Library Marketing Toolkit 101

I thought of the bare bones of several ideas that I would like to try at my library during this session and I will use this process to flesh them out so that they will have a better chance of being successful.

Classic Approach to Marketing
Research → Plan → Communicate → Evaluate

Research what your community NEEDS. There should be no surprises.
Book suggestion: Accidental Library Marketer by Cathy Dempsey, there is also an online newsletter: MLS (Marketing Library Services) http://www.infotoday.com/mls/default.shtml

Plan: the target audience of your new services should be part of the planning. Invite them in and put them on the committee.
*Idea: Start a Friends of the Mears library group. Ask kids to come once a month to meet and talk about what they would like to see happen in the library and help plan events and services.
This is where goals come in: you need set some. Goals should be S.M.A.R.T. (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, Timely) DON’T target everyone, segment the market!
*Idea: Revamp our dismal Mears READS program: do several books, each in a different genre so kids can choose.
*Idea: offer discussion times for the lit tub books! This would be available across teams.

Communicate: Decide what your message is, make sure it reflects goals and objectives. Come up with strategies to reach your target audience. Develop tools to have ready at hand: contact list, picture database.
*Idea: Signs for putting up in the halls. wii@your library, markers@your library, internet@your library, horror@your library, help@your library, textbooks@your library. Come with lots and plaster the place?
*Idea: Have students wear sandwich boards between classes?

Evaluate: Have ways to evaluate the impact and success of your message ready ahead of time. Don’t just evaluate at the end, have a timeline and evaluate throughout so that you can tweak things if they aren’t working. Road map of goals, objectives, and where you think you should be at certain times. The timing will depend on your total timeline.

Guerrilla Approach to Marketing: marketing in seven sentences.
1. Explain purpose. 2. Describe benefits to audience 3. Specify audience 4. Niche 5. Marketing weapons 6. Identity of business 7. Marketing budget.