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Super Library Marketing: Practical Tips and Ideas for Library Promotion

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marketing for libraries

Threads: Is It a Dud or the Next Big Thing in Library Marketing?

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#LibraryMarketing Show, episode 205

๐Ÿ•ฆ It’s been more than a month since Threads was released into the world. And I’ll be honest…

I still have no idea what to think of the newest social media platform.

Every day that goes by I wonder… is it going to be the next big thing in library marketing? Or is it an experiment doomed to fail?

I’ll share what experts are saying in this episode.

Do you have a suggestion for a topic for a future episode? Want to nominate someone for kudos? Let me know in the comments.

Thanks for watching!


Miss last week’s episode? No worries!

Will I see you soon?

Subscribe to this blog and youโ€™ll receive an email whenever I post. To do that, enter your email address and click on the โ€œFollowโ€ button in the lower left-hand corner of the page. You can also follow me on the following social media platforms:

The Top 7 Tips for Library Emails That Are Guaranteed To Appeal to Millennials and Gen Z Readers

Photo courtesy Cincinnati and Hamilton County Public Library

I live with two members of Gen Z. Thanks to them, I know about trending TikTok audio, Temu, and K-pop. Theyโ€™ve given me skincare and makeup advice.

And they use the libraryโ€ฆ not because Iโ€™m their mom, but because it has books and videos and music for free. One is working part-time while dealing with health issues, and the other is working two jobs to save for a house.

Like many young adults, they worry about their financial future. And they value institutions that build community.

Millennials and Gen Z combine to make up 53 percent of the worldโ€™s population. Born between 1981 and 2009, theyโ€™re the largest adult demographic.

And while I generally think itโ€™s foolish to lump an entire group of people together for marketing purposes based on their birth year, there are some things we can say, based on research, that these two groups share.

  • They are readers.
  • They love BookTok, the special subsection of TikTok dedicated to readers.
  • They are more educated than previous generations.
  • They value experiences, like travel and entertainment.
  • They prefer shopping online to going to a store.
  • They do their research before buying products. 

Now, more research suggests your library can promote books and reading recommendations to teens and young adults using one main promotional tactic.

Email.

I know what youโ€™re thinking: โ€œYoung people today donโ€™t read email.โ€

Have I got some statistics for you!

Millennials and email

According to Pew Research Center, Millennials encompass anyone between the ages of 27 and 42.

  • 1 in 3 millennials check their email as soon as they wake up.
  • 73 percent of millennials prefer that companies communicate with them through email.
  • Nearly 51 percent of millennials say email influences their purchasing decision.

Now, of course, your library is not selling anything.

Or is it?

Most of the libraries I work with have two overarching goals: ย increase circulation and increase visitors.

And while library users do not have to pay to participate in those activities, it makes sense for libraries to use the same strategies that brands do for selling products.

So here are four ways to finesse your email to appeal to millennials.

Design is important.

Millennials have a sophisticated eye for visual content. Whatever email marketing platform you use, be sure you follow the best practices for email design. That includes templates with beautifully designed graphics or photos, particularly of faces showing emotion.

  • Use as little text as possible, in a font of at least 14 points.
  • Keep your color choices within your brandโ€ฆ no glowing neon blue fonts!
  • Promote no more than 4 things in your email and add plenty of white space between the email blocks for a clean look.

Here’s a great example from Camden County Library.

Be friendly and as personal as possible.

If your email provider allows you to personalize your emails with a first name, do so. That’s a great way to capture the recipient’s attention in the inbox.

But for true personalization, focus on the content. Spend time thinking about what they want and need from your library. Then, create interest groups based on those wants and needs.

Follow Delafield Public Library’s example. Their newsletter signup is on their homepage.

That link leads to an opt-in page with Hobbies and Interests choices right at the top.

How are you supposed to know the wants and needs of your Millennial audience? Well, if your library does an annual survey, segment your results based on age. What are the aspirations and motivations of this group? For example, if they say they are looking for a place to network and find community, your email messages should focus on the services you provide that meet those needs.

