JM2010 Round Table: Marketing Yourself and the Library (2nd Post)
Posted on January 29, 2010 by ebrennan | 1 Comment
By Annie Hughes, MLIS, Reference Librarian; USC Wilson Dental Library & Learning Center
Round Table: Marketing Yourself and the Library. Facilitator: Marsha Kmec.
While offering patrons pizza and chocolate to entice them to use library resources is always a go-to solution; Thursday’s Roundtable Session on Marketing Yourself and the Library allowed for some brainstorming on other creative ways to reach out. The table was filled with academic, hospital and one consumer health librarian, all of which had ideas to share. Academic librarians in attendance discussed how they find that making a personal connection and putting a face to the services that the library can provide is a great solution. Sitting in on students’ classes, providing orientations and engaging students by requiring them to participate in assignments or literature search exercises are successful for these librarians. With regard to connecting with faculty at your institution, sitting on the curriculum committee and attending faculty meetings are ways to get buy-in. Hospital librarians in attendance said they send out monthly newsletters to staff, sit on committees and go to meetings to give quick 10-minute presentations on what the library can offer. Providing health discussion groups as well as inviting speakers to give talks on health information are two methods that work for a consumer health librarian in the group. Some suggestions for further outreach would be to target local religious institutions and perhaps secure a radio interview or radio spot that would reach the local community. The main outcome was to be creative and find what works and go with it.
For another perspective on this Round Table, visit this blog post.
Posted 1/29/10
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February 2nd, 2010 @ 1:39 pm
[…] For another perspective on this Round Table, visit this blog post. […]