Discover how our next-generation audio guide can enhance visitor engagement, boost accessibility, and bring immersive storytelling to life in your museum. It’s time to reimagine what’s possible.

If you’ve worked with Guide-ID in the past, chances are you’re familiar with our trusty Podcatcher audio guide device. It’s been a reliable companion for many museums over the years, helping visitors enjoy self-guided tours with ease. But as technology evolves, so too must our tools. Enter the Podcatcher Pro – our next-generation audio guide that’s designed to offer a richer, smarter, and more immersive experience for today’s museums. And if you haven’t had the chance to try it yet, we think it’s time to rediscover what we can offer.

A Simpler, Smarter Device for a New Era

So, what exactly is the Podcatcher Pro? Think of it as the evolution of our original Podcatcher but with major upgrades where it matters most. It’s still the easy-to-use audio player you remember, but now it’s packed with advanced features like automatic language selection, enhanced audio quality, and the ability to support group tours with a single device. This means that whether visitors are exploring exhibits solo or in groups, they’ll get the best experience without interruptions or distractions.

Why the Upgrade?

When developing the Podcatcher Pro, we didn’t just want to make an incremental improvement – we wanted to create something that truly changes the way museums can deliver storytelling. The Pro model is designed to inspire and engage visitors like never before. Imagine walking into a room where the audio content changes automatically based on your location, or seamlessly switching between layers of sound to reveal deeper layers of a story. And for those who prefer using their own equipment, the Podcatcher Pro offers wireless headphone support for an even more personalized experience.

More Than Just a Tour – A Connection

One of the biggest misconceptions about audio guides is that they are static, one-size-fits-all solutions. Not with the Podcatcher Pro. We’ve worked hard to ensure it doesn’t just “tell” a story – it helps create it. By integrating AI features, you can personalize tours for specific audiences, offer real-time visitor interaction, and even collect insights that help you improve future experiences. Whether you’re hosting a major temporary exhibition or creating a permanent installation, this device can grow and evolve alongside your museum.

How Museums Are Already Using It

Several forward-thinking institutions have already embraced the Podcatcher Pro. The Birmingham Museums Trust and Märkisches Museum Berlin are just two examples of places where the Podcatcher Pro is transforming the visitor experience. Whether it’s automatic audio triggering in darkened rooms or the ability to pair storytelling with interactive displays, museums are finding new ways to bring their exhibitions to life.

Making Museums More Accessible

We’ve also focused on making the Podcatcher Pro audio guide as inclusive as possible. For visitors who are visually impaired, automatic triggering allows them to navigate exhibitions without needing to manually operate the device. There’s also the option to connect hearing aids via Bluetooth, and support for sign-language tours is another key feature. This means everyone – regardless of ability – can fully enjoy the richness of the museum’s stories.

Why Now Is the Perfect Time to Rediscover Guide-ID

We know that many museum leaders we’ve worked with in the past are always on the lookout for ways to innovate and improve visitor engagement. The Podcatcher Pro isn’t just an audio guide—it’s a platform that opens up a new world of possibilities for visitor interaction, accessibility, and immersive storytelling. If you’ve used our original device before, we believe the Podcatcher Pro will reignite your excitement for what’s possible.

Want to learn more? We’d love to help you rediscover the magic of self-guided audio tours. Reach out, and let’s discuss how the Podcatcher Pro can fit into your next exhibit.

This is more than just an upgrade – it’s the future of museum storytelling

Say hello to Emanuela Kontent! The new sales manager at Guide-ID is here, and she’s ready to rock. We had the pleasure of sitting down with Emanuela for a lively chat about her role, her vision, and what makes her tick. Join us for a fun and informal interview that’s sure to put a smile on your face!

Some questions for Emanuela

What excites you the most about transitioning from a customer service role to a business manager for The Netherlands, Belgium, and France at Guide-ID? What excites me the most about this transition is the opportunity to use my customer service experience to drive business growth and strengthen client relationships in these vibrant markets. Understanding the unique needs and preferences of customers in The Netherlands, Belgium, and France allows me to tailor our offerings more precisely, ensuring we meet their expectations. Additionally, I’m thrilled about the chance start implementing innovative solutions and expanding Guide-ID’s presence in these regions.

