Marketing Public Libraries
Marketing Overview
``Marketing is the management process which
identifies, anticipates and supplies customer
requirements efficiently...''. Thus the essence of
marketing involves finding out what the users
want, then setting out to meet those needs. As
librarians we all participate in this process of
assessing our users needs and trying to fullfil
them. Thus, we are already marketing our library
information skills. However, in order to do this
effectively librarians need to embrace the total
marketing function involving market research and
analysis, service planning and promotion.
• In the consumer-driven approach, consumer wants
are the drivers of all strategic marketing decisions.
No strategy is pursued until it passes the test of
consumer research. Every aspect of a market
offering, including the nature of the product itself, is
driven by the needs of potential consumers.
• A formal approach to this customer-focused marketing is
known as SIVA[12] (Solution, Information, Value, Access).
This system is basically the four Ps renamed and reworded
to provide a customer focus.
•
•
•
•
Product
Price
Place
Promotion
→ Solution
→ Value
→ Access
→ Information
Explore the marketing process
Why market?
• You're not the only information source in town
anymore. You may not even be the only library
in town because the Web offers access to
many libraries! The availability of resources on
the Web can change the way many users
access information.
Why libraries?
• Marketing positions your library in the minds of the
community as a "go-to" source for information and helps
users understand what you have to offer them. Marketing
builds good customer relations, and contributes to a positive
relationship with media, businesses, local government
agencies, and organizations.
• A current catchphrase is "Go where the users are."
This applies to delivery of library services and to marketing
the library.
• New resources are available and new ways exist to market
library services, communicate the value of the library, respond
to increasing demands for mobile services, and meet the
growing need to integrate delivery of services for users
involved in online communities.
Marketing Planning
Marketing planning begin with marketing process:
• internal assessments
• market research
• setting specific goals
• selecting promotion strategies
• creating a plan of action
• Implementation
• Evaluation
Begin with the Library Mission
Statement
• Begin the marketing process by examining your library's
mission or purpose.
• Assess library capabilities with a marketing audit, an internal
assessment.
• Find out what products (services) your users want, and how
they perceive the library, through market research.
• Develop goals and objectives based on your mission and the
results of your internal audit and external research into what
customers want.
• To meet goals, select strategies to promote your products that
will work best, be affordable, and reach your customers.
• Create a plan of action that describes all the steps needed to
carry out the strategies for meeting goals.
• Evaluate how well you have done.
• Select ONE service or one user group for the
purpose of this sample plan, e.g. reference,
children's programming, an annual event, or preschoolers, non-English speaking users, retirees.
• Describe how marketing of this service or to this
group will contribute to the library's mission. For
example, if part of your mission is to serve the
community, you could say that marketing will let
the community know how you can serve them.
INTERNAL ASSESSMENT
The committee will initiate and/or coordinate the regular
measurement of such subjects as patron use of library
services, quality of collections, use of technology
and impacts of technical operations.
• The Committee will undertake and/or coordinate
measurements of the quality of services and collections and
the needs and expectations of the Libraries' clientele to
support strategic planning, facilities planning, budget or
performance review cycles, vendor contract renewals, or
technology/systems conversions. It will endeavor to conduct
library assessment in relation to institutional goals and
outcomes.
• The Committee will recommend to Library Council and/or
other committees actions based on the results of
measurement and assessment.
•
Marketing requires careful planning and begins with understanding the mission of the library. Marketing can
help you succeed in your mission, establish a positive image for the library in the community, and
determine the best way to provide service to users.
Research and planning are critical first steps in marketing. After a product or service for marketing is chosen
based on market research, the marketing plan is created and the goals, objectives, and promotion
strategies are established
Specific goals, objectives and evaluation
EXAMPLES
• To increase the member of children with library card,
assessing library materials
• To improve lifetime readers, thereby insuring educated and
productive future generation
• 3 years campaign set specific goals for juvenile registration
and circulation each year with the final numeric goal of
increasing juvenile registration
• To continue to provide programming for preschoolers.
• To continue the summer library program.
• To be informed and to inform legislators and the public about
library issues.
• To continue to keep city council informed of building/grounds
upkeep as well as other library needs and activities.
