Coordinating a social media presence for the library
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The document provides guidance on developing a social media presence for a library. It recommends researching community social media use, determining goals for individual sites, creating guidelines that address policies and best practices, launching sites in a phased approach with staff training, and evaluating services over time. Key elements include community research, developing social media guidelines, planning a soft launch with staff, and ongoing assessment of services.
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Coordinating a social media presence for the library
- 1. Coordinating a Social Media Presence for the Library Sarah Houghton-Jan Digital Futures Manager, San Jose Public Library Author of LibrarianInBlack.net
- 2. Why do you want to be present in social media?
- 3. Before you even start...ask yourself: why? who? what? when? where?
- 4. Only then move onto the how .
- 5. “ Understanding local patron culture is essential to creating used and useful technology services.” - Char Booth
- 6. Community Research What social networks does your community use? ASK! How does use break down by demographic groups? What is trending upward?
- 7. What to post? Facebook - library news - events - parent-specific materials Twitter - library news - general book/tech news - snippets of local materials
- 8. Are you pushing information out? Or having a discussion?
- 9. Institutional & Policy Limits What policies exist & are they still relevant? - Customer and staff posting policies - Distinguishing work vs. non-work use of social media - Existing policies about at-work tech use, photo use, etc. - Who is allowed/encouraged to post?
- 11. Creating Social Media Guidelines Taskforce of expert users to do project planning and research Project manager + a few key champions Solicit staff input and use it Develop a launch plan
- 12. Elements of Social Media Guidelines General Social Media Best Practices (Overview, Personal Social Media Participation, Site Set-Up, Site Management, Profile Standards, Online Posting Guidelines for User-Generated Content, Additional Guidelines for Staff-Generated Content, General Social Media Best Practices, Notifications and Comments, Statistics, Publicity, Additional New Tech) Practices for Specific Sites (Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Yelp, wikis, blogs, social bookmarking, photo sharing, podcasting, videocasting)
- 14. Site Set-Up - Procedure for new sites - Planning: goals, target audience, success metrics, plan for maintenance) - Log-Ins: sharing/standards - Linking from current site
- 15. Profile Standards - Profile images - Profile name standards (e.g. Almaden Branch-SJPL) - Account email, log-ins, & passwords - Location, contact info, website - Biography template - Disclaimer and/or posting policy links
- 16. Guidelines for Posting Customer Guidelines need to be clear Staff Guidelines = the above + existing policies (e.g. Email & Internet Use Policy, E-Government Policy, Information Security Policy, Code of Ethics, Public Records Policies)
- 17. General Best Practices Be clear. Make it clear what you will be posting so that you will get users who are most interested in that type of information. Be there. Any social media page must be maintained frequently. Be personal. Speak as “I,” not “the library.” Speak as a person and be friendly, just as you would in a physical library setting.
- 18. Notifications & Comments Site coordinator should subscribe to notifications for comments/messages. Staff should post-moderate daily. Staff should reply to all comments within 24 hours.
- 19. Handling New Technologies Who decides when to jump on a new social media site? What standards will be used in deciding to participate? How can someone make a suggestion?
- 20. Twitter-Specific Tips What to post Frequency Hash tags Following your followers @ replies URL shortening
- 21. Facebook-Specific Tips Profile vs. Page vs. Group What to post Setting up administrators Frequency Friending Applications/Games/Causes Events Privacy Setting
- 22. Tools to Use for Twitter Statistics: Twitter Counter ( http://twittercounter.com/ ) Tools: Twitter Search ( http://search.twitter.com/ ) – library mentions. TwitPic ( http://twitpic.com/ ) – photos. Flickr2Twitter ( https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/11212 ) & SnapTweet ( http://snaptweet.com ) – Flickr auto-posts. Twtpoll ( http://twtpoll.com/ ) – polls. Screenr ( http://screenr.com/ ) – screencasts. FutureTweets ( http://futuretweets.com/ ) – pre-schedule Tweets. Management tools such as Seesmic, Touiter, TweetDeck, etc.
- 23. Tools to Use for Facebook Statistics: Facebook’s internal Fan Page statistics (page views, fans, new fans, removed fans, wall posts, photo views, etc.). Plus weekly email update w/ usage. Tools: Flickr Tab & My Flickr ( http://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=2352557895 ) - Flickr auto-posts to FB. Visual Bookshelf ( http://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=2481647302 ) - virtual book displays. Other Facebook Apps can be used to create individualized and content-rich tabs
- 24. General Tips for Social Media Develop an social media plan with a budget and staff needs. Start with the easy one-time things. Move on to the harder, more time-consuming stuff. Duplicate content to save time.
- 25. General Social Media Tools CheckUsernames.com: check username availability Ping.fm, Hellotxt, AtomKeep: sync up posting to multiple sites HootSuite, Seesmic, TweetDeck: manage multiple sites Filtrbox, MyBUZZmonitor: impact/stats
- 27. Planning a Launch Develop a list of existing pages/profiles Meet with key stakeholders first Hold team/branch trainings and talks Encourage and acknowledge participation
- 28. Getting Staff Buy-In Educate, educate, educate. Inform early and constantly. Ask for & use input. Demand consistent managerial support.
- 29. Staff Training Part of training is information. Provide staff exposure at least 1 month before soft launch Offer staff formal training in that time - Play with it, touch it, and learn it. - Fun. Rewards. Food. - Types and numbers of trainings
- 30. Soft Launches Beta test everything! 1. Launch for a small group of staff first (to find big bugs). 2. Launch for entire staff (and ask for feedback, problems, suggestions). 3. Launch for users (without “hard” promotion and ask for feedback). 4. Do a hard launch and promote.
- 32. Evaluating New Services Survey users and staff 6 months in Would you recommend this service to a friend? Why or why not? Evaluate the library's follow-through Has adequate marketing and training been done? Evaluate statistics service use vs. staff time ROI
- 34. Results of Evaluation Continue service or Discontinue service or Extend pilot and - change aspects of the service - do more promotion or training Discontinuing a service is not failing. Persisting in a failed effort is failing.
- 36. F2F World Marketing Ideas Intentional communication & discussion Outreach to partners & community groups Dynamic physical marketing LCD screens in-library or in the community really nice flyers, posters geocaching in the community
- 37. Online Marketing Ideas Library website promotions Have a good service URL (sjpl.org/social) Promote one network through another Short promotions on receipt printers, email alerts, newsletters, catalog Ensure search engine findability Events websites (Eventful, Going, Upcoming) Get links from partners
- 38. Rejoice in failures... for failing indicates that you have encountered a boundary that needs testing.
- 39. Questions? Sarah Houghton-Jan web: LibrarianInBlack.net email: LibrarianInBlack@gmail.com IM: LibrarianInBlack Twitter: twitter.com/TheLiB Skype: LibrairanInBlack Facebook: facebook.com/librarianinblack