Having worked closely with customers, what unique insights do you bring to your new role in fostering strong client relationships and acquiring new clients? Working closely with customers has provided me with more insight into their preferences, and the value and quality they expect from our products. I will certainly bring a customer-centric approach to my new role, focusing on listening the clients’ needs and proactive problem-solving. My experience has taught me the importance of personalized service and building trust through consistent, transparent communication. I believe these insights will be invaluable in acquiring new clients and nurturing long-term relationships with all our clients.

Can you share a memorable experience or a favourite exhibition you’ve encountered through your work with Guide-ID? I would say that one of my favourite exhibitions will remain the museum “Ons’ Lieve Heer op Solder”. The building itself is majestic, but it is as well such an important aspect of Dutch history that not many know about. I thoroughly enjoyed exploring all the floors and sub-floors. It felt like a maze, like an exploration and it was of course made easy and interesting with the usage of our Podcatcher. I believe that it is a museum worth visiting for all age groups because everyone will find something magical inside that will peak their attention.

What do you find most rewarding about helping museums use the Podcatcher Pro to enhance visitors’ experiences? The most rewarding aspect is witnessing how the Podcatcher Pro transforms a visitor’s experience by making it more interactive and engaging. It allows visitors to connect with the exhibits on a deeper level through audio guides and its features. The positive feedback from both museums and visitors, particularly when they share how our technology has enriched and improved their exhibits, is incredibly gratifying. Knowing that we’re contributing to educational and cultural enrichment is what makes this work so fulfilling.

As someone who values curiosity and learning, how do you plan to inspire the same enthusiasm in the museums you work with and their visitors? I plan to inspire enthusiasm by fostering a culture of curiosity and continuous improvement within the museums. This includes collaborating with museum staff to develop innovative and engaging content that leverages the capabilities of the Podcatcher Pro. By showcasing successful case studies and sharing best practices, I aim to demonstrate the transformative power of our technology. This should enhance the visitor experience and spark a passion for learning and exploration in all who visit a particular museum or historical site.

I’d say the answer to the question in the title is obvious. I apply this answer to everything I do, whether creating audio tours and the products that go with it, or the way I design my business and organize it. In this article, I will explain my vision on the use (and abuse) of attention, focusing on how you can ensure that the experience you offer visitors is one they’ll actually listen to.

The world in development

For years now, people around me have claimed that today’s world only consists of multimedia – and tomorrow’s world will be no different. These are the same people who then ask me whether I’ve gone crazy investing all my time and money into developing an audio player and an online platform to go with it. Facebook and LinkedIn adapt their algorithms so that video messages are assigned priority over text, and everyone has a smartphone. And if your company hasn’t joined the race, you’re doomed!

For our business (that’s audio tours), this has led to museums and attractions being flooded with offers from snazzy start-ups year in, year out. You can’t deny that everyone has a smartphone and uses it to access all kinds of photos and videos. So, an app must be an effective way to give visitors what they want, right? People said that the COVID-19 pandemic would only accelerate the adoption of apps, since people would probably rather use their own devices than one that’s ‘shared’ with others. But a few months into the pandemic, we know this not to be the case. That fear is unfounded, and the figures show a different picture.

Audio guide tour Pick-up rate

So, what do the figures show? If you look at usage, most apps’ pick-up rate (the percentage of the total number of visitors using a museum app) is no more than 10%. There are exceptions, of course, but this generally means that 90% of visitors don’t use the apps on offer – that’s a huge waste of high-quality content! The pick-up rate of a physical device, in our case the Podcatcher, is exactly the opposite: it’s not exceptional for 90% of our visitors to use the Podcatcher, even during the pandemic.