Setting Measurable Objectives
• Setting Objectives for each year is a critical not
only for setting our course but for us to create
a marketing promotion plan to insure that the
objective is set,this includes :
• Target for the 1st year of three years plan as
example
• Target for the 2nd year
• Target for the 3rd year
This all involve numeric data getting the target
plan
Library Products
Products in the mix - what does the library offer?
• The marketing audit examines the library's products,
the tangible goods and services such as events,
programming, collections, etc.
• Market research provides information about user
demographics (who they are, where they are, ages,
interests, etc.) and determines the values and benefits
of library products to your users. User demographics
are changing, requiring careful examination of the
marketing mix
It helps determine what library users are looking for in
the way of product features such as variety, quality,
and design, and what benefits such as good
performance, quality, reliability and durability users
demand in services, systems, programs, and resources
The 4 Ps
The marketing audit analyzes the the 4 Ps of
marketing:
• Product -- library services available to clients such
as interlibrary loan, reference, children's
programming, or web access.
• Price of Service -- includes direct and indirect
costs to produce and deliver the product, or
actual fees if any.
• Place -- considers delivery and distribution of the
products and services, location of services,
availability, and accessibility.
• Promotion -- how libraries let users know what
products are available.
Characteristics of Market
As part of marketing research and strategies
a.) Know the Market and realized that market is
beyond
just the people we are currently
served. Identify,
quantify and target the
market that we want to
serve.
b.) Treat everyone like a customer.
c.) Have everyone in the marketing team.
d.) Ask, ask, ask and Listen
e.) Innovate constantly in response to changing
market condition and customer needs
Promoting the Library
promotion, the visible part of a marketing plan.
• Promotion lets the community know about library services or
programs. Promotion is part of the marketing mix
• Successful libraries develop a variety of creative and
innovative promotion strategies such as positive public
relations, eye-catching displays, well-designed publications
(e.g. flyers and newsletters), interactive web sites, aggressive
advocacy, advertising, direct marketing, book sales, friends’
groups, contests, good media relations, public presentations,
blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other new technologies.
Knowledgeable and enthusiastic staff members are also great
promotion tools!
What can you do to convince a user to
"buy" your product?
• POINTS TO CONSIDER:
• What did you find out (or already know) about your
users? That is, who needs a particular service and how
can you communicate the value of the service to those
users who will benefit and for whom the service was
developed?
• How will you reach those who will benefit? For
example,
• who reads news stories and newsletters? Who doesn't?
• Who comes into the library and sees displays?
• Who only works online from home?
• Who can never be sold, who has already been sold,
Advertisement as Part of Promotion
It involves:
• a description of the service requiring publicity;
• description of the audience at which publicity is targeted;
• details of the campaign method to be employed including type of publicity
to be used and method(s) of distribution;
• execution of campaign;
• analysis of campaign performance.
The setting of clear promotional objectives will also ensure that the success of
the advertising campaign can be evaluated. From time to time it should be
accepted that promotional activities have not met their objectives. At this
point the marketing strategies need to be re-evaluated in the context of
the feedback received.
The Medium
Promotional activities can take many forms and the promotional media will
depend on the nature of the target audience and on promotional
objectives.
• Personal Skills
• E-Mail
• The Internet
• Newsletters and Leaflets
The Message
Once you have decided upon the advertising medium you need to consider how to
convey the message you want to get across. The wording and layout of the
advertisement are critical.
The advertisement should be uncluttered with the text printed against a pale
or white background making it easier to read. White ``space'' is powerful.
• Use good quality print.
• Do not print texts in capitals as it is harder to read.
• Use illustrations and pictures.
• Keep the layout interesting, with bullet points, sub-headings and so on.
• Use bold colors and catchy headlines and large print.
• Express the service/product in terms of readers interests.
• Use short sentences, short paragraphs, and avoid long words. Avoid jargon.
• Give examples.
• Look at other peoples advertisements and judge for yourself what is attention
grabbing.
SOUND Advertisement
A good advertisement attracts Attention, arouses
Interest, creates Desire and stimulates Action,
known as the A-I-D-A sequence.
• Attention
• Interest
• Desire
• Action
The time and cost involved in advertising needs to
be considered. Whatever you do to promote your
services will entail costs, even if it is only the cost
of your time, therefore you need to make sure
that you get full benefit for the cost incurred. It is
also important to advertise at the right time and
with the right frequency.