If your library doesn’t do an annual survey, look at the statistics you have on hand, such as circulation or program attendance. You can get a sense of what your patrons in this age group want and need from your library.

You can also reach out to partner organizations that work with this age group for their input on how your library can serve and market to millennials.

Finally, you can use Google Analytics to see what users in this age group do when they come to your website. Use your promotional tactics to market those sections of your website.

Watch your language.

Remember how your high school and college English professors praised you for using big words and complicated sentence structures? They did you a disservice.

The most effective text in email for Millennials is conversational and casual. For your library emails, move away from formal language. Instead, talk to this audience as if they were real people, standing in front of you at the desk.

After you write your email, read it through slowly and check to see if there are any sentences or phrases that you could say more simply. Read it out loud. If your email sounds professorial, try re-phrasing your text to be more conversational.

Share stories of other Millennials using the library.

Millennials love social proof. They want to see people their age using the library.

I know youโ€™ve been gathering stories to share in your marketing campaigns. You can share those stories in your emails as well.

Use a few lines from a story, with a photo in your emails. If you have a longer version of the story on your blog or in video form, add a call-to-action button that allows readers to see the full version.

Gen Z and email

According to the Pew Research Center, Gen Z encompasses anyone ages 14 to 26.

Iโ€™m just going to say this again because I know itโ€™s hard for you to believe. But Gen Z does read email. In fact:

  • 58 percent check their inbox more than once a day.
  • 57.5 percent say they donโ€™t mind if a brand sends them emails several times a week.
  • But here is the biggest statistic I want you to remember: According to Campaign Monitor, the average member of Gen Z gets only 20 emails a day.

Thatโ€™s an advantage for your library because you don’t have to compete for attention in the inbox. Don’t make the mistake of most brands, who assume this audience doesn’t read email!

Here are three ways to create emails that appeal to this important age group.

Keep it short.

Gen Z members have spent their whole lives scrolling Instagram and TikTok. They are accustomed to short digital content, especially from brands (Yes, they do read and enjoy long books and movies). But their expectation from brands, including your library, is for shorter content.

  • Send more emails that contain fewer pieces of information.
  • Limit your text to 2 or 3 sentences.
  • Use images and white space to break up your text.
  • Have one call to action button.

Here’s a great example from Community Library.

Keep it visual.

Gen Z members love a good visual. Graphics work really well with this audience to convey information in a simple way that is accessible to many audiences.

And Gen Z brains are hard-wired for visuals. They’re used to glancing at a graphic and processing the information quickly. So try an email with a graphic to see if you get better engagement than with plain text.

Make it interactive.

Gen Z likes to have fun online. And that’s great for you because it means you get to have some fun creating your emails!

There are four ways to incorporate interactivity into your emails.

  • Create quizzes using free quiz creators like Slido or Quizmaker.
  • Add a GIF.
  • Add a poll or survey to your emails. Google Forms is my go-to for these and it’s free.
  • Add a countdown timer.

More Advice

How Taylor Swift, Pedro Pascal, and Other Trends Led a Library Social Media Marketer to TikTok Success

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When I Heard This One Step To Increase Organic Reach on Social Media, I Got So Mad at Myself, I Did a Face Palm๐Ÿคฆ

Watch this video now

#LibraryMarketing Show, episode 204

There is one very simple tip that you can use to increase the organic reach of your library’s posts on LinkedIn, YouTube, and Facebook (and X, if you still use that). And honestly, when I heard about this tip, I felt like smacking myself. How did I miss this? It’s so easy. I’m going to share it with you.

Plus weโ€™ll give kudos to someone doing great work in library marketing.

Do you have a suggestion for a topic for a future episode? Want to nominate someone for kudos? Let me know here.

Thanks for watching!


Miss last week’s episode? No worries!

Will I see you soon?

