For more than 140 years, the Musee Grevin makes young and old vibrate to the rhythm of current events. 🤩 How can you remain a must-see while evolving with the times? How can you adapt to changing public expectations while remaining true to your DNA? Between tradition and modernity, what position should you adopt?
La We Are COM team went to seek answers fromHelen Imblot, Deputy Director in charge of product development, marketing and sales at Grévin Paris. To cross the decades, this Parisian institution has known how to reinvent itself, without ever denying its origins. 👀 Let's take a guided tour of a well-executed communication strategy!
Hello Hélène, to begin with, what would be your definition of brand image?
That's a big topic! It seems to me that branding, It is the set of representations of a brand, everything it offers to establish its positioning. Branding is not limited to products or services; it is the result of beliefs: a purpose, missions, values, etc. That it infuses into all its actions. More broadly, it is a capital which contributes to the construction of a brand image.
I would add that a brand image is not built exclusively on what it is. It can be very interesting to nourish it with what it is not. What does it absolutely not want to be? What will it never be? Brand image is also the sum of its commitments.
A brand image isn't built exclusively on what it is. It can be very interesting to enrich it with what it isn't.
First of all, can you tell us more about your target audience? How do you communicate with them?
At the Grévin Museum, we have three main target audiences. Our public The most important is that of families with children over 7 years old. This public visits the museum mainly during school holidays. Then come adults from the Paris region et many tourists, French and foreign, who visit the museum all year round.
To satisfy each of our target audiences, We need to diversify the experiences we offer, the types of personalities we represent and our actions. communication.
Grévin is a heritage brand with a strong emotional dimension. How do you balance tradition and modernity in your communications and development strategy?
To understand our development and therefore communication strategy, we must go back to the origins of Grévin, an establishment founded in 1882 by Arthur Meyer, journalist and founder of the daily newspaper “Le Gaulois”. The museum's aim was to represent current personalities in 3D, at a time when photography was not yet widespread. Grévin is therefore the heir to a journalistic tradition, to which we remain faithful through the ages.
Still, The museum aims to represent the personalities who make the news or those we call "game changers", these personalities who have, in one way or another, impacted the world or their sector.
In this sense, figures like Squeezie and Léna Situations, who contributed to the rise of Social Media in France and the emergence of the profession of content creator, have as much legitimacy to be included in the Parisian Hall of Fame as personalities such as Jane Goodall, whose work revolutionized the understanding of the relationship between humans and animals, or Pierre de Coubertin, founder of the modern Olympic Games, who redefined the approach to sport by thinking of it as a vector of peace, capable of transcending national, political and cultural divisions.
We have been able to evolve the very spirit of the museum to remain in step with our times. This is why we claim to be both the Pantheon of the Illustrious AND the Temple of Current Events., a place where every personality, whether emblematic of the past, current events or a bearer of the future, finds their place in the most iconic Parisian Hall of Fame.
Grévin is the heir to a journalistic tradition, to which we have remained faithful through the ages.
Precisely, how can we reconcile two positions, while remaining visible and coherent?
Since we're constantly in the news, we have plenty of opportunities to communicate. Our experiences are tailored to the company's key events: the Olympic Games, Fashion Week, etc. Grévin being a historic and heritage house inscribed in the hearts of the French, the media are generally quite fond of our activations. We also carry out numerous operations in advertising, press relations and public relations.
When it comes to consistency, it all comes down to a strategy of repetition. I am convinced that it is by demonstrating educational skills, by regularly affirming and reaffirming our position, that the public will remember our dual ambition., that of being both the Pantheon of the Illustrious, but also the Temple of current events. The real common point of all our activations is that they bounce off current events and trends. Grévin is an incarnation of his time.
What ambitions lie behind your brand promise, "to be experienced as much as to be visited"? What communication initiatives are you implementing to promote the immersive experience?
We wanted to evolve the experience, transforming a museum to see into a museum to experience. In 2019, the tour route was redesigned to be more immersive and more interactive, to enrich our visit proposal.
Before, visitors had fun taking pictures of the personalities as they walked from one to the other. Today, many of our wax figures are staged in the heart of a real experience: the visitor can take part in a council of war with Bonaparte, parade in General de Gaulle's Jeep at the time of the liberation of Paris, record a hit in the studio with Gims, or even take a seat in the famous red armchair of The Voice alongside Nikos,… More than ever, the visitor is placed at the heart of the narrative.
To assert this brand promise, we communicate 360° and always according to three principles.
- We communicate throughout the year and especially during school holidays.
