From devices to BYOD: how the Acropolis Museum went to 40,000 users per month with Smartify

Overview

The Acropolis Museum integrated Smartify into their offering over multiple years, improving the visitor experience and expanding their reach.

Their audio tours and image recognition app is free for all visitors to the venue with their entry ticket.

The brief

Despite being a highly visited institution, the Acropolis Museum was limited in its audio guide offering. They had 300 devices, meaning thousands of visitors were left without additional interpretative materials.

The team approached Smartify to explore whether a solution on visitors’ own devices – the bring-your-own-device (BYOD) model – would be a better way to meet the demand.

Little did they know that moving to this solution would bring so many additional benefits in terms of sustainability and accessibility too.

Previously we used hardware devices. With so many visitors we had issues with charging them and distributing. Now, we can offer an experience to every single visitor that’s more sustainable, cost-effective and efficient. Most importantly, the experience itself is also far more advanced and visitors love it.

– Aggeliki Kouveli, Acropolis Museum

The solution

The team at Acropolis Museum worked with Smartify over several years to integrate best-in-class solutions for their visitors.

Year 1: general audio tour offering with tickets replaces the need for hardware devices. Smartify also delivered staff training and workshops for best practice.

Year 2: expanded languages and 3D scanning of the collection to enable image recognition across a collection of about 3,500 objects. Through object recognition, visitors could instantly unlock a wealth of additional information, commentary and alternate views of the exhibits not always visible from the display. The museum integrated additional signage to encourage usage of the application.

Year 3: launch of AI-powered translations and itineraries for personalised experiences. Visitors are able to cater their visit to the amount of time they have available and their individual interests.

The results

The Acropolis Museum’s digital visitor guide now has up to 40,000 users per month, accessing the content in over 25 languages. Thanks to the advanced automated translation technology, the guide transcends linguistic boundaries, bringing the museum’s unique treasures to life for people in every corner of the world.

What’s more, the app has a 97% satisfaction rate and an 8.4 Net Promoter Score.