Tai Kwun Enhances Visitor Engagement with Customer Data Platform on AWS

Tai Kwun, a cornerstone of Hong Kong's art scene, is curated by its non-profit art and heritage programs. It serves as a vibrant, welcoming space that fosters community inspiration through arts, culture, and heritage. Situated in the heart of central Hong Kong, Tai Kwun offers immersive, world-class experiences, nurturing a deep appreciation for arts and culture within the community.

In 2023, Tai Kwun sought to boost visitor numbers and engagement. Alex Tse, head of ICT at Tai Kwun, says, “We seek to foster a greater appreciation for contemporary art among Hong Kong residents.” To achieve this, the organization decided to implement a customer data platform (CDP) and establish a unified customer database to enhance exhibition marketing campaigns.

Tai Kwun opted for a cloud-based CDP. This decision aligned with the organization's existing local cloud operations for visitor-facing systems like its website and mobile app. "We aimed to develop the CDP on a secure cloud platform, ensuring end-to-end data protection for our customer information," says Tse.

Tai Kwun chose to build its CDP on Amazon Web Services (AWS), following a recommendation from its Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) HR provider, which also operates its HR system on AWS. To expedite deployment, the organization worked with an AWS Partner to design and implement the AWS infrastructure.

The CDP runs on Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) Auto Scaling to automatically add or remove virtual server instances. The infrastructure also includes cloud-native Amazon Aurora—a relational database management system—for Tai Kwun Contemporary’s MySQL customer database. Furthermore, the organization deployed Amazon CloudFront for content delivery, Elastic Load Balancing (ELB) to maximize application scalability, and AWS WAF, a web application firewall.

Despite initially anticipating a 6–8-week timeline, Tai Kwun successfully rolled out its CDP on AWS in two weeks. The seamless deployment process prompted the senior management team to migrate its local cloud-based loyalty program to AWS.

By using AWS, Tai Kwun secures customer-related data spanning its CDP and loyalty program environment. Tai Kwun benefited from the robust security measures and certifications provided by AWS, including ISO 27017 and PCI PSS, ensuring data protection and compliance. This also paved the way for easy enhancements to its websites, such as the addition of a payment feature. Furthermore, Tai Kwun strictly adhered to AWS data protection best practices within its AWS environments.

In addition to benefiting from comprehensive security, Tse and his IT team have also saved time through server scaling automation—time they've used to focus on migrating Tai Kwun's remaining on-premises servers to AWS. Tse adds, "While it feels like our cloud journey with AWS is just starting, we are now better equipped to harness our data and enhance customer engagement."

With the implementation of its CDP and loyalty program on AWS, Tai Kwun has successfully consolidated customer data within a highly secure environment. This unified dataset empowers staff to finely target marketing efforts and foster repeat visits. As a result, the organization projects a 10 percent increase in visitor numbers over the next 12 months, with residents estimated to visit the gallery an average of three times annually.

Notably, this uptick in visitors has been particularly pronounced among millennials, who comprise eight out of every ten visitors. This demographic, alongside those slightly over 25 years old, plays a pivotal role in driving the contemporary art market. Tai Kwun attributes this surge in interest to the enhanced utilization of social media channels facilitated by the CDP on AWS. Tse says, “The CDP on AWS helps us tailor relevant emails to specific demographics and seamlessly distribute up-to-date information through our mobile app."

Tse envisions an even broader impact in the future, aiming to cultivate a stronger connection between individuals of all age groups, including gallery staff, and the institution. He emphasizes the potential for Tai Kwun to inspire a wider audience to embrace Hong Kong's vibrant contemporary art scene. "The diverse nature of contemporary art—spanning sculpture, digital art, and virtual reality—kindles a rapid interest among our staff and visitors alike. With the CDP on AWS, we aspire to fuel a deeper engagement with the city’s dynamic art landscape," Tse concludes.