NEW JERSEY LIBRARY CHAMPIONS: Order Your Posters!

The NJ State Library will be launching a community based public awareness campaign featuring role models as “Library Champions” from the sports and literary fields demonstrating how libraries have the power to transform people’s lives. Our “Library Champions” campaign will emphasize that libraries have the power to transform people’s lives by offering free and excellent reading and learning opportunities for everyone.

The State Library will provide your library with gorgeous full color 18 * 24″ posters (they will fit on the end caps).

To place your order go to: http://tinyurl.com/njchampions

Champions so far include:

AUTHORS
• Judy Blume
• Janet Evanovich
• Michael Connelly
• Chris Andersen

ATHLETES
• AJ Burnett, NY Yankees
• Kofi Kingston, WWE
• Justin Tuck New York Giants Football
• Zach Parise, New Jersey Devils
• Devin Harris, NJ Nets
• Cheri Blawet- Paralympics Gold Medalist
• Lauryn Williams- USA Track and Field – Olympian
• Joe Theismann, , NJ native
• Trent Cole- Philadelphia Eagles
• Jim Dowd, retired, Stanley Cup Champion

We are still trying to secure a Phillies player.

We are developing a beautiful Web site that will have more information about the champions and important information about what why libraries are valuable to our communities. We encourage libraries to have their customers become champions too and will have a link for them to sign up with NJLA. We will also be providing a web icon for you to place on your sites.

We have secured four billboards, one in south Jersey and three along the NJ Turnpike that will run November through February. We wil also be running ads at teh Path Train stations in December and February and will have skins on tractor trailers.

We are still looking for box truck owners wiling to give us free space on their trucks to feature a graphic of an athlete or author and a positive message about the value of libraries. We will pay for the design and installation of the skins. If you know anyone who owns a box truck or a company with a fleet of box trucks, please contact me via email. Thanks.

Nancy Dowd, Director
NJSL Marketing and Public Relations
ndowd@njstatelib.org

National Gaming Day PSA and video available for NJ Libraries

Is your library participating in National Gaming Day? The State Library has a video that can highlight the value of gaming and a PSA to help you promote National Gaming Day that you can embed on your web sites.

PSA: Fernium 8. You must take 30 seconds to watch this incredible video. It was made by teens for teens and will blow you away! Thanks to a partnership with Newark Public Library and East Side High School for making it possible.

Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcTJVPqXLBo

Video: The first place video for the Tell Us Your Story contest sponsored by NJSL and NJLA, this video by Cape May county tells a great story about the value of gaming with a bit humor. You’ll love it for sure!!

Link:

Details:

Fernium 8
The NJ State Library is partnering with Newark Public Library and East Side High School to launch a PSA made by teens for teens to celebrate National Gaming Day. The PSA was edited from, “Fernium 8,” a film that was done by
students at East Side High School.The film has receive accolades, including a spot in the Four River Film Festival in Karlova, Croatia, Best Fiction in the Sixth Annual Newark Public School’s Film Festival, honorable mention in the 35th Annual New Jersey Young Film & Video Maker’s Festival and Official Selection of the 2009 Princeton Student Film & Video Festival.

Tell Us Your Story
This stunning video was created by Cape May County Library to portray how the value of gaming goes far beyond the act of playing a game.

New Jersey Libraries are encouraged to embed the films on their web pages.

Questions? ndowd@njstatelib.org

Tweet or Text … Help us write a book!

This is National November Write Your Own Book Month and the New Jersey State Library is taking the challenge to write a book with 50,000 words in one month. We need your help to both write and to spread the word to EVERYONE you know – friends, family, customers, co-workers, hairdressers, teachers, students. Everyone has the potential to write something that might positively impact the life of a stranger with this book!

Here is the plan:
The NJ State Library will compile a book with the collective wisdom of people sharing advice with another human being. Words of wisdom for a child, friend, politician, parent, teenager, adult, parent … The catch is, you have to text your advice and it can only be 140 characters or less. We’ll collect your text messages until we have 50,000 words of wisdom. The name of the book will be, H2H (Human to Human) wisdom in 140 characters- unless someone texts us a better title! We’ll even publish it online so you can share it with your friends and families.

How to submit your H2H words of wisdom:

1. Text “H2H” to 51684, hit “space” and type your advice. Standard message charges apply. You’ll receive a message to let you know your submission has been accepted. We will keep you updated about the book but we won’t send more than 1 message per week and you can stop the messages anytime you want by replying “Stop”.

