Social Media & The Library

Social Media & The Library 

I have always been a big user of social media ever since I was in high school. I love the idea of sharing pictures, thoughts, good/bad experiences, and more. I think it’s a great way to communicate, build relationships, and keep in touch with people that you don’t see on a regular basis. I have also noticed that social media has become an outlet for businesses to market and promote their brand. A librarian can use this same method to promote their school library to the community.

Facebook:

Libraries can create pages through Facebook to market and promote their library. The creator of a Facebook page can post: photos, videos, and events. Users are also able to post reviews on the Facebook page with their likes/dislikes. Libraries can use Facebook pages to draw attention to their library by informing the community of the fun, educational, and interactive activities that the library hosts.

Pasadena High School Library was one of the first school library Facebook pages I found. Their library Facebook page was filled with photos about events that the library puts on such as, Name that Book Competition, Literacy Night, and Slime and STEM Fun. The page consists of interactive photos of students at these events, and flyers on events that are coming up. My favorite part about the page was an article posted of students playing giant games, such as: Chess, Connect Four, and Jenga. The article was captioned, “Pasadena High School library has giant chess pieces, noisy kids, and nobody saying Shh!’’ Pasadena High School library has done a great job in using the Facebook page to make sure their library looks fun and inviting to all learners.

Creating a Facebook page for your school library has its advantages and disadvantages. An advantage of using Facebook is to promote and market your library. Seeing the Pasadena High School Library page makes me want to visit their library myself. A disadvantage of using Facebook is that not many students have it. Promoting your library through Facebook would most likely reach more adults than students.

Twitter:

Twitter is another great social media platform to promote a school library. I enjoy using twitter because tweets are short and to the point. Tweets has a 280-character limit per tweet, so users are forced to get their message across with a short statement. Tweets can also consist of pictures, videos, and links to websites. Users can also use tweets to take a poll, which can be beneficial when trying to decide what users prefer in the library. Lastly, Twitter allows users to reach their desired audience with the use of hashtags.

I followed a few of the biggest names in educational technology to see what interests them and to get some ideas for the future. Here are some of the tweets that I liked and found useful.

Kathy Schrock (@kathyschrock) discusses the importance of student collaboration in her tweet about learning centers.

Jim Lerman (@jimlerman) suggests more than 30 education technology websites of various content areas for educators.

Gwyneth Jones (@GwynethJones) provides her followers with a fun and interactive back to school library activity.

A few advantages of creating a twitter account for your school library would be that it’s user-friendly, and you’re able to provide links to other websites. You can also retweet tweets onto your page, and you are able to reach a certain audience with the use of hashtags. A disadvantage of using twitter to promote your library would be the limit of characters per tweet.

Instagram:

Instagram is my favorite social media platform. I love that Instagram is all about photos and visual sharing. I think that creating an Instagram account for the school library is a great idea. Instagram will allow librarians to post eye-catching photos and videos to promote and market the school library.

Here are some ideas on how you can use Instagram for your school library:

·      Post eye-catching and engaging photos

·      Create Instagram stories to inform people of what activities and events the library has to offer

·      Use a suggestion box through Instagram stories for users to make suggestions of what they would like to see in the library

·      Use the poll feature on Instagram stories to allow users to help you make a decision for the library.

·      Create a countdown for events happening in the library

·      Use hashtags to target your desired audience

As you can see Instagram has a lot to offer for its users. Instagram is one of the most popular social media applications, as it’s a simplified version of Facebook. Instagram has many features that allows you to grab the attention of your target audience, all while still being easy to use. A disadvantage of Instagram is that it can only be accessed on an iPhone or Android app.

Overall, the thought of using social media to promote the library excites me. I look forward to creating my own social media accounts for my library one day to display all that my library has to offer.