The Killerton estate was gifted to the National Trust by the Acland family in 1946. Like many National Trust sites, it is an old property sometimes requiring essential maintenance work. During the period of February to October 2017, essential repairs were required to the roof. Due to the work, the first floor and other parts of the house and exhibits had restricted access for visitors.
Killerton was keen to understand the potential impact on the visitor experience of this work, as-well-as the impact and understanding of the ‘one big story’ (why the Acland family gave up their home for their beliefs).
Research Approach
Due to the differing nature of the estate and the objectives, Turquoise recommended a multi-pronged market research approach. Research was conducted across, August, September and October of 2017 which comprised of:
- Exit interviews conducted by Market Research Society (MRS) trained interviewers
- Sentiment analysis of National Trust comment cards and luggage labels (from visitors of the main house)
- Turquoise Touchpoint Kiosk was used to facilitate iPad self-completion surveys by visitors of the Killerton shop
- Turquoise Game Changer was used to analyse social media and Trip Advisor comments to understand and compare Killerton visitor experiences with other South West National Trust sites
Insights Delivered
- The research successfully identified the characteristics of different visitor groups who were either satisfied or not
- Turquoise identified one simple question that Killerton could ask visitors to enable them to identify these groups
- The optimal intercept point for these groups and the management of expectations were also recommended
- Regarding the maintenance work the key to satisfaction was being aware of the work in advance of the visit, although there were additional demographic differences
The successful installation of the Turquoise Touchpoint Kiosk showed that a motivated group of volunteers within the shop could encourage much wider completion of questionnaires which could be easily adapted to gain a range of visitor insights throughout the year.
More about Game Changer
Turquoise Game Changer is a qualitative market research tool that enables the analysis of any volume of text-based comments. For Killerton’s visitor experience market research, we used this revolutionary tool to analyse over 40,000 Trip Advisor comments – tapping into a range of 11 different emotions relating to the visit: From love and delight through to frustration and disappointment. The ability to analyse keywords, themes and context at such a granular level is what gives Game Changer the edge, and Turquoise were able to recommend specific improvement opportunities based on what was frustrating certain visitors. By analysing comments from other sites in the region, Killerton can now benchmark themselves against other National Trust locations, armed with the insights required to improve visitor engagement.
Turquoise Game Changer Dashboard for the National Trust
If you would like to understand much more about the experiences of your visitors, customers or staff and how Turquoise Game Changer could help you unearth improvement opportunities for your organisation, we’d love to hear from you.
You can contact us here.