Social Research ¦ Market Research ¦ Behavioural Insight ¦ Evaluation ¦ SROI
Social Research ¦ Market Research ¦ Behavioural Insight ¦ Evaluation ¦ SROI
The Groundlings were an online research community of 250 Royal Shakespeare Company audience members and potential audience members. The community first began in 2023 and continued until March 2025.
The group was systematically sampled from the RSC mailing list to represent a broad spectrum of RSC audience members – from Patrons to those who had not visited but would have liked to, and including a boost of n=50 teachers who used RSC resources or undertook visits/outreach.
The Groundlings were set fortnightly tasks covering a wide range of topics. They:
In addition to the set-piece activities, one of the most valuable aspects of the community was the audience-curated discussions. Participants were free to suggest topics for discussion and, over duration of the community, more than 176 unique discussion topics were suggested and discussed by the group, with most garnering extensive engagement. Topics included show reviews, events they considered/ were attending at the RSC, pre-visit emails and communications, memories of experiences The Groundlings have of Shakespeare and the RSC, the availability of Shakespeare merchandise, accessibility, and EDI.
These discussions were also summarised in our fortnightly reports and provided RSC insight into the ‘beating heart’ of discussions.
The Groundlings Community – which was named by members themselves – was an example of an incredibly engaged longitudinal study. Members formed their own quiz groups held on Zoom, organised in-person meet-ups, and also lobbied to have ‘Groundlings Badges’ made and distributed, such was the pride and engagement in the group, and we duly obliged.
The group was kept fresh through a review of engagement every four months or so, and those who were not involved were removed to make room for others who were recruited to maintain the overall profile of the community.
