Meet the Shortlisted entries for the Using Data category in the 2025 Digital Culture Awards, which celebrates the innovative use of data collection and analysis to steer decision-making and drive impactful change.

The Winner will be announced in the middle of March. 

The Shortlist

1. Noise Solution CIC – Beats and Stories: Demonstrating and improving outcomes

The text reads 'Live automated analysis of wellbeing above a number of screenshots showcasing data collection.

Image © Noise Solution CIC

The Beats and Stories project, run by Noise Solution CIC, uses an evidence-based approach to deliver one-to-one music mentorship workshops to at-risk young people.  

The project combines one-to-one music mentoring, focused on beat making, with a bespoke digital platform, delivering 500 hours of mentoring monthly and working with 250 young people annually. The project utilises a data collection system with an intuitive interface, which automates data analysis, making it efficient and easy to use while also providing meaningful insights. 

These young mentees are often facing challenges around mental health, are care-experienced, excluded or on the edge of exclusion. Due to their robust data strategy, Noise Solution can show that Beats and Stories has halved low levels of wellbeing and tripled high levels of those involved, and has benefitted hundreds of young people directly. In 2024 changes in outcomes for Noise Solution participants are estimated to create savings for families and services across the East of England of £6.46 Million 

2. Foundling Museum – Foundling Museum’s Ticketing Transformation

The Foundling Museum logo.

Image © Foundling Museum

London’s Foundling Museum is the only Museum in the UK to celebrate people who have been in care, and those who care for them. 

To improve its operations, the museum took a data-driven approach to reviewing its ticketing structure and systems. The goal was to streamline the user journey, increase revenue across digital channels, and capture more valuable customer data. By leveraging digital tools, they simplified the online purchasing process for visitors, covering both primary sales and add-ons, and encouraging repeat engagement. 

To maximise revenue from ticket sales and Gift Aid, the museum applied multiple performance metrics to benchmark its position against similar venues. As a result, they achieved a revenue increase of over 30%, exceeding their budget by thousands of pounds. 

Additionally, the museum implemented a bespoke Zapier integration with Shopify to integrate customer data, enabling valuable audience insights and more personalised communications. 

3. Octagon Theatre – Octagon Theatre’s data-driven learning cycle approach to campaigns

A performance of The Book Thief at Octagon Theatre. The ensemble cast are looking out at the audience, holding their hands out wide.

The Book Thief at Octagon Theatre – © Pamela Raith

The Octagon Theatre creates adventurous theatrical experiences at its home in Bolton. Following closure during redevelopment and the pandemic, it embarked on a campaign to rebuild audience numbers, harnessing digital tools and developing a system of continuous use of data from several sources. 

The theatre redeveloped their ways of working to maximise the efforts of their small team. They have created a series of KPIs informed by past data, and prioritised regular data sharing across the organisation. The team brings together data from multiple digital platforms, including social media engagement stats, Google Analytics, email marketing data, and qualitive data from online surveys. 

As a result, the theatre developed a successful dynamic pricing strategy, implemented improvements in audience experience, increased online advertising and supported the artistic team in future programming decisions. They’ve seen a 20% increase in income and a 12% rise in ticket sales in the last year.  

4. York Unlocked – York Unlocked – Event App

York Unlocked was founded in 2022 to open the city’s architecture and urban landscape to the public, aiming to inspire a love of architecture and bring diverse new audiences to the city’s heritage. 

Hugely popular but with few resources, it lacked quantitative data to enable it to become sustainable long term. In 2024, they collaborated with local tech firm Boon & Moil to develop a festival app which enables them to capture information on all aspects of users’ visits. 

Seven hundred unique users created 48,000 data logs across the two days of the 2024 event, revealing where users came from, how far they walked during the event, and how many venues they visited. Combined with qualitive information from surveys, this information has now transformed how York Unlocked understands its audience and pursues vital funding, supporting the longevity of the project. 

What next? 

Head back to the main Awards page to learn about the Shortlisted organisations in other categories.