Wednesday, March 19, 2008

PM session: library catalogs and OPACs

I am "live wiki'ng" the PM session on library catalogs here.

First session of library camp - Marketing, Outreach, Public Relations, & other stuff

First topic - staff buy-in. Faculty at a university assume they know everything about the library and tune library staff out. Would like to see them assign more library use. Public libraries would like teachers to let them know what assignments are in advance so that appropriate materials can be located.

Question - ultimate goal is to reach students, but is not happening through faculty. Would like to do more branding on webpages so that they can become aware of what is available to use at the library. Want to reach more non-users.

Bringing digital natives to the website can be hard but pays off.

JoCo Library site comes up as a favorite - looking at the literary map of KC.

So much content - but not all can be on the front page. How to boil down content and create intuitive paths??!

Instant messaging on a university website - looking at branding of the "ask a librarian" logo

Orientation and other presentations to students - difficult to capture attention of tired frosh.

Talking about using names - make sure that the students' name and the librarians' name are used in transactions.

Talking logos- trying to rebrand means rehauling all library materials, library vehicles, getting staff to throw out old forms and bookmarks, powerpoints left over from 1994.

Getting management to make people accountable - write branding into ppls. performance plans. David says "just do it!"

External marketing requires internal marketing - make the plan palatable and important to staff so that the buy-in occurs as part of the process. Convince staff that this is saving them time to provide them with logos, templates, and other tools that will help them do their job better.