There’s a very specific reason we pitched a session to the National Arts Marketing Project Conference on behalf of the Philadelphia-based Wyncote Foundation.

In a year’s research in 2014, we set out to understand the conditions and capacities that are encouraging innovation in the deployment of digital technology in the cultural sector, particularly among legacy cultural institutions. In our resulting report, Like, Link, Share: How cultural organizations are embracing digital technology, we provide examples from these innovators that demonstrate why the most progressive and effective technology strategy is not (only) about marketing. Yet marketing is the arena where many cultural institutions park their organization’s digital strategy and the staff responsible for it. We want to tell you why that’s a mistake, why funders are increasingly interested in a far more holistic approach to tech, and what organization-wide digital strategy looks like when empowered across all departments.

As a preview to our discussion, here are three quick reasons why we believe that digital strategy is aligned with all strategy.

1.       Making art.  Today, “media” is shorthand for a powerful set of tools that both artists and producing staff employ to create compelling works. Artists need access to these digital tools, to display and production capacities, and to engagement platforms, whether for projects that are fully digital or hybrids that combine digital and analog, and whether used for creation of static “objects” or interactive experiences.

2.       Doing business.  Digital technology offers the capability for increasingly targeted approaches to reaching new people, connecting them with our organizations and each other, and offering platforms where they can “take part,” not just “partake” in our organizations. Digital platforms also allow internally silo-ed departments to share data, information, and work processes easily and efficiently. Organizations with minimal technology capacity are inherently less efficient than their tech-savvy peers and even more seriously handicapped when compared to competitors in commercial culture, who rely on advanced Customer Relationship Management tools and engagement platforms and tightly linked business functions.

3.       Gauging impact. Digital technology offers new ways to discover and measure the impact of our work on those we engage. Analytics help us understand use, including the time spent with our materials and the number of repeat visitors. Comments, reviews, and other forms of engagement give us direct feedback about ways people experience our organizations and want to be involved. Participation in online forums and discussions, and contributions to content like memory books or photo journals, show us the ways people are willing to bring their owns ideas and experiences to enrich our work. And, links to our projects and postings show us how they are valued by other people and organizations in the “digital space.”

Not convinced that digital strategy should be organization-wide? Read a recent McKinsey paper that gives reasons for an integrated approach, one that is centrally “dissected, understood, and addressed.”  The paper goes further to describe the increasingly prevalent Chief Digital Officer position as the senior leader effectively functioning as “chief transformation officer.”  It’s that important. Working for an organization too small to consider such a lofty role and job title? No worries, as long as your CEO is ready and eager to lead in all the ways our increasingly digital culture demands.

See you in Salt Lake City!

Sarah Lutman is speaking during the preconference A Look Behind the Curtain: How Grantmakers Are Evaluating Proposals for Digital Media during the National Arts Marketing Project Conference 2015. REGISTER before this Friday, 10/23!