questions about what and why it was critical for the researcher to justify their findings. To ensure that the researcher used suitable sources, reviewed steps, and correctly reported their findings as expected, i.e., in a manner addressing their objectives, they relied on the Prisma method for essential aspects such as screening of all sources for use in the study. The aim was to select an approach that delivered the best possible outcomes.
3.2. Population of Study, Inclusion, and Exclusion Criteria
All the sources that qualified for use during the research were relevant to the topic and had not been published earlier than the last six years. Any source or publication that did not meet the above criteria was not used or considered for the study. Further, the researcher prioritized the peer-reviewed sources due to their high dependability and applicability (Siedlecki, 2020; Kang, 2023; Nantharath et al., 2016). Elsewhere, non-official publications such as personal blog sites and unauthorized sources were exclusion criteria for the researcher.
3.3. Sampling Technique and Analysis
The researcher used simple random sampling to sample the systematically reviewed resources. The technique was the most appropriate because it gave all the sampled elements an equal probability of being selected, provided they were pertinent, relevant, and applicable to the topic. Essentially, the above reduced the biases and their associated errors. The researcher collected data using tools such as physical recording books, laptops, and computers. The researcher stored the data collected for analysis and arrived at the findings section.
The researcher analyzed the collected data through a simple strategy broadly defined by categorization and comprehensive review. The researcher classified All data collected into categories based on fundamental elements such as similarity of findings, relevance, answerability to the research questions, and how they were relevant to the research and its objectives. Further, the researcher synthesized the findings by checking finer details such as correlation to the research, applicability, and relationship with existing evidence-based practices or findings (Köhler et al., 2023). The researcher scrutinized the ultimate findings further to remove any inconsistencies, issues, and problems. Ultimately, the researcher remained with relevant, applicable, and meaningful findings.
Figure 1: Data Collecting Procedure
4. Findings
The following are the critical findings vis-a-vis the marketing plan of Modern Art Gallery, its application, and its benefits to it.
4.1. Marketing Penetration Approach
Robul et al. (2020) define a marketing penetration model or approach as a strategy primarily focused on retaining existing customers or client base. Whenever an organization focuses on securing and maintaining the existing market base from being encroached on by competitors, it uses a market penetration strategy (Khanka & Gupta, 2022). Therefore, by using this approach, Modern Art Gallery needs to focus on increasing customer loyalty, customer feedback, and customer satisfaction with its existing customer base. According to Ernst et al. (2023), the marketing penetration approach often seeks to protect the existing client base to avoid exploitation by competitors.
According to Kassaneh et al. (2021), A marketing penetration approach would be critical to Modern Art Gallery in improving the quality elements of its business. Per Zollo et al. (2022), the marketing plan would entail identifying the existing customers, evaluating their needs, and undertaking product promotion aligned with them. As highlighted above, the aim is to improve the existing customers' satisfaction and loyalty. It would help enhance sales by converting Modern Art Gallery's non-customers and potential to active customers (Chernev, 2020). Additionally, Perreault et al. (2021) assert that the strategy entails increasing the frequency of an organization's service consumption and product use. It implies that courtesy of technology, Modern Art Gallery can increase its customers' product and service purchases and consumption frequency. The above essentially refers to improving the quality and outcomes of the business without necessarily expanding Modern Art Gallery's customer base.
To achieve the goals of market penetration strategy, Blakeman (2023) highlights that Modern Art Gallery needs to undertake the following. First, the existing clients' awareness can be increased through marketing and promoting the gallery's product (Huang & Rust, 2021). For instance, it should identify the existing and new customers and enroll them in follow-up programs on services offered in the gallery.
Second, Eagle et al. (2020) explain that Modern Art Gallery needs to introduce customer loyalty campaigns and programs. It can reward loyal clients using this strategy to encourage them to maintain their loyalty to the services offered by the gallery. Elsewhere, the gallery needs to use various price promotions, such as discounts for existing clients, to retain them purposely. All the above techniques would enable Modern Art Gallery to increase the value accrued from its customer base before expanding its client base.
4.2. Product Innovation/Development Approach
Ernst et al. (2023) reveal that Modern Art Gallery would focus on enhancing the multi-dimensional aspects of its products and services under this approach. First, the management must introduce new products and services (Huang & Rust, 2021). The above is possible by approaching more artists or asking for more products from the existing artists to be displayed (Park, 2020). The above helps create a wider pool of products and services that would satisfy many diverse needs of more clients (Kassaneh et al., 2021). such an approach would attract additional clients with varying tastes and needs to Modern Art Gallery, thus enhancing its business and profitability.
