V&A Mused: Building a Digital Product for Generation Alpha

Working with Kati Price, Head of Digital Media and Publishing, I helped recruit a specialist project team: a Product Owner, UX/UI Designer, and content leads. I co-led procurement with Kati, selecting Big Bite as development agency and SEOMG! for SEO. I ran daily stand-ups, owned the agile process, and kept things moving across a multi-stakeholder initiative.

The high-level strategy for Mused was developed by Emma Scott of Cultivation Partners before I joined. My role was to validate, refine, and implement it. Before the project team was recruited, I did significant upfront work with Kati to pressure-test the approach, structure the project, and communicate the concept to stakeholders so we had buy-in before we formally kicked off.

Drawing on my experience at Beano.com, I brought specific learnings around how cultural brands can broaden their digital offer to reach new audiences. From Beano I'd seen the value of a data-driven content pipeline: qualitative research informing content creation, quantitative insight validating what worked, feeding back into the next round of research. I also knew how valuable it is to gather compliant, anonymised insight from a hard-to-reach audience, and pushed to replicate this approach at the V&A.

We established quizzes as the primary acquisition format, an approach I'd seen work as an under-utilised channel for young audiences at Beano. The site also included facts, videos, and challenges, designed as retention drivers to keep users coming back. We chose WordPress as the platform because Mused is fundamentally a publishing proposition, and WordPress gave us the tools to iterate on content quickly and optimise for SEO from day one.

I pushed our content strategy towards SEO as the primary acquisition channel. With the focus on organic reach rather than paid marketing, we needed a channel that could work at scale. By taking an audience-first approach and leveraging the V&A's significant domain authority, search became a viable route to reaching young people, particularly through quizzes optimised around topics they were actively searching for. Working with SEOMG!, we built a strategy that met young audiences where they were already looking. It won "Best Use of Search" at the UK Search Awards 2023.

A key part of my role here was sitting between the SEO agency and the V&A content team, translating requirements in both directions. The SEO data told us what to write about, but the V&A's editorial standards meant we couldn't just become a content factory. I made sure we maintained quality while still responding to search demand.

I have deep experience building digital products for young people, and I guided the team through implementing COPPA, GDPR, and the ICO's Age Appropriate Design Code. We designed privacy-first analytics that gave the V&A meaningful insights without compromising on safety: no ads, no user messaging, no collection of personal data, and fully anonymous optional surveys.

I pushed for a more data-orientated approach across the project. The team had strong qualitative research skills, and I complemented this by championing quantitative insight. I drove the decision to run a soft launch ahead of the full press launch, specifically to gather quantitative data we could act on before wider attention hit.

Working with Sonia Joao at Oxy Insights, I helped translate trend research and user testing into content and product decisions. Our Trendspotter panel (a group of young people) shaped quiz topics and content tone.

A key innovation was "A Random Question", a COPPA/GDPR compliant insight tool that I guided the specification for. This optional feature appeared within quizzes and articles, asking users about their preferences and interests. The questions were completely anonymous and fed real-time quantitative insight back to the V&A, helping inform content decisions while maintaining full privacy compliance.

I co-authored documentation for the permanent V&A team, covering product and technical handover, integrations with V&A services, and domain infrastructure. This gave the in-house team what they needed to continue scaling after my contract ended.

There were understandable questions internally about how far the audience-first approach should go. Some stakeholders favoured a heavier V&A content skew, keeping things closer to traditional museum territory. We tested different balances and found that more V&A-focused framing didn't resonate as strongly with the target audience in user testing.

We resolved this collaboratively, maintaining a mix: pop culture content like Taylor Swift and Minecraft quizzes worked as the primary acquisition driver, while V&A-focused content sat alongside it, giving users a route into the collection. We backed the approach with user research throughout. It was great to see this audience-first thinking reflected in the wider V&A when they later ran a Taylor Swift Songbook Trail that attracted significant press.

An audience-first approach using trend data from young people comes with obvious considerations for a cultural institution. Not everything trending with 10–14 year olds is appropriate for the V&A to publish. Working closely with Tom Windross (Head of Content) and Tom Shreeve (lead content writer on Mused), we established clear editorial frameworks so the content team could move quickly on trending topics while staying within boundaries that upheld the V&A's standards. This involved stakeholder engagement across the organisation to build confidence in the approach.

A key technical challenge was integrating Mused under the main V&A domain (vam.ac.uk/mused) when the V&A's main site sat on entirely different infrastructure. Working with Kim Plowright, I pushed for this approach because appearing under the V&A domain was essential to leveraging its domain authority for our SEO strategy. This required close collaboration with the V&A's technical team to resolve the integration.

Mused launched in September 2023, on schedule and within budget.

The SEO strategy won "Best Use of Search" at the UK Search Awards 2023.

Mused hit its original user target within a year of launch. By January 2026, it had grown to 4x that goal, with continued month-on-month growth.

After launch, I continued working on product and content iteration, optimising based on real usage data. I managed the handover of relationships with external agencies, trained the in-house team, and ensured they had everything needed to continue scaling independently. The processes and documentation I established enabled the V&A team to grow Mused to 4x its original target after my contract ended.