Subscribe to this blog and youโ€™ll receive an email whenever I post. To do that, enter your email address and click on the โ€œFollowโ€ button in the lower left-hand corner of the page. You can also follow me on the following social media platforms:

How Taylor Swift, Pedro Pascal, and Other Trends Led a Library Social Media Marketer to TikTok Success

Photo courtesy Cincinnati and Hamilton County Public Library

One of Paul Wellingtonโ€™s first library experiences was not a pleasant one.

Growing up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, his parents occasionally took him to the Milwaukee Public Library, but it wasnโ€™t a big part of his life.

โ€œIn high school, I distinctly remember visiting a branch after school,โ€ recalls Paul. โ€œI was not allowed to use a computer since I didnโ€™t have a library card. I felt very unwelcomed, with little interest in returning. But little did I know libraries would become a big part of my life just a few years later!โ€

If you pay attention to library social media, you have seen Paulโ€™s work. He is currently the social media specialist for the Cincinnati and Hamilton County Public Library (CHPL), working on the team I used to lead!

Paulโ€™s work received national attention earlier this year when he posted this now-famous TikTok showing how holds are gathered at the library. The post has, as of this publication, a whopping 3.7 million views, 599,000 likes, and has been shared nearly 25,000 times.๐Ÿ˜ฎ

โ€œI came across the idea when I saw a duet of a woman mimicking the person in the original video on TikTok,โ€ explains Paul. โ€œThe next week, I proposed the idea to staff at a branch, with the realization that finding a volunteer was a long shot. Surprisingly, Kelwin (the Cincinnati Library staff member in the TikTok), agreed to mimic the person in the video. Cue the hilarity!”

“I thought the clip would receive a few thousand views, and I was really shocked at how quickly it went viral, including on other social media platforms.”

Paul Wellington

“Some other posts that have performed well are the Taylor Swift visit and Pedro Pascal as libraries posts. I shared the Taylor Swift TikTok a few days before she visited Cincinnati, and I hopped on the Pedro Pascal trend after seeing a post from Vancouver Public Library.โ€

Working for a library was not Paulโ€™s first career choice. He originally pursued a degree in architecture at the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee. During the spring of his first year, he got a job as a circulation aide at the Milwaukee Public Library.

โ€œI was promoted to Circulation Supervisor at a branch in 2016,โ€ says Paul. โ€œDuring the height of Covid in 2020, physical circulation was slow, and I asked to assist the Marketing department with Facebook and Instagram. I loved managing social media, which eventually led to my current position as the Social Media Specialist with CHPL.

โ€œMy favorite part of managing social media for CHPL is thinking of creative ways to promote the library, whether itโ€™s through humorous text, videos, or memes,โ€ shares Paul. โ€œMy least favorite part, and this is something Iโ€™ve started recently, is editing captions for our YouTube videos. While very tedious, itโ€™s important that CHPL makes its content accessible to everyone!โ€

I can say from experience it is difficult to manage social media for a library like CHPL, which has 41 locations and serves a population of 800,000 residents county-wide. Paul has the libraryโ€™s five strategic priorities, which are guiding principles for deciding what he posts on social media.

โ€œWithin these priorities, I focus on promoting the libraryโ€™s events, services, and resources,โ€ explains Paul. โ€œEach day I share 4-6 posts on Facebook and Twitter, and 1-2 posts on other platforms (Instagram, LinkedIn, Threads), so there are plenty of opportunities to promote the library offerings.โ€

โ€œI would say one key to success is capitalizing on social media trends and events in your local community. If youโ€™re able to incorporate the library into this type of content, youโ€™re setting yourself up for success.โ€

How does Paul resist the urge or the demand to post about every program or service the library provides?

โ€œThe most common requests for social media posts are events, and the library has hundreds of them each month,โ€ says Paul. โ€œA large number of our events are recurring storytimes and book clubs, so I tend to promote other unique events. Library staff understands this process, and I rarely have to deny a requested event promotion.โ€

Paul spends a lot of time on social media, (go figure!) looking for inspiration. His top four favorite libraries to watch are:

And Paul has one big piece of advice for anyone working on social media for a library.

