Where did the idea for this website come from?

The idea for the KulturaTaniej.pl was first of all born out of a liking for cultural attractions offered by city institutions - cinemas, theatres, philharmonics etc. The second element which encouraged us to work on the website was the success of platforms that offered booking services at discount prices. However, we decided that shopping websites weren't really suitable for all companies and institutions because cultural services are often placed next to fast-food and beauty treatment offers. Besides, we wanted to create an effective tool for promoting culture that at the same time wouldn't be a sales website. Cultural events deserve a more thematic advertising and it is this belief that motivated us to create KulturaTaniej.pl.

In your offer, you address both cultural institutions and their audiences.  In what way can each of these groups use KulturaTaniej.pl?

The rules are very simple. We offer 4 services for institutions - today's offer, reduction, contest and patronage. Let me briefly explain each of them.

Today's offer allows for promoting novelties, measurable advertising and sale support by making tickets available with a discount of 50% or more. The institution doesn't have to pay and the only cost is the discount and a provision for KulturaTaniej.pl.

Reductions are another advertising and sale supporting tool. It's a form of a paid Internet advertising whose advantage is a 100% measurability and the ability of encouraging the audience by means of lower ticket prices. Reductions may range from 20% to 40%. Internet users print them completely free of charge and use them at the venue, for instance, in the theatre. It's a great tool for eliminating seasonalness (for instance on weekdays institutions usually record lower sales.

Other services are contests and patronages. On our website and on Facebook, we organise contests that attract the attention of many people. We give our patronage to interesting events which we want to tell internet users about. In exchange we only want our logo to be put in the promotional materials.
Thanks to all these actions, cultural institutions can effectively reach the people who probably wouldn't use this type of services in normal circumstances. And the audience can learn how valuable and interesting the cultural offer is in their city. By using KulturaTaniej.pl, a potential client of an institution has the possibility to learn about that institution and use its offer at a lower price. Access to information about a service and its discounted price are what motivates to experience something new.  

How do you convince cultural institutions to use your services?

The dedicated nature of KulturaTaniej.pl appeals to the users' imagination because they know what to expect of the website. Shopping platforms available in Poland are very general and present services of all kinds which doesn't have a positive influence on the image of a cultural institution. Advertising an offer on KulturaTaniej.pl guarantees reaching thousands of recipients who in other circumstances wouldn't know about a given performance, show or event. A key factor are also discounts available on our website, which can be quickly and comfortably used by users looking for attractions. This way cultural institutions become more familiar and gain new fans. What is important for institutions is that the costs are fixed and that's why it pays off to sell tickets at lower prices and have a full house. 

 
 

What institution can be certain that investing in promotion on KulturaTaniej.pl will be profitable?

We are certain that cooperation with KulturaTaniej.pl will guarantee popularity for several reasons. First of all, we know that theatres, cinemas, exhibitions, literature and concerts can be sources of good fun and ways to spend time in a pleasant and useful way. Demand for culture is huge but the amount of offers available on the market pushes cultural institutions to the side. Thanks to intensive actions in social media, numerous courses and reviews we stimulate interest in culture, and the comfortable navigation of our website makes culture easily available. As mentioned earlier, it is crucial that institutions don't have to pay for publicising their offers The costs are fixed and we provide profit from ticket sales and a chance of winning new clients. Admittedly, institutions which choose the 20-40% reductions pay for this form of advertising but they can very accurately verify the effectiveness of the campaign by counting all the reduction printouts that the clients bring.  

So you work as a middleman between cultural institutions and the audience. Why do you think such thing is needed?

Cultural offers usually lose against more popular services or services that were advertised more intensively. Many people are distrustful of culture because it seems to them that it's incomprehensible or boring. Such stereotypes are best overcome by experience - I know many people who associated theatres with entertainment for snobs but once they got convinced to see a show they were delighted. We think that if money are the barrier that stops people from learning about the cultural offer, than this barrier should be limited - offering discounts is a great idea for gaining trust of audiences not accustomed to culture. Clients who get to like cultural entertainment will later be prone to pay the full price for it.

You use classical promotional methods in the area of culture. Why does entrepreneurship in culture pay off?

It's worth investing in culture because it has a tremendous intellectual value and at the same time is a source of pleasure. We only have to make the people who are not interested or are just barely interested in culture aware of this. It will contribute to a better perception of culture and to showing that it's not meant only for a small circle of recipients.  In other words, cultural institutions have a great potential, also in the scope of entrepreneurship, but they have do more work to fully use it. Institutions related to culture, similarly to companies in other branches, have more and more competition and they must understand that without a proper attitude they won't be able to compete on the market and effectively gain clients.

Lower ticket prices mean better accessibility of culture but will this be enough for an average Pole to spend his/her time in a cinema, theatre or philharmonic?

Everyone has their own taste but interest in culture will certainly not improve if we won't start using such offers more frequently. Someone who doesn't try it at least once won't remain a fan of culture - that's why it's worth promoting it. We believe that thanks to KulturaTaniej.pl Poles will appreciate culture more and will start choosing it over, for instance, thoughtless rest in front of a TV.

The website started just recently and is addressed to residents of big cities. Do you plan on reaching also people in smaller cities in the future?

There's no doubt that bigger cities have richer cultural offers. Nonetheless, we want to be a website for all Poles and that's why if we get interesting cooperation proposals, we will present special offer also for smaller cities.

Korneliusz Smolik, spokesman of KulturaTaniej.pl, was interviewed by Agnieszka Gernand