I work in a public library and as a librarian I think we may use Facebook, Twitter and Youtube as a combined social media strategy for service outreach. Facebook and Twitter are among the most effective Web 2.0 tools for marketing library resources and services (AlAwadhi & Al-Daihani, 2019) and are ideal to deliver marketing campaign in our library 2.0 environment.
Facebook provide a fast-spreading method for advertisements and promotions of libraries. We may use it to give information to the users, as well as collect views and opinions of users through the “share” and “comment” functions (Lam et al., 2019). It would be a good static platform with Twitter and YouTube to supplement with dynamic contents and forging engaging relationship with users.
Twitter is influential in maintaining connections and forging ongoing engagements with our users. Stvilia and Gibradze (2014) noted most library tweets were related to building and maintaining connections with library users and informing library users about library events and facilities and to promote the library collections and services. Further, it creates an open forum for users by disrupting the boundaries of geography, position, institution, and hierarchy (Admon et al., 2020). By effectively utilising the Twitter platform, the traditional library extension activities in our library can be effectively enhanced by virtual mode to cover remote users. Twitter would enable our library to remain as a community living room by opening virtual doors for people to come and stay safe during extreme social conditions like during Covid-19 (Alajmi & Albudaiwi, 2020). In adopting Twitter, fellow colleagues should be trained to involve in producing Twitter contents. By actively engaging with users and consistently providing patrons with service updates users would be encouraged to come back for more (Potter, 2012).
Online promotion can be optimised with the effective use of video marketing. Marketing with video can be extremely powerful to convey a lot of information about the library in an arresting way. Our library may make use of Youtube to conduct virtual library visits for schools or interested parties and the number of visits will likely surge it is no longer bound by physical walls. Furthermore, the use of Youtube ties in with the current trends of social media marketing with video streaming. Youtube promotes the interactions between libraries and its users through broadcasting live videos. We may use Youtube to broadcast live videos of popular events such as talks of celebrities and famous authors to favour a massive number of audience and ensure the smooth delivery of service despite extreme social conditions.
References
Admon, A. J., Kaul, V., Cribbs, S. K., Guzman, E., Jimenez, O. & Richards, J. B. (2020).Twelve tips for developing and implementing a medical education Twitter chat. Medical Teacher, 42(5), 500-506. doi.org/10.1080/0142159X.2019.1598553
Alajmi, B. M. & Albudaiwi, D. (2020). Response to COVID-19 pandemic: Where do public libraries stand? Public Library Quarterly, 1-17.
AlAwadhi, A. & Al-Daihani, S. M. (2019). Marketing academic library information services using social media. Library management, 40 (3/4), 228-239. www.emeraldinsight.com/0143-5124.htm
Lam, E. T. H., Au, C. H. & Chiu, D. K. W. (2019). Analyzing the use of Facebook among university libraries in Hong Kong. The Journal of Academic Librarianship, 45(3), 175–183.
Potter, N. (2012). The library marketing toolkit. Facet Publishing.
Stvilia, B. & Gibradze, L. (2014). What do academic libraries tweet about, and what makes a library tweet useful?. Library & Information Science Research, 36, 136-141. doi: 10.1016/j.lisr.2014.07.001.