The Business
Hyland Cinema is a landmark single-screen art house theatre in London, Ontario co-owned by Moira Adlan and her husband, Ali Adlan. Unlike most other movie theatres, Hyland Cinema opts to screen independent and retro films instead of the latest Hollywood blockbusters. The cinema also hosts educational events, panels, guest lectures, and costume nights making it a film buff favourite in the city.
The Challenge
Over the last 18 years, under the Adlans’ leadership, Hyland Cinema has built an impressive membership program with a base of over 8,000 avid moviegoers. This was all being tracked manually using an Excel spreadsheet, handwritten cards, and an expensive lamination process.
As the membership base grew, Adlan recognized their manual tracking system was inefficient, costly, and no longer sustainable for the business. Handling lapsed memberships at the end of the month was an ordeal for both Adlan and her team, as well as the cinema’s members. Long line-ups were common, which required extra staff to assist customers and to update the database each month.
The process was not only costly and cumbersome but needed a solution to collect valuable information on how and when clients maximized their memberships.
The Solution
With support from Digital Main Street’s Digital Transformation Grant (DTG) Program, Adlan began working towards revamping Hyland Cinema’s membership system. The DTG initiative provides brick-and-mortar small businesses with a digital assessment, online training, and a $2,500 grant to implement their Digital Transformation Plan.
With the grant funds received, Adlan engaged a website developer to build a custom solution for tracking and renewing memberships that integrated seamlessly with Hyland Cinema’s existing website. In addition to creating a better customer experience and improving efficiency, Adlan and the web development team are also working on software that automatically tracks exactly how, when, and for what movies or events, filmgoers are maximizing their membership perks. The existing membership data was migrated to the new platform and the next step is to integrate the theatre’s point-of-sale system with the digital membership cards.
Key Deliverables
- Applied for and received a Digital Main Street DTG grant in November 2021
- Website developers were retained and briefed on project goals and objectives
- Code was written to develop software to create a seamless online renewal process for members on the Hyland Cinema website
- Existing data was cleaned and transferred to new membership portal
- Handmade membership cards were phased out and replaced with digital cards synced to an online platform
The Impact
The newly developed membership software has impacted Adlan’s business in a number of positive ways.
- Increased productivity. With staff no longer bogged down by manual membership tracking and renewal processes, they can contribute their unique skill set to other areas of the business.
- Greater cost efficiency. The costs required to maintain the old manual database were extensive. The funding provided to build the new database improved the business’s bottom line by reducing database operational costs and allowing for more efficient staffing.
- Enabled data collection. The new digital cards can feed information into the online membership database giving Hyland Cinema. With the development of new software, the business will soon be able to access valuable data insights about the habits of its members.
- Improved customer experience. Adlan says the feedback from her customers has been overwhelmingly positive. “There are all kinds of little things they really like about it. They find that it’s a lot easier,” she shares.
Next Steps
With a new digital membership platform in place, Adlan is focused on completing the development of her tracking software to better understand her customer base, and leverage this data to make informed decisions. The new system will track member attendance to produce big-picture data on customer trends and how they are using their memberships. Once this new software is in place, Adlan will be able to leverage a more personalized and targeted approach to digital marketing for members based on their preferred genres and habits.
Hyland Cinema is now working on expanding its current program; “a lot of the non-profits in the U.S. have tiered memberships and they’re very successful,” says Adlan. The data collected by the new system will be invaluable and ensure its membership program remains both profitable and beloved by London film fanatics seeking a unique theatre-going experience.