Mobile Website

But I’m not crazy, of course. Well… not entirely. The ubiquitous smartphone is a powerful piece of technology. So why don’t we leverage it? I think it’s important to tell stories to as many people as possible, including to visitors who prefer to use their smartphone to listen to an audio tour. That’s why we launched a new product a few months ago: a mobile website. This provides an interface for visitors to listen to the same stories on their own smartphone as on the Podcatcher – all powered from our online content platform.

And of course, I wanted to experience that for myself! So I went to the World Press exhibition in Amsterdam’s De Nieuwe Kerk. I scanned the QR code and listened to several audio stops via the mobile website. Although the tech worked flawlessly, I wouldn’t say it was a wholly positive experience. I got distracted every time I looked at my phone, trying to find and start the audio stops along the trail. I don’t know about you, but I get a constant stream of notifications. Once you’ve seen them pop up on your screen, it’s hard to ignore them. So, instead of having a relaxed exhibition experience, I found myself flicking between the impressive photos in the exhibition and the messages on my phone. Having looked at the data from other users, I can say I’m definitely not the only one who uses the mobile website in this way. The data shows that the number of stops visitors listen to via the mobile website is a lot lower than the number of stops listened to via the Podcatcher. That’s because of the distraction factor.

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Our inclusive audio guide app

That was when I decided that we needed to adapt the app – already in development at the time – so that it offers the same experience as our Podcatcher. Instead of distractions, we’re only enriching the experience with some fantastic storytelling. This app also had to work according to the ‘point-and-listen’ principle. During your visit, you should be able to use your eyes to appreciate the building and the works of art – you shouldn’t need to look back at your phone every time.

The launch day was just a few weeks ago, when our entire in-house team got to trial the first beta test for the Map-My-Visit app. I know I’m not being entirely objective, but it’s a fantastic app! For years now, we’ve been bold enough to claim we have the ‘world’s easiest audio guide’, but now I’m quietly confident we have the ‘world’s easiest app’ as well.

Simply grab your smartphone, open the app, and it’ll immediately recognize which museum you’re in. After that, all you have to do is hover your smartphone over the Bluetooth IDentifier and listen to the audio – it’s really that easy. Feast your eyes and focus completely on your surroundings while you listen to the most fantastic storytelling. The app is now live and will soon be available at several museums. I’m sure more will follow shortly.

What’s next?

In the near future, we’re going to look at the user data from the app and compare that with the data for the Podcatcher and mobile website. We’re not going to remove those last two options: the app will be a third option for our visitors. All data on our customers will be neatly gathered in our online portal, so that we can take a good look at the differences between the products. I’ll keep you posted on the results. If you’re interested in hearing about our findings, please send me a message! My initial feeling is that the data will confirm our vision: the less people are distracted, the more they listen to the story. That’s ultimately what I care about.

In the current day and age it is important to guide your visitors through your museum, making sure they can keep their social distance. Thankfully, an audio tour can help you to create the safest experience for your visitors. Why it’s good to use an audio tour, you ask? Because you can use the visitor data it collects to optimize the routing in your museum or attraction. We’ll share three ways you can use your audio tour (data) for this!

Check your audio tour

If you have to require your visitors to walk a set path in order for them to keep a safe distance, you might have to adjust things in your audio tour set-up. Check which stops are listened to the least, and remove them from the tour for the time being.

Usually this feature is used to check on the quality of audio tour content. Why isn’t this stop being listened to? Is it not a clear stop on the route visitors take or is the content not interesting? Now it can be used to create space in your museum.

If you want to check on flow and make sure that some stops don’t get overcrowded, you can use your audio tour as well. When you see a certain stop gets a lot of visits, you can take action to make sure there’s enough space available in order to keep people safe.

Use the audio tour to check if all visitors have returned

Working with timeslots is one of the ways museums or attractions use to control the amount of visitors. But how will you know if the people have actually left, before letting new people in? The Podcatcher can be a smart way to count the people that are inside at any given moment. If you require your visitors to take an audio tour into the museum or attraction when they go in, you can simply count the Podcatchers to see if everyone has returned. Don’t have all the audio tours back? Then new people have to wait to go in, in order to keep the maximum allowed number of visitors in line.