โ€œIt is important to understand the demographics for each platform. For example, CHPLโ€™s Facebook followers have an older demographic, while Instagram consists of a large number of Millennials.”

“Content that works on one platform may not work on another. You can still share the same event, service, or resource across all library platforms, but consider the text and the way itโ€™s presented (photo, graphic, meme, or video).โ€


More Advice

Turns Out, Thereโ€™s One Social Media Platform That Really, Really Works To Promote Your Collection to Gen Z and Millennials! Hereโ€™s How To Take Advantage of This at Your Library

Upcoming Appearances

Will I see you soon?

Subscribe to this blog and youโ€™ll receive an email whenever I post. To do that, enter your email address and click on the โ€œFollowโ€ button in the lower left-hand corner of the page. You can also follow me on the following social media platforms:

Empathy Marketing: How To Use Greed, Fear, Love, and Hope To Motivate Your Audience

Photo courtesy Cincinnati and Hamilton County Public Library

The worst day Iโ€™ve ever had in a job was in 2009.

I was working in television news as a producer. It was during the recession, and times were tough for TV stations. Most of our ad dollars came from car dealerships. Vehicle sales fell 40 percent that year, which meant the dealerships had no money to spend on television ads.  

One morning, as I sat down at my desk, our news director called one of our morning editors into his office. Andy was in there for about 10 minutes. He emerged crestfallen.

Over the course of the next two hours, a dozen or so of my 60 fellow co-workers made the same journey in and out of the news directorโ€™s office. When they emerged, all of them had lost their jobs.

I could barely function that day. Writing was hard and my concentration was nonexistent. The only thing that got me through the day was the conversations I had with my fellow, still-employed co-workers, in hallways, offices, and in the back parking lot. We spent time trying to process what had happened and how it would impact our work.

Iโ€™m certain you have a similar story. And to make it through the day, itโ€™s likely you pulled aside a friend, or a co-worker, or called your spouse or parent and talked it through. Sharing your story and receiving validation for your experience made you feel better or at least, more able to handle the crisis. Someone practiced empathy for you.

Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of others. It can, and should, play a role in your library promotions.

Libraries are uniquely positioned to put empathy marketing to work. We care about our communities. We want our patrons to find the information they have, to experience joy, to learn, and to feel included. And that can play a significant role in creating effective promotions.

What is Empathy Marketing?

Empathy in marketing means communicating with your audience that you understand and share the emotions they feel. Itโ€™s more than pushing out promotions, one after another, on all channels.

Empathy marketing shows your community that you understand their pain, frustration, hurdles, and problems. When you demonstrate that, you’ll unlock the key to turning your audienceโ€™s emotions into action.  

Emotions that drive action

Think about your favorite novel. The author used empathy to make you care about what happens to the characters. Without that, you likely would never have finished the book.

In the same way, a promotion that lacks empathy is just noise to an audience. You need to make people understand that you care by harnessing emotion in your library marketing.

People are motivated to action by four main emotions: greed, fear, love, and the chance to grow. And under those main emotions, there is a range of nuance: stress, anxiety, worry, compassion, hope, and many more.

How does this work in the real world?

Research shows empathy in marketing increases engagement. Social media platforms take full advantage of this. They count on users to respond emotionally to posts with emojis, and comments, and share the thoughts, struggles, celebrations, and memories of their family and friends.

This is why storytelling works so well in marketing. When your promotions are emotional, they are more memorable. Your audience can see themselves in the story and imagine how they would react in the same situation. And the emotion someone feels after hearing that story has a greater influence on whether that person takes action and uses their library. Itโ€™s that simple.

When I worked in a library, the people in our community were worried specifically about jobs. They wanted valuable, stable employment. Many were stuck in low-paying jobs with no prospects for advancement.

At that time, there werenโ€™t many programs in our area aimed at giving people the basic coaching they needed to put together a resume, ace an interview, or even sort through prospective job openings to find the right fit for their life and their family. So, my library partnered with another organization to put on a series of free workshops aimed at improving the job prospects of members of our community.