- Our communications are multi-leveraged: notably via the media, local displays (stations, metros, shops, etc.), digital (SEA, Display, programmatic, etc.) and social networks which have become the cornerstone of all our COM plans.
- We are developing influence operations: as brand ambassadors, influencers allow us to meet new audiences.
Squeezie, among others, called on us for one of the episodes of its famous "What's Behind the Door?" format. His idea? To trick Éric and Ramzy into believing they had been chosen to join the Grévin Museum, to present them with deliberately botched wax statues. Even though it wasn't easy to make, this very funny operation benefited from incredible visibility.
We wanted to evolve the experience, by transforming a museum to see into a museum to experience.
Communicators are curious, and Grévin regularly welcomes new personalities. How do you choose these figures, and how does their integration impact your communication?
The selection of personalities is based on specific criteria, aligned with the museum's artistic and scenographic vision. The entire Steering Committee is in constant discussion about the value proposition and the developments to be considered to enhance the visitor experience.
Concerning French personalities, to remain faithful to our journalistic tradition, the choice of celebrities is made through "The Grévin Academy", an academy made up of women and men from the world of press and media and chaired by Stéphane Bern. As for international personalities, we have developed the "Grévin Awards", a 100% digital operation that asks Internet users questions. They can vote from a list of 10 pre-selected game changers.
Regardless of the selection method, we respect certain criteria. The elected figure must be a genuinely popular game changer, have a dedicated career, and be a long-standing figure.
Regarding our communications, we try to mix as effectively as possible the affinity devices with the levers of mass media. Also, for several years, We try to promote communication themes to provide a link to all of our activities. So, if 2024 was dedicated to sport, with the Olympic Games, 2025 will put music in the spotlight with inaugurations by personalities from the French and international scene.
How do you announce the arrival of a celebrity? How do you reveal their wax statue to the public? All of this is also planned in collaboration with the celebrity's communications team.
Responsibility, diversity, inclusion... How can we take action and raise awareness when we welcome hundreds of thousands of visitors each year?
Our commitments are multiple. On the one hand, to guarantee diversity and inclusion, our agents are able to communicate in many languages. On the other hand, to guarantee accessibility, our experiences are adapted for people with disabilities. We are also starting a project to rethink the UX-UI of our website to improve the experience of Internet users suffering from visual impairment or epilepsy, for example.
In terms of responsibility, we favor actors engaged in logics CSR. Our suppliers, for example, must all sign our "Integrity Code."
On the employee side, Our HR ambition is zero accidents. We are committed to ensuring the health and safety of our employees. We train them to respond to any incivility they may experience from certain visitors.
The museum is proud to hold the EPV label – Living Heritage Company – which celebrates rare professions, including that of wax figure designers.
In your opinion, what major developments will impact brand communication in the years to come?
Unsurprisingly, AI! Communications professionals will have to master what must be (and remain, in my opinion) a daily assistant. When preparing for a celebrity's entry into the museum, we can use it to inventory the criticisms—sometimes very imaginative—that could be relayed, for example, on social networks. By definition, stars are segmenting; as many voices as many opinions. We then gain in efficiency in anticipating the reactions of detractors and therefore our response elements.IA comes here as a complement to our social listening tools andonline reputation.
I would add that The new GDPR guidelines will disrupt communication strategiesMore than ever, it will be necessary to retain the interest of audiences by rethinking content and interactions.
AI complements our social listening and e-reputation tools.
Before we leave, do you have any last advice for those who read you?
Here is my New Year's resolution: Make time for new encounters! In a world where time is at a premium, you need to conserve time to meet new people. Curiosity nourishes the mind and refreshes ideas.
4 things to know about Hélène Imblot
His mantra? « Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Be kind. Always. ", translate " Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Be kind. Always.. » Robin Williams.
His favorite COM campaign? The "Orange supports all the Blues" campaign, released to coincide with the 2023 Women's World Cup. Hélène praises the content, the message, and the production prowess of this spot. Remember.
Her passion ? Hélène is passionate about culture and entertainment. She spends most of her free time educating her children about this world.
His anecdote about the Grévin Museum? When a celebrity joins the establishment, the team must meet them three times to create their perfect double. That's how our PR manager once found herself stopped at customs with Michael Jackson's head in a box. It's not a situation you encounter in every profession!
During the measurement appointment, everything is absolutely noted and recorded by our team in the workshops. Our characters must faithfully reflect reality. So I know the measurement of the distance between Audrey Fleurot's right ear and nose, that of Clarisse Agbégnénou's head circumference, or even the precise size of Antoine Dupont's thigh circumference! Our Data Collection register definitely doesn't look like everyone else's. 😉