Podcatcher audio guide device

Our Podcatchers collect a ton of different (anonymous) data which can help you get insights in your audio tour and visitor behaviour. We share this data on a daily basis with our clients via our online analytics module.

Do you want to know more about using the insights our audio guide has to offer? Or do you want to start to use the Podcatcher yourself in your museum or attraction? Get in touch with us directly, we’re happy to help!

The Netherlands is yet again covered in a blanket of snow. Cue chaos in the media and on the streets. The national weather agency issues the highest weather alert code, and everyone’s on their guard. Nobody wants to slip. But I take a slightly different view: I know how much there is to learn from slipping up – figuratively. Although the time between falling and getting back on your feet can be quite painful, these are the moments that provide the most valuable lessons.

At the Griftpark

Yesterday, eager to enjoy the snow like everyone else, I took my eleven-year-old son to Griftpark in Utrecht. The park has a hill that most people affectionately refer to as ‘the mountain’. The mountain has two sides: one side has a pond and a fence at the bottom; the other a large lawn. You can guess which side was busier and which was quieter. The busy side was packed with kids whooshing down the mountain on sledges, falling, and getting back up. So, we decided to try out the quieter side.

Applying the theory of falling and getting back up to myself, it’s clearly been a constant in my life – including in my career and my journey with Guide-ID. Without all that falling and picking myself up, I would never have got where I am today: being the proud CEO of a fantastic company that enables millions of people around the world to hear wonderful stories. So how did I fall and pick myself up on that journey? Let me tell you.

Back in the 2000s

At the turn of the millennium, probably in 2003, we started thinking about how we could shake up the audio-tour market. Dedicated to the cause and following a year of hard work, we had written software on a PDA (essentially, a predecessor of the iPhone) and developed the first, ugly-looking version of the IDentifier that automatically played a story when a user stood in front of a work of art. It was the prototype of the system we use today. I took my demo set to the director of a large museum in the Netherlands. He burst out laughing when he saw the IDentifier: did I truly believe he would put that thing in his museum? Ouch, that fall hurt.

Once I’d recovered a bit from the painful fall from that encounter, there were two options: we could do nothing and leave it at that, or we could take the criticism as feedback and go back to the drawing board. After a few days of mulling it over, we chose the latter. Less than six months later, we had completed a beautifully compact design for the IDentifier. Time to go back to that museum director. After two meetings, the deal was done.

I’ve dozens of ‘falling over’ stories like that. One of them is thinking that multimedia is ‘the bomb’ and finding out after five years that audio-only actually offers a much more intense, high-impact experience for museum visitors. The second involves a complete misjudgment of costs, almost going bankrupt twice, and putting my own house down as a collateral at the bank.

The beauty of it is that all that falling over has huge added value. Because falling involves realizing how not to do things. You learn a lot and fast, especially if you keep the period between start and test as short as possible. I fully believe in the value of short stints to try something out and learn. There’s nothing wrong with failing when you do, but you have to remember to get back up. You can’t stay down for too long: you must persevere, and persevere some more. And remember to stay positive!

The COVID-19 pandemic has been a big fall for many people. For Guide-ID it was a challenge as well, but we acted fast and our choices turned out really well. Unfortunately, many of our customers have also taken a small or big fall, adapting to the new circumstances. But the pandemic has also helped us learn more than we did in previous years. I hope with all my heart that all museums will also be able to take valuable lessons, so that they can soon get back on their feet and continue their work

Lessons learned

We’ve gathered all the lessons from falling and are now using them to develop a whole new eco-system of both hardware and software that will be able to do so much more than the current system! How? Because we’ve learnt what not to do.