The emotion we’ve used to market that program was hope… a sense of hope for the betterment of our community and a sense of hope for those who want a better-paying, more fulfilling job. Hope is related to that fourth base emotion: the chance to grow.

Hope infused every promotional piece we created to promote the workshops. We knew that if we really leaned into the hope this program provided, we would compel our target audience to sign up and attend the workshops.

And it worked! Our workshops filled up and we had to start a waiting list.

A subtle but important shift

I want you to take a look at the last few promotions you have created. Were you merely telling your audience that a service existed in your library? Did your promotion include any emotion?

Here’s how to bridge that gap. Look at the difference between the two paragraphs below promoting Weiss Financial Ratings Site, a library database that allows patrons to find and compare insurance companies. Letโ€™s say you want to compel your community members to do their insurance coverage shopping using your library.

Push marketing: Introducing Weiss Financial Ratings – Your Ultimate Insurance Database!  Tired of sifting through endless insurance options? Look no further! Weiss Financial Ratings is a comprehensive database that helps you find the perfect insurance company tailored to your unique needs.  

Empathy marketing with fear: The fear of making the wrong insurance decision can be overwhelming, leaving you vulnerable and uncertain about your coverage when it matters most. But your library is an unwavering ally in this sea of uncertainty. Weiss Financial Ratings, available for free at your library, lets you easily and confidently navigate through insurance options. Peace of mind is non-negotiable when it comes to safeguarding your future.  

See the difference?

Hereโ€™s another example. When I worked at a library, we had a personalized reading recommendation service called Book Hookup. Cardholders used a form on the website to tell a librarian what books they like. Then the librarian gave them three personalized reading recommendations.

When we sent emails promoting this service, I used empathy in my subject lines. To parents, I appealed to their need for convenience, saying, โ€œYouโ€™ve got a lot to do. Let us pick out your next favorite book.โ€ To teens, I used greed and a little bit of rebellion as motivation, saying simply, โ€œRead something YOU want to read for a change.โ€

For a streaming movie service, you can center your promotional message on frustration, saying, “Tired of endlessly scrolling through streaming platforms, only to be met with the frustration of not finding anything captivating to watch? Say hello to a free, curated selection of blockbuster hits, timeless classics, and hidden gems. Your precious time deserves to be spent indulging in the magic of cinema, not lost in the labyrinth of choices.”

Itโ€™s a slight, but effective change in wording that leads to big results. For your community, empathy marketing feels less like promotion and more like help.

How do I know what emotions motivate my community?

If you want to get to the heart of the emotions that motivate your community, use psychographics.

Psychographics is the study and classification of people according to their attitudes, aspirations, and other psychological criteria, especially in market research (Oxford Dictionary). They go beyond basic demographics: location, age, gender identity, and library card usage.

To segment by psychographics is to divide your library audience into groups according to their beliefs, values, and reasons for being. It delves deeper into your cardholderโ€™s values, dreams, desires, and outlook on life.

Psychographics identifies motivation. Why does your library community take certain actions? Why do they feel the way they do about the library? How do they see the role of the library in their life? And what activities do they participate in, both inside and outside of the library?

Once you identify the emotions that motivate your community, create messages that help, rather than promote. Hereโ€™s an easy thought process to use as you sit down to create promotions. Ask yourself:

  • How does my community see this problem?
    What do they do about it right now?  
  • What are their fears?
  • What are their hopes?
  • What do they really need from my library, and why do they need it?

Psychographics lead to compelling marketing messages because they focus on your communityโ€™s unarticulated needs and motivations. Learn how to identify your communityโ€™s psychographic makeup here.


More Advice

Customer Service Is Helpful: How One Library Scores Big Promotional Points by Being Friendly

Upcoming Appearances

Will I see you soon?