2. Tweet to: @h2hbook

We will include your initials or first name to your quote if you include it. All entries must be submitted no later than November 30.

3. Go online: Follow this link and fill out your words of wisdom online.

Guidelines:

No profanity

No personal references

While we would love to use all quotes that are submitted, we will be editing the final product and reserve the right to reject submissions.

Questions? Nancy Dowd: ndowd@njstatelib.org

Nancy Dowd
Director of Marketing and Public Relations
New Jersey State Library
609-278-2640 ext 122
www.njstatelib.org

Two new marketing books for librarians

Many of you know that Kathy Demsey and I write the M Word Blog. What you might not know is that we have both recently published books about marketing for libraries. Kathy’s book, The Accidental Library Marketer, is published by Information Today. Mine, Bite-Sized Marketing, Realistic Solutions for Overworked Librarians, is published by ALA Editions. I’ll talk about mine in a future post.

If you are one of those people who were thrown into having to market your library and had to “learn on the go”, Kathy’s book is going to be invaluable for you. It is the quintessential “Marketing 101 for Librarians”. Kathy talks about “true marketing” and has created a visual map that takes you through the complete cycle step-by-step.

Having worked with Kathy for a couple of years, I can testify that nothing drives her crazier than people who treat promotion, advertising, marketing, public relations and branding and advocacy as the same things. In her book, she settles the definitions once and for all and once you read it, you’ll understand why she is so insistent on using the proper words.

Even if you have been doing a good job with your marketing efforts, this book will serve as a good reference to make sure you’re on track. Chapter topics include: Basic Communication, Assessing Your Current Situation, Using Demographics, Getting Buy-in, Evidence Based Decision, Statistics, Writing Formal Plans and Getting the Message Out. The book is an easy, but important read.

Mobile Marketing

Sorry for taking so long to get back to the blog. We have been really swamped- working on a new campaign featuring some really incredible library champions. Look for more news very shortly. We have awesome athletes like Justin Tuck, Zach Parise and AJ Burnett who have volunteered to be our library champions. And that’s just the beginning. More to come….

The mobile marketing pilots are underway and it’s been pretty interesting. We are using a SMS text messaging system and I think the hardest part has been finding the right formula to get people to sign up. But let’s start at the beginning …

What is SMS Mobile Marketing
People are given a short code (phone number) and are asked to text a keyword {special name) to sign up for a prize, coupon, information, news, etc. When they send a text, their cell phone number is added to a database. The library can access that number and send text messages directly to the phone. Recipients can stop receiving the messages by texting “stop”.

From a library point of view, SMS marketing allows us to create segmented mailing lists so that we can easily create a very targeted communication network. This is something most of have never been able to do before because we didn’t have the time, staff or money. Because the system can be interactive, it also allows us to create a communication network that will serve as immediate focus groups and give immediate feedback about programs or services we are offering.

OTHER BENEFITS OF SMS MARKETING CAMPAIGNS:

Deliverability: As 94% of all text messages are read, your marketing message will be seen by virtually all of the subscribers in your campaign. Great medium to reach teenagers, moms, ESL groups. Espically effective for cutting through clutter.

Qualified Recipients: Since your subscribers have opted-in to receiving your offers and promotional messages, you know they have an active interest in your library, and your products.

Flexibility: With text messages sent and received within minutes of starting your campaign, you can use mobile marketing for ad-hoc purposes, such as driving traffic to your library for spontaneous programs.

Range of Use: Mobile marketing can be used for a wide range of purposes: announcing new product, special events…etc. Subscribers can be treated as an exclusive group for offers and information that only they have access to, increasing loyalty, purchases, and speed of communications.

COST: A simple plan can run as low as $50 a month!

Augmented Reality … onto the future

When Jaap and Erik came and spoke with us about the power of using videos to market our libraries, they demonstrated an interesting video that involved augmented reality.

Helene Blowers has written and excellent post on her blog, Library Bytes with several links as well. She also challenges us to imagine what we could use augmented reality for in our libraries. She starts us off with her own vision: “When I shift my thinking about AR apps to the physical library space I see our whole collection opening up before our eyeballs. Imagine the ability to walk down an aisle and see the reviews and popularity of an entire shelf titles just by pointing the camera lens on your phone at the spines (or outfacing covers). “

I can envision community partnerships where people would be able to access information and order materials from the library throughout the community. So if I am walking through the historical district I’d be able to view information about the history of the town, choose materials from my library’s catalogue and download the the book, chapter, music, etc. directly to my cell. I can also envision the interactivity where people would contribute their own content that would be added to our catalogues where other people could access, comment thus creating an ongoing “everyday historical experience”.

