Custom app for audience reach and subsidy accountability
Appfront builds apps for cultural organisations that record audience reach per activity and produce the figures that municipalities, provinces and funds ask for: visitors, target groups, origin, education and progress against performance agreements. So that year-end accountability is an export, not a reconstruction.
What is an audience reach and grant accountability app?
A funder doesn't ask whether the season was good; they ask how many people came, who they were, and whether the agreements were met: number of performances, visitors, schools in the education programme, neighbourhood activities, new target groups. An audience reach app records what needs counting for each activity, pulls visitor numbers from ticketing and box office, adds counts from free activities, and tracks how far the institution has got on each performance agreement.
Without such an app, accountability is an annual reconstruction. The ticketing system knows the paying visitors, the till knows the museum admissions, the education coordinator has a list of schools, the festival has an estimate of the square, and someone has to put all of this into the municipality's format, which differs from the province's and the fund's. It takes weeks, the figures cannot be traced back, and every question from the funder means more searching.
We build custom solutions because every organisation has different sources and different agreements. A theatre counts tickets, a museum counts admissions and groups, a library counts members and activity participants, and a festival counts with a daily estimate. Performance agreements are set out in a decision that is structured differently for each municipality. The app connects to your ticketing and till systems, knows your agreements and produces the report each funder requires.
Activity as the unit
Every performance, exhibition, workshop or neighbourhood activity with date, location, target group and source of the count: ticketing, box office, registration or estimate.
Reach from sources
Visitors from ticketing and box office captured automatically, counts and registrations for free activities entered, origin and target group added where known.
Performance agreements and reporting
The agreements from the decision letter as trackers, progress by quarter, and a report per funder in the format they require.
How we build your audience reach and grant accountability app
We start with the grant decisions and the latest accountability report: what was requested, where the figures came from, and what it cost to produce them. The app follows from that.
The performance agreements per funder, the sources visitors and participants currently come from, and what exists only on paper or in someone's head. We review the latest accountability report and where its figures originated.
The activity register with type, target group and location, the integration with ticketing and tills, and input for free activities, education and neighbourhood work.
The commitments from each grant decision as counters in the app, with progress per period and an alert when a commitment falls behind.
The report per funder in the required format, the multi-year comparison, and then management and adjustments when a grant decision changes.
What an app for audience reach and grant accountability does in practice
The components below feature in almost every publicly funded institution. Which ones you need depends on your sources and on the number of funders.
Activity register
Every activity with type, date, location, target group, partner and the agreement it falls under.
Ticketing and till integration
Visitors per performance and daily admissions pulled automatically from your ticketing and till systems, with counts linked to each activity.
Counts and registrations
Input for free activities, education and neighbourhood work: number of participants, schools, groups, with an estimate where counting isn't possible, and the source noted.
Target group and origin
The target group per activity and, where available, origin from ticketing postcodes, without storing personal data.
Performance monitor
The agreements per funder as counters with quarterly progress and an alert when a commitment falls behind schedule.
Accountability report
Per funder, the report in the required format, with the source for each figure and a comparison with previous years.
Who we build an app for audience reach and grant accountability for
The app is intended for institutions where grant funding makes up a large part of the budget and where accountability currently consumes the first weeks of the year.
Theatres and concert halls
Visitors from ticketing by performance, education with schools, and a performance agreement per genre. The integration with ticketing and the education count are the core.
Museums
Daily admissions from the box office, groups and guided tours counted separately, exhibitions as an activity. The daily count and the groups are what's needed.
Festivals
Free and paid events mixed together, counts per day and per stage, an estimate where counting isn't possible. The source for each figure is the core.
Libraries and community arts centres
Activities in neighbourhoods, participants per workshop, collaborations with schools and social services. The activity register and the neighbourhood breakdown matter most.
Test your idea first: a working prototype in 1 day
With OneDayBuild, we turn your idea into something tangible in one day for €1,150, so you can see whether further development is worth the investment. Decide to go ahead with the full build? Then we credit the full cost.
Explore OneDayBuild →Technology and integrations
This page is about measuring reach and accounting for it. For applying for and managing grants yourself, see our page on grant management software, and for running a venue's operations, see our page on performing arts software. You can read about how we work under getting software built.
For annual accounts with definitions per funder, see our software for annual audience reach reporting.
If the figures concern participants in workshops, lessons and programmes rather than visitors, see our app for participant reporting in arts funding.
Why choose Appfront for your app for audience reach and grant accountability?
A report is only as good as its source for each figure. That is what we build on: every number in the report can be traced back to an activity and a count.
Counting at the activity
Not at the end of the year, but at every performance, guided tour and workshop. The report is the sum, not a search.
Format per funder
Each municipality, province and fund asks for its own structure. The app produces, from the same source, the report each of them wants.
Shortfalls visible in time
A performance agreement that falls behind in September can still be corrected in September. In January, it is just an explanation.
Security and privacy for an app covering audience reach and grant reporting
The app works with visitor numbers and, where ticketing provides it, postcodes for visitor origin. Personal data of visitors is not transferred; origin is aggregated by postcode area and counts contain no names. Access is set up by role: programming and education enter data, management sees the monitor, and the funder receives a report.
The app runs in a European data centre, with encrypted storage and daily backups. Integrations with ticketing and point-of-sale use their own keys, which can be revoked per integration.
Frequently asked questions about an app for audience reach and grant reporting
Questions cultural organisations ask before getting started.
It records per activity how many people attended and who they were, pulls the figures from ticketing and point-of-sale systems, lets counts of free activities be entered, tracks progress against each funder's performance agreements, and produces the report in the format that funder requires, with the source for each figure.
Those that offer an interface or an export; most ticketing systems for venues and museums do. For each system, we determine in the first step whether the figures can come in automatically or via a periodic export. The app will not be a second ticketing system.
For each activity, the staff member enters the number of participants, based on registrations, an on-site count or an estimate, and the app records which of the three it was. If a funder asks how a figure was arrived at, the answer comes from the app.
Yes. Origin comes from the postcodes ticketing already holds and is summarised directly by area; no names or addresses are transferred. The target group is recorded per activity, not per person. That is enough for what funders ask, and it keeps the app away from sensitive data.
The monitor shows, for each agreement, where you stand relative to the season, and gives a signal when it is falling behind. In September, management sees what still needs to happen in the autumn, instead of having to explain in January why a target was missed.
Yes. Each grant decision has its own agreements and its own format, and the same activity can fall under several agreements. The app keeps these apart and produces a report per funder from the same source, so the figures are consistent with one another.
Check that first. Ticketing reports paid visitors per performance, and for a small venue with one funder that may be enough. Custom work makes sense when free activities, education and community work make up a large part of reach, when there are several funders with their own formats, or when performance agreements need monitoring throughout the year.
Your reporting as an export instead of a reconstruction?
Tell us which funders you work with, which ticketing and point-of-sale systems you use, and how long your last funding report took. We'll show you what the activity register, the monitor and the report look like.