Though much has changed in the more than 10 years since callforentry.org first launched, some features were included from the beginning. Following our summer surveys of both artists and administrators, fall seems like the perfect time to revisit a few favorite features, as voted on by arts administrator users.
In no particular order, you told us your favorite features of CaFÉ are:
1. It’s a Resource for Artists.
Built into the CaFÉ ethos since day one, artists are exposed to a multitude of opportunities in a single space. Whether an artist is building their career or well-established, they are able to easily find and apply to calls appropriate to their respective skillsets. “You do an excellent job of getting arts related information out to artists,” noted one survey participant, “and you do not charge artists using your platform (unlike some other listing operations that claim to be free to artists, but the ‘free’ service pales compared to their subscription service).”
As this respondent noted, the service is and has always been free to use; artists only pay application or jurying fees that are determined by the arts organizations who present the individual calls. Because art is our business, CaFÉ is designed specifically to connect artists to arts organizations. We’re grateful to hear our users appreciate this, too!
2. The Ability to Customize.
“Creating the call was easy and perfectly customizable,” a respondent commented. The needs of arts administrators can vary greatly depending on the size, scope, and type of call. One thing we heard over and over in our recent survey was how much CaFÉ users adore that they can modify their experience. From setting up custom form questions to adding filters to help artists find calls, arts organizations can customize their applications as needed.
3. Adjudication is Simplified.
Another survey participant remarked, “We like CaFE for organizing the submissions. It is much easier than filing all of them internally.” CaFÉ’s streamlined system makes it easy to organize applications and move seamlessly from submission collection to the jury process. The system is also secure, as administrators assign individual credentials to jurors for scoring. Once an organization has selected which voting rate to use and assigned jurors, scoring can begin. From there, it’s as easy as eliminating the low-scoring applicants and communicating the final results with artists.
Bonus: The ability to personalize doesn’t stop at the application: adjudication processes can be set up to adjudicate by body-of-work or to score individual images.
4. Communication is Made Easy.
CaFÉ administrators can choose to communicate with an individual artist or with a group of artists. Write one email and have individually personalized messages go out to each of the recipients. Further, administrators can save email templates for re-use in the most frequently sent types of communications. And, all this contact information can be transferred offline to a spreadsheet for record keeping or internal reporting. As one survey respondent said, “I love that I can download a report of invited artists with images, details, and contact info.” Easy, peasy.
5. It’s Updated and Up-to-date.
We were glad to hear that our frequent updates made the top of your lists, too. The CaFE system is regularly enhanced to improve applying, jurying, and managing calls for all users because our commitment to being a resource in the arts community remains steadfast.
- Done: “You need to change the light green color you use for some of the written material to a darker color. It is almost impossible to read!”
- Done: “Make it easier to see the STATE of where the shows are!”
- Done: “Change the required size of jpgs.”
Further, we know the thousands of arts organizations and hundreds of thousands of artists who use the CaFÉ system for online application and adjudication management rely on us to stay up-to-date, relay best practices, and stay abreast of technological trends. For example, the new site, which launched on September 27, 2018, gave artist users a new look and feel and improved accessibility; and, as we plan additional improvements to CaFÉ for release throughout the fall and winter,
Did your favorite feature make the cut? Tell us about it! Tweet “My favorite @CallforEntry feature is…” so we can hear from you.
Written by Leah M. Charney
