Smithsonian Institution National Museum of African American History and Culture Digital Experience Initiative Request for Proposals

Since opening Sept. 24, 2016, the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture (the “Museum”) has welcomed more than 11 million in-person visitors to its location on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., as the nation’s largest and most comprehensive cultural destination devoted exclusively to exploring, documenting and showcasing the African American story and its impact on American and world history. The Museum has also continually expanded its reach by engaging millions more online through its digital presence, including the Searchable Museum, the Museum’s signature online platform for interpretive, scholarly, digital experiences

The Museum launched the Searchable Museum in November 2021 with the release of its first exhibition experience, Slavery and Freedom. Since that initial release, seven exhibitions from the Museum’s permanent and changing galleries have been added to the Searchable Museum, along with many new digital stories, Constellations featuring objects from the Museum’s collection, and digital learning resources for educators and students.

The Searchable Museum is committed to bringing all the Museum’s permanent exhibitions online while creating new, original, interpretive, digital experiences that reimagine the Museum’s exhibitions, collection, archives, and scholarly works in a digital space that engages online visitors with visually compelling, immersive, multimedia storytelling that is informative and educational. As an online platform, the Searchable Museum is built on a flexible, scalable, and secure cloud-based computing environment and content management system, using modern standards for web browser-based applications that meet current requirements for online accessibility, and align with the Museum’s established brand identity and online style guide.

In 2025, the Museum is prioritizing improving the accessibility and discoverability of its original digital content through qualitative and quantitative audience research and analysis, iterative design enhancements to the user experience, and a strategic approach to content development and publishing that aligns with the Museum’s audience outreach and engagement goals. The Museum is also prioritizing growing its online audience reach and engagement through the design and development of new, interactive, immersive features for the Searchable Museum that add value to the user experience and provide new opportunities for engaging learners of all levels who visit the platform online. Key outcomes will include the release of the online exhibition experience for A Changing America, 1868 – Today, the final permanent exhibition from the Museum’s History Galleries, an enhanced Home Page and Search experience, and improved audience analytics tracking.

Among the Museum’s key objectives as part of the Smithsonian’s Strategic Plan are to provide online visitors to the Searchable Museum with experiences that grow and diversify the Museum’s audience reach, enhances engagement, and increase the Museum’s impact among key online audience segments. To meet these objectives, the Museum seeks to enhance the usability, accessibility, flexibility, functionality, and performance of the Searchable Museum online platform and develop new digital content experiences drawn from the Museum’s exhibitions, collection, archives, and educational resources.

Together these enhancements shall provide the Museum’s online audiences with a digital experience that meets the Smithsonian’s strategic goals of serving as a trusted online source for all Americans and ensuring every home and classroom has access the Museum’s digital resources.

The Smithsonian is looking to award one time-and-materials contract with possible multiple option periods to one successful Offeror.

NOTE: This is not a solicitation for a federal contract and is therefore not governed by federal procurement procedures.

The RFP will be available on or about 4/7/25. Please note: The Smithsonian anticipates the need to include a Minimum Qualifications Requirement. Interested Offerors will need to respond to and provide documentation satisfying these minimum qualifications in order to be considered for award. Any and all materials must be submitted by the deadlines set forth in the RFP in order to be considered.

***NOTE: This posting has been updated on 4/1/2025 to reflect a new RFP release date of 4/7/2025. The original posting had a release date of 4/1/2025. ***

Thank you for your interest.