Returning to the story of the snowy day in Griftpark: there I am, at the bottom of the quiet (and pleasantly spacious) side of the mountain. On my left I see a wheel-less skateboard being used as a sledge; on my right, I see the very sturdy-looking fence. And in front of me, I see my son, with an injured wrist. He was in a lot of pain, the poor thing. But when we left hospital yesterday, wrist fixed, he said: ‘I really want to go to the mountain again, but I’ll slide down on the busy side.’ That’s the essence of falling over, picking yourself up, and learning. I’m immensely proud of him!

At Guide-ID it’s in our DNA to help our clients tell their stories. Audio guides can open up your museum and make it accessible to all, in ways that you may not yet have considered. Here, we’d like to share with you how we can help you become more inclusive, using the options our audio guides have to offer. Let’s start by sharing the first step towards ‘all-inclusive’ storytelling. When creating an audio guide, start by asking yourself these three easy questions: who, what, where?

Who?

Think of your audience. Who are you trying to reach? If you want people to understand the story, you have to speak their language. Find experts who can help you achieve that. Within your team, you will want to involve the curator, and possibly educators. But think of external partners too. A script writer or audio guide producer can help you make the most of your content. If you are creating a tour for a specific target audience, get them involved. When you are doing a tour for children for example, why not ask a teacher to proofread your texts, to make sure you have struck the right chord?

What?

What is the story you want to convey? No doubt you will have lots of beautiful objects to talk about. But be selective. Avoid overwhelming your visitors with too many stops. Keep in mind that 150 written words will result in a little over one minute of recorded text. We find that an average of 200 words works best. However, if a story is exceptionally thrilling, amazing or emotional, just go ahead and give it the length it deserves.

Where?

Think of exactly where you want to tell the stories. You can choose to link stories to the works of art or objects, or you can tell a more general story – in a room description, for example. Imagine visiting your museum in a wheelchair. Can you actually see the objects the tour describes? Can you get close enough? Furthermore, spread out the stops, to avoid having too many people viewing the same object. This is particularly relevant in Covid-times. Your audio guide can help visitors keep a safe distance from one another.

Create for a wider audience

Setting up your script, be aware that you are writing for the ears. Avoid complicated words and sentences. Texts are sometimes full of (art historical) jargon or assumed prior knowledge. With a few easy adaptations, you can render a text comprehensible for a wider audience. And this is where our Podcatcher can open up a world of possibilities… The ABC buttons can be used to offer extra layers of information, in text, in video, and even tactile, thus helping to enhance the experience.

Tours for the blind

For blind or visually impaired visitors especially, audio guidance is essential. One option is to create separate content for this specific group, a second would be to enrich your standard tour by adding descriptive audio in one of the layers. This audio can consist of a voice literally recreating a picture for the listener, describing measurements, depicted scene, colors used, painting techniques and effect; but think of music, too, creating the atmosphere depicted. Special tactile buttons for the Podcatcher make the ABC buttons easy to find. An added bonus is that a descriptive tour in our experience is not only much appreciated by visually impaired visitors, but also by people with autism, and by people who are more comfortable listening rather than reading. And again… be sure to consult the target group for feedback.

Tours for the deaf

Guide-ID’s mobile website features a text overlay option, that displays the texts of your museum’s audio tour on the mobile phone of your visitor. However, our advice would be to create a special tour for the hard of hearing, using a customized version of your primary tour, rewritten in apt language. Better still: go for a Sign Language tour, it being a primary language for many visitors. In our MapMyVisit App we now have the option for a Sign Language video tour, which can be managed on the same platform as your other tours.

Allow us to help you

Interested? Please reach out to us at Guide-ID. We’ll be happy to help you make your museum open to all.

I believe that museums are the mirrors of our society. This is because the collections they display and stories they tell appeal to a diverse audience. When I embarked on my career in the museum sector over 20 years ago, educational services were a hot topic. Museums had begun organizing guided tours and workshops for schools and groups, and placed labels and texts for individual visitors (although these were still often written in technical jargon). This was the point at which museums became even more accessible – you no longer had to be an art expert to understand what an exhibition was about.

