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Library awareness is another aspect that librarians must consider. While it may fall under the marketing tree, the awareness or publicity of the library is the action part. Once the market research is complete you can implement the types of awareness that the library is trying to achieve. Creating awareness is a good step in trying to get people to come through the door or browse online. Still, libraries must also be aware themselves to a changing trend in awareness tools and techniques.
Many research databases purchased by libraries now provide current awareness tools, including new issue, new article, citing, and topic alerts, delivered by email or RSS feed (McKee, Koltutsky & Vaska, 2009). These types of awareness make it so that the library can constantly provide new information to the users, especially if they are using at home. There has been a change going on regarding the awareness tools, they are shifting from a current awareness as a library tool to a set of databases provided by vendors (McKee et al., 2009). However, this shift has showed that although it is a useful tool, it is not tailored to users specific needs and is updated very frequently potentially creating a type of information overload (McKee et al., 2009).
Many librarians are finding hard to market themselves due to the fact that marketing and branding were not a typical part of their vocabulary (Cipkowski, Cole & Graves, 2009). Needless to say that librarians are finding ways to promote themselves, either through traditional means such as flyers or more recent types such as email and listservs (Cipkowski et al., 2009). Even though libraries have always been doing awareness programs, they have to constantly adapt to their surroundings. It seems that as of late the typical awareness techniques are being replaced by more cost effective online tools.
Upon a recent visit to a local library I inquired how the library advertises itself. The librarian said that the library uses email and RSS feeds and no longer sends out mailings due to the costs involved. This prompted me to ask how a librarian tackles the potential hazard of a technology based awareness system with an aging user base that is not able to use such tools. The librarian said that it is a problem, but that they offer computer classes and instruction, even at the basic level. It could be implied that part of the marketing strategy is to make sure that you have the necessary services in place for the less technologically gifted users so they can be alerted of what the library is offering.
Another thing I noticed when visiting the library was how quick the staff was to reference the online website for the library. Since I was behind the scenes I was able to see how the website was put together and how users can navigate through it. What struck me as interesting was how there were many links to what the librarians were reading and other links to book clubs and readers advisories. It was a breath of fresh air to see a library adopting such simple, but effective tools to provide their users with more information. Even though the page is still being worked on, the library has managed to fully utilize the space in providing awareness and publicity to its users in the library and at home.
Trying to show your users what is available to them is a changing process. With online tools making information easily and quickly available, many hi tech users are used to having everything at their fingertips. However, even with all these new technologies, you cannot forget about the users that cannot use or even understand what these tools are. Therefore, it is up to the library to ensure its users that, even though they have to adapt and stay in stride with current technology trends, they will remain dedicated to teaching older users how to use and understand the new formats.
References
Cole, K., Graves, T., Cipkowski, P (2010). Marketing the library in a digital world. The Serials Librarian, 58, 182-187.
McKee, S., Koltutsky, L., Vaska, M (2009). Introducing refaware: A unique awareness product. Library Hi Tech News, 29, 1-6.
The costs and time involved in marketing efforts does make e-mail and RSS feeds an affordable, attractive option. I think Facebook is a great marketing tool for libraries. Rather than taking more time to compile and send out an e-mail, a librarian can quickly post a new book at the library or a reminder of an upcoming author's visit in a matter of minutes. As a push technology, it's an easy way to communicate with patrons. Posters in the library marketing the Facebook page and encouraging users to join or like the page are a good tool for continuously building that online community.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Suzy above and think she has some great ideas about advertising for the Facebook page so that more users become fans. It can be difficult to advertise for such a wide audience using such "new" tools (Facebook, web site, etc.), but I think eventually this is the way that an even larger majority of marketing will be done. I have found that at my job, most library patrons find out about programs from either flyers at the library or through word of mouth. I usually don't hear about anyone reading our web site for programming, but as a library serving a smaller community, that's probably not unusual. Our computers are set with the library's web site as their page, so that encourages people to look around when they use the Internet. We've also used the Facebook page to let teens know about upcoming teen events which has worked out really well! Hopefully we'll soon see the merging of old marketing technologies like flyers and posters with new ones, such as Facebook, blogs, and web sites.
ReplyDelete- Whitney Jones