How alternative marketing strategies impact the performance of Spanish museums

Abstract

PurposeThe current work seeks to analyze the different effects of three alternative strategic marketing orientations – market orientation, sales orientation, and product orientation – on non‐profit organizations' effectiveness, specifically their economic and social effectiveness.Design/methodology/approachIn order to test the hypotheses proposed, an empirical analysis of 182 Spanish museums was conducted.FindingsThe study reveals that social effectiveness relates highly to product and customer orientation, whereas economic effectiveness mainly depends on sales orientation and inter‐functional coordination.Practical implicationsThe results suggest that applying a marketing orientation centered on the product and knowing the visitor is critical for successfully fulfilling the objectives of conservation and diffusion of culture. Moreover, the organization needs to focus on sales, on the internal customer, and on the coordination between the managing institutions, to be able to achieve satisfactory economic results.Originality/valueThis work makes an empirical contribution to the analysis of market orientation on cultural organizations. Although previous research has underlined the relevance of a market orientation for museums and cultural organizations, few empirical analyses have been developed until now.