Subscribe to this blog and youโ€™ll receive an email whenever I post. To do that, enter your email address and click on the โ€œFollowโ€ button in the lower left-hand corner of the page. You can also follow me on the following social media platforms:

๐Ÿ“ˆ2 Proven Ways To Entice People To Read Your Libraryโ€™s Emails

Watch this episode now

#LibraryMarketing Show, episode 202

I have a tiny favor to ask of my library marketing friends. ๐Ÿ˜Œ

I need you to do something different when it comes to email marketing. It is an effortless, quick thing to change! I’ll make my case to you in this episode.

Plus weโ€™ll give kudos to someone doing great work in library marketing.

Do you have a suggestion for a topic for a future episode? Want to nominate someone for kudos? Let me know here.

Thanks for watching!


Miss last week’s episode? No worries!

Will I see you soon?

Subscribe to this blog and youโ€™ll receive an email whenever I post. To do that, enter your email address and click on the โ€œFollowโ€ button in the lower left-hand corner of the page. You can also follow me on the following social media platforms:

Customer Service Is Helpful: How One Library Scores Big Promotional Points by Being Friendly

Photo courtesy Cincinnati and Hamilton County Public Library

Meghan Kowalski thought she wanted to work in politics.

In college at the Catholic University of America, she interned for then-Senator Hilary Rodham Clinton while also working at the campus library.

โ€œI was interning for her during a summer when the Democratic National Convention was held,โ€ explained Meghan. โ€œIt was organized chaos. That summer taught me that I MUCH preferred library work over politics,โ€

Library work runs in the family. Meghanโ€™s father was the librarian at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York, where the family eventually settled.

โ€œI canโ€™t ever remember not loving or being aware of the power of libraries,โ€ said Meghan. โ€œWhen we lived in Florida, the branch library for our area was a few streets away from our neighborhood. It was the one place outside our neighborhood I was allowed to bike to by myself. I would go, peruse the shelves (usually for a new Laurelene McDaniel book), and come home with my reads for the week.โ€

Meghan now works as the Outreach and Reference librarian for The University of the District of Columbia. She loves connecting people to the information they are interested in or need. And she loves what she learns from the students and faculty during her interactions.

When Meghan started her job four years ago, her position was brand new. So, she conducted a SWOT analysis to identify the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats that her library faces. During the process, she uncovered an amazing angle for library promotion.

โ€œI used a series of formal and informal interviews, space assessment, and document review to get a handle on what people thought about the library,โ€ explained Meghan. โ€œFrom there, I realized that we had a great brand image as being โ€˜The Helpful Place.โ€™ Time after time, I learned that people went to the library for help because they knew someone would always be there.โ€

โ€œEven if the library couldnโ€™t help (for example, with a financial aid problem) at least we tried or would direct them to someone who could assist. I leaned into that to reinforce our already positive customer service experience while slowly building our platforms.โ€

Meghan also set about getting her fellow staff and faculty trained to provide great customer service to their students.

โ€œDuring my first summer here, I created a customer service commitment document and general training workshop,โ€ said Meghan. โ€œThis gets reinforced twice a year during our required departmental events. Iโ€™ve covered everything from customer service basics to remote customer service to accessible service to how to deal with students who already have too much going on.โ€

Meghanโ€™s university is an HBCU (Historically black college or university) and a commuter campus. Their students are non-traditional. Those facts about her target audience inform everything Meghan does to promote her library.

โ€œThey have so much going on already,โ€ said Meghan. โ€œI donโ€™t want ‘dealing with the library’ to be another hurdle they have to jump. So, we work on equity and consistency in our service. We are going to focus on the individual in front of us and work with them in a manner that best suits them as a person.โ€

โ€œIn the end, all the outreach I do comes down to one simple message – we are the place you can come to get help. It doesnโ€™t matter if Iโ€™m sending an email, tabling at an event, teaching a class, or just chatting with someone – I want them to walk away remembering that the library is where they can come for help.โ€

Meghanโ€™s focus on reinforcing the libraryโ€™s reputation as a place where students can get good customer service was well-received and supported by staff and faculty.