I’m happy to see that this accessibility has only increased nowadays. Museums welcome a wide range of visitors and play an increasingly relevant role for different communities in society. They have evolved from places with a purely educational purpose, transferring information unilaterally, to dynamic hubs focusing on interaction, participation, and engagement. In addition to curator contributions, museums are now keen to accommodate various perspectives, a whole range of voices, which can in turn broaden your view of a museum piece.

Look for stories that move people

But how can you achieve this pluralism? In terms of audio tours, the best results are achieved by offering powerful storytelling that seeks to build a bridge between the content and your target audience. Seek out an emotional connection: a story that touches people, makes them think, and appeals to your target group.

The tool for your stories

Guide-ID’s mission is to make these different stories accessible to different audiences. That’s why we offer a platform that enables you to create stories for various target groups. Whether you’re catering to time-pressed tourists, blind or visually impaired visitors, or families from the local community: our Tour Editor – our Content Management System – enables you to create individual tours and add various layers in as many languages as you like.

Our Podcatcher features ‘ABC buttons’ that you can use to create a quiz for children or add different levels, such as a second layer, to the central story of your audio tour. For example, you can include time for the curator to speak or add an image description, so that blind or visually impaired visitors are equally able to experience the piece. It’s worth saying that an image description can be just as insightful for visitors with no visual impairment!

Going one layer deeper? You may want to add a poem or a piece of music to tune your content to the specific needs of your visitor. Creators are free to put together their own ‘menu’.

In practice

Many museums now apply this pluralistic approach. For example, in LABIOMISTA (Genk, Belgium), artist Koen van Mechelen will personally take you on a tour of the park, and there’s also a tailor-made tour with contributions from children. At the new ‘Kinderen van de Renaissance’ (Children of the Renaissance) exhibition at the Museum Hof van Busleyden (Mechelen, Belgium), visitors can listen to educationalist Pedro de Bruyckere share his vision of a Renaissance portrait of a child. Alongside contributions from experts or curators, you could also choose a specific group of people and let them tell their story. For instance, the exhibition ‘Heeren, vertrekt!’ (Gentleman, start the race!) at the Sint-Pietersabdij museum (Ghent, Belgium) features testimonials from racing cyclists at the time. The possibilities are endless: a child describing what they see, a person with dementia recalling memories, or a blind person communicating their experience as they touch a sculpture.

What voices do you offer a platform to?

Writing content and recording testimonials takes time and preparation. And while all testimonials are valuable, they don’t all add value or achieve the desired effect. So, start by determining the common theme of the museum or exhibition. After that, have a look at the target groups you want to appeal (or appeal even more), and which objects and stories are best suited for that purpose. Integrate the pluralistic approach in this process. Strong storytellers both from inside or outside your museum can help you do this. You can also work co-creatively with a specific group and ask them to act as a sounding board. This pluralism opens up a new world, enables you to make links with current affairs, stimulate several senses, and allow visitors to experience the object in a different way.

It certainly felt good to see a sign reading ‘FULLY BOOKED’ outside a museum. The In Flanders Fields Museum (IFFM), like many other Belgian museums, sold out during the Easter holidays. The weather and the Belgian travel ban undoubtedly made a difference. Museums, including the IFFM, remarked that many visitors were people who would not normally visit museums.

I asked Piet Chielens, director of the In Flanders Fields Museum, how he feels about this resurgence. “It’s fantastic to see people rediscover how meaningful their leisure time can be when museums are the only places open to offer ‘live’ cultural experiences. We hope that this continues to some extent once everything opens up again!

The number of visitors is obviously limited, and the audio guide means that people generally stay a little longer. Because of the coronavirus restrictions, we can only allow half as many visitors in comparison with other busy periods! They are now mainly Belgian, and largely Flemish, families with children. Belgians are always among our visitors, but in ‘normal times’ almost two thirds of visitors to IFFM are from abroad. Obviously, it’s because of our main subject, a World War. And that subject draws visitors from everywhere, especially countries in Great Britain and the British Commonwealth. To them, Ypres has always symbolized the huge sacrifices their countries made in the First World War. That feeling will always be with us. We hope to see these visitors again as soon as it is safe for them to return.”