Promoting with new technologies
• Include new strategies as well as maintaining
traditional methods. Investigate concepts,
definitions and best practices for blog
presentations, RSS, wikis, folksonomy, tagging,
library catalog 2.0, multimedia, Flickr,
Podcasting, You-Tube, social networking sites
(MySpace, Facebook), virtual worlds (Second
Life), Web 2.0, and Library 2.0.
• To attract Generation Y teens, it's necessary to
understand how teens use social media, like
blogs, social networking sites, virtual worlds,
Filipinos are 3rd facebook users
Survey Conducted
• In the Philippines however, digital is the third most frequently used
medium with 11 million Filipinos aged 16-60 from Class ABCD homes
accessing the Internet daily, following the more traditional media of
television and radio, at 81 percent and 43 percent, respectively.
• Filipino online users are also spending an average of 9 hours a week
connected, mostly for email (29 percent of online users check email daily),
social networking (28 percent) and multimedia (20 percent).
• Young Filipinos, particularly those between 16-24 years old are in the front
line of social networking.
• Growth in social networking has been fuelled by the transition from PC to
mobile. Mobile users spend on average 3.1 hours per week on social
networking sites compared to just 2.2 hours on email.
• Filipino digital consumers also have have a relatively large number of
social network and brand friends. They have an average of 171 friends,
higher than the global average of 120. Brand friends (engaging with brands
and their activities on social media) are also slightly higher at the average
of 5, compared to the global average of 4.
Web Marketing
Libraries on the Web
• Some users never visit the facility. For others,
a web site is just another branch of their
favorite library -- and a great place to shop for
information 24/7. More libraries are providing
services and marketing on the Web as a
response to changes in the way the world
accesses information.
Information access has shifted
Things to consider on marketing public library:
• For many users, the web is integrated into their
lifestyle. This is especially true of younger
generations. Millennials expect research to be
easy. They do not seek help from librarians.
When they can’t find what they need, they give
up and assume that the information cannot be
found.
• Gen Y preferred to discuss information needs
with a real person rather than find out what they
needed on their own. The highest criteria on the
students’ list of needs when seeking information
was ease of use. They also expect customization
and are technology veterans who use new
communications
Suggestions for changing services
include:
• Interactive group spaces, support for remote
usage, wireless networks, and portals that
combine catalogs, e-journals, reference materials,
etc.
• Integrate library information and more
multimedia resources into popular search
engines and incorporate “open” web resources
into catalogs.
• Use students on teams that design new services.
• Represent services and instruction visually and in
multimedia modes
• Explore services for mobile devices such as cell
phones
• As libraries shift more services to the
Internet, the library web site becomes
increasingly important -- as a product
(service) in its own right and as a major
tool in marketing other products of the
library. Libraries can use the Web to
provide services, to market services, or
as part of the marketing process.
A few tidbits about how some public
libraries are marketing away:
• School libraries target students' interests: Details how one librarian turned
a corner of her school library into a "Coffee House" and snuck in some info
literacy too!
• Meadows library is tailored to city: The importance of understanding the
demographics of your patron base is highlighted here.
• Community Library makes pitch to teen readers: Neat marketing and
programming ideas from how one library celebrated Teen Read Week,
which included talks from a comic book writer, a video game playoff, and
an Open Mic Night.
• Library strives to be heart of community: This library features a used book
store, cafe, gift shop and a conveyor belt/item sorter for returned books.
Why? As the library director said, "We're no longer just a place to come
and find books...People expect there to be more activity, instruction,
education and enrichment."
• Patrons share library pride: The Des Plaines Public Library is a hopping
place, due in no small part to its outstanding collections. One patron even
said the library had a better DVD collection than Blockbuster. This library
seems to know who its competitors are and are stepping up to them.
Conclusion
• As librarians we should be actively marketing and
promoting our library services. The basic aim of marketing
is to know and understand our users in order that the
library is able to satisfy those needs in an effective way. A
marketing plan is an essential tool which will enable us to
focus our efforts. The market plan should assess where you
are now (market research), where you are going
(objectives) and how you are going to get there (strategies).
References:
• Katz, B. 1988, How to market professional services, Prentice Hall.
• Dinesh K. Gupta, Marketing Library & Information Services:
International Perspective