โ€œI approached this from a fait accompli standpoint,โ€ explained Meghan. โ€œItโ€™s integrated into something we ALL do. I reinforce it by sharing positive feedback whenever we get it. I also framed it from the beginning as โ€˜This is something you are already doing.โ€™ My work is just reinforcing that positive attitude and training on the nuances.โ€

Meghan admits that it is hard to measure the impact of good customer service. Reviews, polls, and occasional surveys of the library are all positive. The library also sees a lot of repeat customers.

โ€œIf I focused too much on basic metrics, I might cry,โ€ declared Meghan. โ€œInstead, I see our outreach as relationship building. If you make a student happy, they will talk about you with your friends.โ€

โ€œThat is why customer service is so important. You can help someone, but if you do it in an off-putting way, that person will never come back. You can also be unsuccessful in solving someoneโ€™s issue but, if you are friendly about it, that person comes back because they liked the experience and at least you tried.โ€

In addition to presenting at this yearโ€™s Library Marketing and Communications Conference, Meghan is launching a new personal newsletter (on Substack) called Content Prompt.

โ€œItโ€™s basically designed to juice your creative side to find content ideas when your brain is tired,โ€ explained Meghan. โ€œWe donโ€™t have to work alone! The one great thing about librarians is that we are all so willing to share.โ€

Meghan has one great trick for catching those fleeting moments of inspiration.

โ€œI keep a note in my phone where I can brain dump things whenever the inspiration strikes,โ€ explained Meghan. โ€œOnce a week, I sit down with that note and process things out to make sure I can actually do something with them.โ€

โ€œAlso, never discount the phrase, โ€˜I donโ€™t know. Letโ€™s find out together.โ€™ For our students that shows that research is a process, and we are all working on it. It can also model that failure is okay. Resilience in research is a key skill. When our students see that even librarians have to keep trying, it helps.โ€


More Advice

Turns Out, Thereโ€™s One Social Media Platform That Really, Really Works To Promote Your Collection to Gen Z and Millennials! Hereโ€™s How To Take Advantage of This at Your Library

Upcoming Appearances

Will I see you soon?

Subscribe to this blog and youโ€™ll receive an email whenever I post. To do that, enter your email address and click on the โ€œFollowโ€ button in the lower left-hand corner of the page. You can also follow me on the following social media platforms:

Time for a Reality Check: Hereโ€™s the Truth About Your Libraryโ€™s Email Open Rates

Watch this video

#LibraryMarketing Show, episode 201

I hate to be the bearer of bad news. But your library’s fantastic email open rate may not be the cause for celebration that you think it is.

We’ll talk about that and what metric you should focus on for email marketing in libraries.

Plus weโ€™ll give kudos to someone doing great work in library marketing.

Do you have a suggestion for a topic for a future episode? Want to nominate someone for kudos? Let me know here.

Thanks for watching!


Will I see you soon?

Subscribe to this blog and youโ€™ll receive an email whenever I post. To do that, enter your email address and click on the โ€œFollowโ€ button in the lower left-hand corner of the page. You can also follow me on the following social media platforms:

Book Talking To Promote Your Collection: Five Shrewd Ways To Entice People To Check Out More Books

Photo courtesy Cincinnati and Hamilton County Public Library

My co-worker Yaika recently returned from StokerCon with an amazing library marketing story.

Yaika was on a panel. The organizers of the panel brought about 700 Advanced Reader copies, or ARCs, to the session. An ARC is a version of a book that is made available before the official publication date.

The ARCs were set on tables before the presentation. The panelists then talked about the various ARCs during the session, naming them by title and author and discussing the most intriguing things about each book.

Of course, they gave a quick summary of the plot. But, every time they talked about a book, they mentioned the appealing factors that make people want to read a book: the characters, the tone, the setting, the pacing, and the themes.

And once the audience heard the appealing factors, a bunch of people would jump out of their seats and run to the ARC table to see if the book was available.

Why did attendees, who seemed hesitant to pick up a book before the session, feel compelled to grab books during the session?

Itโ€™s because the panelists were book-talking.

A book talk is a short presentation about a book to convince other people to read it. Book talking is not a formal book report or review. Itโ€™s more of a mini-commercial. 