I visit the museum on Friday 9 April, having reserved my ticket in advance: this is an absolute necessity in these coronavirus times. There is a queue outside and a sign stating ’fully booked’. The instructions on the ground are clear: maintain a distance of 1.5 meters. Waiting in the corridor, we think about the visit ahead: shall we take the audio guide? Shall we add a more immersive layer? The museum began to offer audio tours because individual visitors were asking for them. Business manager Peter Slosse says that in the past period, 1 in 2 visitors have taken the audio tour. This far exceeds expectations: the museum’s original estimate was 1 in 5.

I am assisted by a friendly receptionist. He asks if I’d like the audio guide. “Of course!” I reply. I congratulate him on the visitor numbers, and he says, “We are really happy that it’s so busy. The museum is vibrant again.” Just before I enter the museum, a host explains how to use the audio guide. Chielens then explains how the audio tour works. “The basic tour takes you to 40 listening points in the museum. Listening to all the clips on this route takes about an hour. The audio tour also allows us to add to our story. It has become the in-depth tour: offering background information on objects and specialized descriptions, without us having many of these objects in the collection or much space for them in the exhibition. This tour features colleagues, friends and specialists we have often worked with as well as our own scientific team.”

It is soon clear to me that the museum has indeed made a comeback. I’m certainly not alone in this. What I notice is the great diversity of the visitors. There also lots of young families with very small children using audio guides. How has the museum handled the development of a separate tour for children? Chielens: “Of course, our education team has years of experience with this exhibition. They know what appeals to children, and they also know the stories behind certain objects. They approached Gerda Dendooven with it, and she, in her own way, has turned it into an exciting and at times moving story in 18 stages.”

I, personally, was very impressed with the audio contribution on Sam Dillemans’ work. You hear the manager himself speaking with a passion and giving a more thorough explanation of the work. I also love the fact that this contemporary work offers a clear vision of war in our time. The stories of 100 years ago are still relevant today.

www.inflandersfields.be

At Guide-ID, we’re passionate about technology and culture. Combine these two to create the perfect job. Since 2009, our creative team’s passion – and increasing customer collaboration – has driven constant improvements to the Podcatcher platform.

The natural co-creation process

Sometime in 2004, I got an idea that would turn the audio tours market upside down. With nothing but my imagination and a small but dedicated team, we created a very simple platform and audio player that could easily be used by everyone. In 2009, we launched our online platform and Podcatcher. It’s an incredible feeling to create a product you dreamt up and watch it become successful. To me, creativity plays a key role in a tech market where companies often imitate each other, and you quickly become a dime-a-dozen provider. That just doesn’t fit with who I am and how I want to shape my company.

After the first 30 customers had joined our ecosystem, more and more questions started coming our way. Customers who used our system every day gave us new input that we used to unleash our own creative ideas and develop our product further. This natural ‘co-creation process’ with our customers resulted in more and more new features being added to the platform.

Audio-to-video synchronization & analytics

One of these new features was audio-to-video synchronization. A number of our customers told us they were showing films with subtitles in a few places in their museum. Wouldn’t it be great if visitors – who were already walking around with a Podcatcher – could listen to the film’s audio in their own language? We killed two birds with one stone: the subtitles could be removed to create a cleaner film image, and the galleries became quieter once the audio could be listened to on the Podcatcher. The best part is that every visitor can listen to the film’s audio in their own language on the Podcatcher.

Our customers also wanted to know which tour languages were listened to, which museum pieces were most popular, the average listening times, etc.: insights from data, in other words. This is how our analytics module came to be.

Constructive criticism

Our customers didn’t only share their needs with us. Sometimes there were also features that needed improving or functions that weren’t performing. I find it really annoying when technology that’s meant to help you gets in the way instead. That’s why our mantra is ‘keep it simple’, and we only launch solutions once we’re sure they work. That’s something we can only do once our product has been used in real-world applications and our customers have given us their feedback.

