A method to measure the emotional experience of audience by the EMOJ tool. The case study of Macerata Opera Festival

This paper aims to present a case study on the application of Emotional Analytics to measure audience experience in the culture sector. The adopted technology enables audience measurement by detecting persons' face and recognizing the emotions they feel in real time, while watching a show or attending a cultural event. It is the result of a long-term research and development project, whose goal is to advance neuro-marketing by proving a non-invasive ad wearable technology to investigate individual affective and emotional response in public spaces. The developed Emotional Analytics platform is called EMOJ and in summer 2019 has been used to analyse the experience lived by the audience of the Macerata Opera Festival, a series of opera representations that take place in the Sferisterio Arena, in Macerata. The goal of this project is to provide useful information on the quality of each performance and of the entire festival perceived by the audience, in order to make the right choices to improve the performances and to have a return on ticket sales for the coming years.