And book talking is one of the most effective ways to promote your collection, especially when you describe the book using those intriguing story elements.

Whether you are a degreed librarian who works on library promotions or a communications professional who works in a library, everyoneโ€ฆ and I mean everyoneโ€ฆ can talk about books in this way.

Your passion for the collection, not your degree or expertise, is what makes this type of marketing so special. And promoting your collection is incredibly important to the success of your library.

Your collection is the reason most people get a library card. Books are your brand. You should promote your collection all year long.

If you are a front desk worker, you can book talk with patrons during every interaction! But how do you book talk if you arenโ€™t working at the front desk?

Here are 5 promotional tactics that you can use to book talk with readers when you arenโ€™t working directly with the public.

Email

Every month, I get an email from the Jacksonville Public Library that drives me to the catalog EVERY SINGLE TIME I get it. Do you know why? The email is a book talk in digital form!

I donโ€™t even live in Jacksonville. I donโ€™t live in Florida! But this email makes me want to read books.

The email contains a list of books, usually fewer than 10. Next to each book is a summary of the plot, plus a little extra something: a review, or a hint at something appealing about the theme, genre, or characters. Itโ€™s intriguing! And it makes me add to my TBR (to-be-read) pile.

I also love this example from Jefferson Public Library. Scroll to the bottom of the email to find a promotion that includes those appealing elements which can be more helpful in describing a book than the plot.

Print

The folks at LibraryReads offer a downloadable PDF flyer each month that is a book talk in print. Each of their selected titles is listed, along with a description of the book that includes not only the plot, but words that describe the bookโ€™s genre, intriguing factors, and the authorโ€™s style.

On your website

I must confess that every time I visit my libraryโ€™s website, I am on the hunt for books. Your readers are too. Your job is to make those books sound enticing enough to compel them to place a hold.

Create a page on your website, like Naperville Public Library. They have their book recommendations divided by genre and age group.

And they describe more than the plot. The annotations next to each title help readers decide which of the titles to check out.

Bookmarks

Your library can โ€œupsellโ€ books using bookmarks. Upselling is a sales term in which customers are encouraged to buy a more expensive version of a product than they originally intended.

For libraries, upselling is any action that compels your cardholders to check out more items than they originally intended. And bookmarks are the easiest way to do this.

Start small and manageable. Pick 3 categories to focus on, like cookbooks, horror, and Westerns. You can also choose age-based categories like adults, teens, and early readers.

Once you’ve decided on your categories, make one bookmark for each of your categories. Each bookmark should feature 3-6 books (3 if your bookmarks are one-sided, 6 books if your bookmark is two-sided).

For each book on your bookmark, add a photo of the cover (because book covers can also be enticing!) and the title. Then, write one line about the plot. Write a second line about the characters. Write a third line that describes the book using intriguing language like โ€œquirky,โ€ โ€œthought-provoking,โ€ and โ€œfunny.โ€

Challenge yourself and your staff to hand out a bookmark during every patron interaction. Make it a game to match the bookmark with the patronโ€™s interest using context clues.

For example, if you saw the person browsing your new arrivals display and theyโ€™re an adult, you can hand them your adult fiction bookmark.

If someone comes to the drive-through to pick up their holds and you notice theyโ€™re checking out a whole stack of picture books, give them one of the early readers’ bookmarks. Heck, give them an adult bookmark too!

If someone checks out a cake pan from your Library of Things, give them a cookbook bookmark. And so on.

Videos

Ask a fellow staff member or patron to talk on camera about a book they read and loved. Challenge them to do it in under 60 seconds, like Thayer Public Library does!

Then, post the video natively to all the social media platforms your library uses with a direct link to the book in the catalog. You know how social media platforms LOVE videos!

Bonus idea

I have to share this infographic created by Lester Public Library. They gathered stats on book talks they provided to local students. Itโ€™s such a great way to prove the value of the library to the community, parents, and stakeholders like local legislators and funders!


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