Our new ecosystem

We are currently developing an entirely new ecosystem that combines hardware with software. I am sure the new features will make our customers very happy. We can’t talk about them just yet, but these new technologies allow us to offer amazing features to museums and visitors. This technology can quietly be applied to existing features, we’re still excited about our ‘non-distracting’ and ‘audio-only’ philosophy.

We’ll share more on this soon!

We love to hear from our customers, which is why we host recurring customer discussions and webinars. There’s a reason our tagline is ‘the art of listening’. We also study the data. With more than 421 million stories told, we have a lot data available to us that we can use to look for patterns. How do visitors listen to the audio on the Podcatcher? Do they need to frequently adjust the volume? Can we automatically adjust the recorded audio to make the volume uniform? Do visitors listen differently on a Podcatcher than our App? And what about our mobile-friendly website? These are all questions that we can answer by carefully studying the data and using the information we’ve gathered to make improvements.

Creativity and passion are key in this, and our team has plenty of both. Share your ideas with us! We’ll provide features to match in the future.

Yes! We finally seem to have turned the corner. Museums can reopen their doors in increasing numbers of countries. Visitors can barely wait to visit museums once more, and Guide-ID is ready to share stories with them once more. During the pandemic, we worked to make our entire platform easier to use for existing and new customers. In this blog, I will explain why we are truly worthy of the title ‘world’s easiest audio guide’.

We have a number of years of experience under our belt. This means that we have a very good idea of what museums and their visitors want. In 2004, when we started working on multimedia guides, all data showed that small screens distract too much from what visitors really care about: the authentic works of art and buildings. When we switched to audio-only and non-distracting in 2009, the pace of things really picked up.

Rapid and controlled growth

So far, we have completed close to 800 projects in 17 countries! We have also developed a system that both grants us continuous control over all our devices, but also provides valuable insights on the stories that visitors are listening to all over the world. Here’s a fun fact: this amounts to over 423 million stories shared since we launched! We never could have achieved such a large number without investing in working efficiently, continual process improvements, and the monitoring of all that data. Furthermore, we also made a number of mistakes during that period. Thankfully, we learned a lot from those mistakes.

Of course, COVID-19 has had an impact on our company. We have grown rapidly since 2009. With almost all of our clients around the world suddenly being forced to close their doors, we had something to reflect on. But, as I also wrote in earlier blogs, our team is very flexible and always ready to go the extra mile. This was also the case when we were forced to intervene in our costs and expenses. While this was far from a pleasant experience, it was desperately needed for our survival and we are thankful that we managed to keep almost all of our clients. As the CEO, I’m proud of our team – especially when I see and hear that our clients are satisfied with our products and services.

We always achieved rapid but controlled growth, which ensured that we could build a good buffer to address any setbacks. As we’re flexible, we’ll come out of this crisis stronger than we were before it. We’ll be financially strong, with an optimized company process, and lots of new and awesome products!

Onboarding made super simple

For new clients, we made the onboarding even better than it already was. We can easily import content from a range of systems to our platform. If a client wants to share a story via our mobile website or app, they can do it in no time at all. Or if a client wants to offer their visitors the ultimate experience via the Podcatcher audio guide, our optimized logistics will ensure that we can deliver the audio guides even more quickly. Clients can start with a small set of Podcatchers and then expand on this when they can welcome more visitors. It’s a great option to have during these uncertain times, if we say so ourselves.

We are on hand to help you

I truly hope that museums will soon be filled with visitors again, who we can tell some beautiful stories – the more the better. In as many countries as possible, at as many museums as possible, with as many visitors as possible. Our team has ensured that all of our systems are entirely ready for this. In the past month, we welcomed many new clients to our platform. In addition to always providing rapid delivery, we always discuss what represents the best fit for our clients and their visitors. So please submit your ideas and let us share your stories. You know where to find me…