We are only at the beginning. Erik and Jaap suggested a scenario. Imagine that everything we know about libraries was destroyed by fire. What would emerge from the ashes? There have been some great discussion about this. John Blyberg, Kathyn Greenhill and Cindi Trainor wrote a wonderful document called, “The Darien Statements on the Library an Librarians”. The “Michaels” ( Casey and Stephens)have spent two years writing about the Transparent Library.. Even the Futurist, Thomas Frey, has weighed in with a lengthy article. So the question becomes,”What do you think will rise from the ashes?”

Event Celebrates Winning Entries for “Tell Us Your Story” Contest

The New Jersey State Library and New Jersey Library Association celebrated the winning entries of the 2009 “Tell Us Your Story” contest today at the New Jersey State Museum auditorium.

Congratulations to the winning entries:

First Place: Cape May County
Second Place: West Deptford Public Library
Third Place: Cranbury Public Library, Ocean County Library and South Orange Public Library

Honorable Mention: Mount Laurel Public Library and West Orange Public Library

To see the videos go to our facebook page.

This campaign was an incredible success with over 800 participants learning about the power of Tribes from Seth Godin; being inspired by the Shanachies to use videos to promote, market and advocate for their libraries; learning about Word of Mouth marketing, fundraising and mobile marketing at the Marketing Boot Camp; exploring the power of strategic storytelling at workshops and webinars and creating a digital story as part of this contest.

Thank you to everyone who participated.

You have inspired us.

We hope we have inspired you as well.

-Nancy

We’ve Only Just Begun

Just because the contest is over doesn’t mean the campaign to collect stories about your customers have ended. In a sense, we have only just begun! Anyone reading the news about libraries knows that communities around the nation are facing tough choices and funding for libraries is being slashed. From here on you’ll want to put your skills into action to ensure that the NJ public knows libraries transform lives and that we are a tough but essential tax choice. We are getting great press right now but we must stay vigilant. Libraries across the country are experiencing horrendous cuts and we must make sure are stories are strategic and powerful.

Several libraries have shared ways they are continuing their efforts.

Several libraries have taken the “Tell Us Your Story” to the next level.

Atlantic County libraries gave away tote bags to anyone who filled out a card. They got a lot of great comments to start a storybank. See all the comments here.

Two incredible librarians from Mount Laurel, Joan Serpico and Kelly Garwood, developed a form for customers to share their stories. They display a logo on the front page to make it easy for folks to share. Take a look at the form here.

Joan Divor from Burling County Library adapted the form from Snapshot Day and has been having a terrific response rate. Here’s what her form looks like: Burlington County Library’s Tell Us Your Story Form

I’ll be speaking at the HRLC Tech Talks tomorrow about the flip camera and how with a camera under $100 you can let your customers tell their stories live. This fall we’ll be partnering with the RLCs to sponsor workshops that will help you learn how to tell a strategic story AND how to use the stories and photos to create digital stories.

We need your stories!

Dear Colleagues,
Thank you for showing your commitment to becoming better marketers by reading this blog or attending our bootcamp, workshops or programs over the past year. We are putting together promotional pieces to share with the Governor and legislators and we don’t want to leave out any library.

We need stories about people who used your library for any of the following:

• Searched, applied or got a job
• Started a business
• Became a citizen
• Used the Internet for something substantial- online classes, research, homework, etc.
• Found a new vocation
• Were inspired through art, music or other cultural programs
• Renewed their desire to live after tragedy by finding social connection, volunteer opportunity, friends,…
• Used how-to-manuals to save money by doing work themselves
• Volunteered and used the experience for college or work application
• Other (was there something we missed?)

Please send the following information by July 31 to Gary Cooper: gcooper@njstatelib.org

Your customer’s name and a sentence or two of how your library helped.

We will need a picture.
Will you provide one or would you prefer someone from the State Library to come take the picture?

Please include your name and phone number.

Thanks! -Nancy Dowd

Great PPT to share with your business customers

Slideshare has a huge collection of outstanding presentations you can point your business customers to help them understand the newest technologies. Here’s just one, but there are many, many more.