To ensure International Museum Day fulfils its ambitions, we need your help!

You are the ambassadors of International Museum Day. Thanks to the activities that you organise and the strong connections you develop with your public, this event continues to be a success year after year.

In addition to the activities you plan, your participation in International Museum Day is an opportunity for you to:

• Implement partnerships  with schools, associations, other museums, etc. to promote the event as a moment of sharing and collaboration; 

• Use and disseminate the graphic materials of the event, in order to spread the news of your activities efficiently throughout the world; 

• Spread information about International Museum Day to the public via your web spaces (website, social media, etc.);

• Send a press release about International Museum Day or organising a press conference as a means to ensure the visibility of your museum and of the event;

• Gain international visibility about your activities before and after the event: by sharing information about your International Museum Day activities with ICOM, allowing us to spread the news throughout our network and beyond through social networks and our website dedicated to the event. It also allows us to enrich our archives with International Museum Day activities from each year’s celebration.

International Museum Day draws the attention of both the general public and museum professionals around the world. We hope that you will plan your own activities for the 2015 edition of the event, following the general principles of International Museum Day and that the examples of past International Museum Day activities, be they original or conventional, with limited budget or broad‐based activities, will provide inspiration for your own preparations.

We recommend that you follow eight important steps:

1. Target a specific public 

Regular visitors? A new public? Socially‐disadvantaged persons? Specific public: children, teenagers, senior citizens, handicapped persons, etc.? In the Kit for Museums , you will find examples of activities that target different publics.

2. Define your objectives

To reach a new public? To attract various types of visitors? To enhance the museum’s visibility? To highlight your participation in the community? To be heard by public authorities? To make your institution known to potential partners?

3. Position your museum

The objectives you set can also be related to the positioning of your museum. International Museum Day helps to show the importance of museums in society and to highlight their different aspects. You need therefore to find the positioning that best suits your institution. Is it an innovative museum? A museum that listens to social issues? A dynamic museum? A museum in contact with the public? A museum that generates tourism?

4. Forge institutional partnerships and sponsorships 

International Museum Day is an opportunity to create local, national or international partnerships, regarding anything from collections, to mediation or financing. Collaboration can be implemented with other museum professionals, other museums, associations, private companies, and more.

5. Develop a precise budget 

International Museum Day’s activities can be organised in large structures as well as small institutions. The necessary human and financial resources will also depend on the visibility you choose to give to the event.

6. Create an unexpected programme  

In the Kit for Museums, we will give you some ideas with examples of successful International Museum Day activities in the past. An unexpected activity programme is key to your success!

7. Develop a communications and promotion strategy 

We have developed a set of communication tools to help you implement your strategy. ICOM and its network can also be one of your communication channels.

8. Make a post‐event evaluation

It is important for you to analyse the success of your International Museum Day and its effective impact. It is therefore essential to define criteria of success, depending on your objectives. Some examples of good performance indicators include: attendance, creation of long-term partnerships and the number of media sources that diffused information about the event.

International Museum Day is an occasion to honour museum audiences and to offer a wide range of special activities, depending on your target public.

It is best to define your activity programme in relation to the theme suggested for International Museum Day 2015: Museums for a sustainable society.

Examples of activities for a general public

Official poster and its variations (postcard and web banner)

Each year, ICOM creates an International Museum Day poster, as well as a postcard and web banner, linked to the theme of the year, enabling participating museums to illustrate the theme and to attract visitors with an appealing design. 

You can download the poster, the postcard and the web banner for 2015 on the International Museum Day website on the page The Poster

In 2014, thanks to you, the poster was available in 32 different language versions. This year, ICOM Committees will assist us in providing you with International Museum Day poster for 2015 and additional tools in your own language(s).

If you wish to use the poster in a language that is not available, do not hesitate to contact your ICOM National Committee. 

The poster we provide contains a blank space at the bottom left where information about your museum, your partners and the activities you are planning to organise can be easily inserted. However, the official logos must not be removed. You may also send an email to imd@icom.museum to receive an editable InDesign version if you wish to modify the poster’s format.

We invite you to print and hang the poster in your museum during International Museum Day. You can also adapt this image in many ways and on any media, according to your wishes. Warning: you cannot use this image for commercial purposes.

In order to disseminate and archive your creations for our records, we would be grateful if you could send us any modified designs made from the International Museum Day 2015 image.

You can look for three different kinds of support:

•  Financial support: financial aid for the everyday functioning of a structure or for a special event such as International Museum Day. This support can come from private companies or public administrations.

•  In-kind sponsorship: a company can donate products for your event, such as for a reception, or it can print or disseminate the leaflets of your event free of charge. 

•  Skills sponsorship: a company can make its staff available to you free of cost, for example the communications department. This kind of sponsorship is on the rise in particular for educational programmes.

To give visibility to your partners, you may offer to: 

•  Insert their logo in all the communications tools created for the event and particularly in the poster.

•  Insert information about the partner in the press kit and press releases.

•  Organise the International Museum Day launch jointly with your partners.

•  Invite partners to participate in your activity programme or to disseminate documents during your International Museum Day event.

•  Organise a reception for networking purposes, if you have a number of sponsors.

•  Publish the company’s advertisements in one of your communication outlets.