Building communities in absence of relations. Branding efforts of US art museums in the pandemic

During a crisis, art museums focus on branding as they contribute to a museum’s relations, target multiple audiences, and embrace the community they are committed with. Branding depends on the sizes and salaries of boards, employees, and volunteers, who combine their efforts and they mix advertising and fundraising with branding. Advertising and fundraising expenses can therefore signal the branding effort. IT (information Technology) expenses may show commitment to branding. Considering the 100 biggest US art museums, this paper analyzes the branding effort in the pandemic according to accounting and the sizes of boards, employees, and volunteers. As the economic result of relations with all stakeholders, total revenue results are positively correlated with salaries, sizes of boards and volunteers, and fundraising expenses, as contributions prevail with the lockdown of museums. Without previous literature on the magnitude of branding efforts and performance, this research may represent a benchmark for challenging time, while museum branding analytics is still looking for trustworthy measures.