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By West Midlands Museum Development / Posted on Tuesday 3rd August 2021

Volunteers Celebration and Recruitment Campaign

West Midlands Museum Development (WMMD) is looking for videos and images from Accredited museums and those Working Towards Accreditation in the West Midlands. The content will showcase the diversity of your volunteers and the activities they undertake.

Deadline for submissions: 5pm, Friday 20 August

We’d like to promote the wide range of museum volunteering opportunities in the region, including but not limited to; Front of House roles, demonstrators, collections care, audience engagement, fundraising, administration support, Trustees, social media and remote volunteering. If you can, send images and recordings of the interesting and surprising things your volunteers do! The videos and images may be marketing materials that you already have, or you may ask your volunteers to record new content specially for the occasion.

Submissions will be used as part of a video montage for the WMMD Volunteers Celebration and Recruitment Campaign films.

The films and content will be shared online across websites and social media channels, for press and promotional activities, and some images may be used in the supporting Volunteers Recruitment Marketing Toolkit and templates to help museums across the West Midlands promote their own volunteering opportunities.

Technical specifications:

  • We would like any type of material you have (images, videos, screenshots, screen captures, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook videos and images, Zoom recordings that are relevant)
  • Upload images and videos with the highest resolution possible (don’t select “compress”)
  • The materials can be in either portrait or landscape orientation
  • Selfies are absolutely fine
  • Ideally, shoot any video in 1080x920p and images at “high resolution” but don’t be afraid to upload lower resolution materials
  • If using sound, make sure it’s clearly audible and there isn’t a lot of background noise
  • Please name your files with your museum name and number each file (if uploading multiple submissions)

Please note that we cannot guarantee that we will use all materials submitted.

Consent to share materials
Organisations sharing materials such as video or photographic content with WMMD and our project partners for use in the Volunteers Celebration and Recruitment Campaign must ensure that they have received and recorded permission from all identifiable individuals.

How to submit materials
Please complete the Material Release Form BEFORE submitting any materials. Submission is via Dropbox, instructions detailed on the Materials Release Form.

Deadline for submissions: 5pm, Friday 20 August

More about the campaign

Although we won’t be hosting our regional volunteers awards ceremony again this year, we would still like to say Thank You to the thousands of museum volunteers in the region; the volunteers that have been working behind the scenes and at home, the Trustees that have applied for funding and monitored finances, the volunteers that have kept everyone in the loop and checked in on friends and colleagues during closure, and those that are eagerly waiting to return to venues.

The recent WMMD volunteering survey has demonstrated that many museums have seen a significant reduction in their volunteer numbers, with many long term volunteers choosing to permanently step down, concerns about safety over the coming months, new commitments; all reducing capacity and activity in many venues.

WMMD has commissioned Happenstance Films and Social For Good to develop a marketing campaign to celebrate and thank museum volunteers in the West Midlands. The campaign will showcase and promote the diverse opportunities and museums we work with and aims to encourage more people to volunteer in West Midlands museums.

The campaign will launch in autumn 2021 and consist of a series of short films that signpost viewers to opportunities on the WMMD Volunteers Portal. The films will be released alongside a Volunteer Recruitment Marketing Toolkit, which will include templates and guidance for using the films and resources to construct a bespoke recruitment campaign. Individual museums will be able to use the toolkit to promote their opportunities directly to their local communities and social media followers.

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