Second, according to Stone et al. (2020), Modern Art Gallery's management should strongly consider investing more in product awareness and marketing in all the existing platforms. The gallery marketing team should not focus on conventional marketing channels like television and newspapers. Instead, the management and finance team must allocate enough resources to venture into contemporary marketing sites such as social media (Schama, 2023). As such, Zollo et al. (2022) posit that There is a need for thorough wariness making about Modern Art Gallery's paintings, drawings, and sculptures on all the above sites. To pragmatically undertake the above, the marketing team must evaluate the market and understand its popularity, acceptability, and other marketing details (Kassaneh et al., 2021). The above would enable it to map out the target markets for the first time and repeat marketing of its products. A focus on product development ensures that the gallery's product or services meet the requirements and needs of the clients, thus leading to acceptability and gains after marketing as opposed to a lack of knowledge and popularity of a product or service in a market or imprudent and wasteful marketing of a product that the maker essentially hates.
4.3. Market Betterment and Development Strategy
The market betterment and development marketing plan approach is one of the most popular strategies for expanding or already developed businesses or organizations. Primarily, the approach's users aim to broaden the scope of a business' market beyond the existing one (Schama, 2023). Modern Art Gallery needs to focus on expanding its client base by entering new geographic locations (Taormina & Baraldi, 2023). Additionally, the management can strongly consider approaching new demographic targets such as youths and schoolchildren by systematically targeting such people through marketing departments. The above implies that the Modern Art Gallery must not depend on families as the business's significant clients. (Han & Kang, 2020).
Vigorous product marketing with convincing insights into the product to the new markets, i.e., which Modern Art Gallery has expanded, would be equally crucial. For example, the management can focus on modifying the existing paints and drawings or sculpture requirements of the supplying artists to meet the demands of the new markets, such as youths and children. It implies that such products must be catchy and have elegant colors and paintings to appeal to the younger generation (Khanka & Gupta, 2022). Ultimately, Modern Art Gallery would successfully increase its customer base and ensure that it is satisfied, courtesy of the product development marketing plan.
4.4. Diversifying Approach
This marketing plan primarily entails expanding to new markets and giving them unique and new products that a business never had previously. Perreault et al. (2021) state that it is a demanding marketing planning stage because of the vast resources needed to identify new markets and understand their requirements. Additionally, more resources are required to develop new products and get them to such markets. Modern Art Gallery needs to invest in new markets, such as outside the nation, and create products that are suitable to them (Sahir & Rosmawati, 2020). for example, the business can partner with foreign artists famous in specific regions or countries. Therefore, availing such products through online exhibitions would be highly embraced in new markets, thus helping in expanding the business scope of Modern Art Gallery. The above implies that Modern Art Gallery doesn't need to depend on conventional physical visits and business-based activities. Instead, it reiterates the calls for the business to be diverse and embrace contemporary trends, such as significantly increasing its digital presence. The above is essential in ensuring that the business benefits from exploring even foreign markets without any limitations of geographical locations (Martin et al., 2020).
Table 2: Findings
5. Discussions
Using the Marketing Penetration Approach implies that Modern Art Gallery is willing to secure its customer base against any exploitation by competitors. Additionally, it seeks to ensure that the existing customers are of the highest possible value to the gallery and its business before it can expand its scope and operations. Further, according to Perreault et al. (2021), the strategy is critical in ensuring the business understands its customers well their needs and avails the best possible to meet them. Essentially, it implies a target to ensure that the clients are satisfied. It, therefore, suffices to state that the marketing plan indicates the need for efficiency, effectiveness, and quality returns in the future for Modern Art Gallery by maximizing returns from its existing client base instead of expanding the market without benefiting from it adequately.
On the other hand, the product Innovation/Development Approach depicts the need to focus on increasing the variety, quality, availability, and marketing of Modern Art Gallery's services and products. A lack of variety leads to the dissatisfaction of many clients who have varying tastes and needs. Additionally, poor product marketing leads to low awareness and purchase of a service or product (Blakeman, 2023). Therefore, Modern Art Gallery must utilize the product innovation and development strategy to enhance its services and product visibility, awareness, and variety. The above seeks to ensure that Modern Art Gallery in the future conforms with emerging trends, such as the need to have variety and adequate marketing to have a competitive edge in an increasingly competitive industry where alternatives are readily available and where people get information on competitors' products quickly courtesy of developing ethnology.
Market Betterment and Development Strategy would enable Modern Art Gallery to expand its business and clientele base after establishing itself. The idea is to increase the gallery's business and generate more returns. It implies that firms in the future cannot afford to rely on existing markets, yet aspects like competition are increasing. Modern Art Gallery itself suffers from customer attrition due to various reasons. Therefore, the business must expand its market in the future to enhance its business and revenues. Besides, it can enable the management and owners of the gallery to make the required profits to sustain the gallery's existence and operations.
Elsewhere, the Diversifying approach is critical in ensuring that expanding to new markets is a long-term strategy for Modern Art Gallery. Therefore, it should benefit the gallery and its management in the long term. Identifying new products that fit the new markets helps ensure that a business remains objective pragmatic, and satisfies its customers. The above sets the precedence for future practice in departments such as marketing and product or service innovation at the Modern Art Gallery. Essentially, they would realize the need to understand the needs and dynamics of various target customers and meet them appropriately to ensure utmost customer satisfaction and associated booming business.
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