11/25 Update
My friend Andy Woodworth wrote a beautiful piece that you simply must read. Read here. I know our lives are often so busy that we don’t even have the time to think about those whose words have touched our lives. If Andy’s words touched your heart, then consider passing on the gift by sharing your words. Life is all about one human being sharing with another human being. This is your chance to share what is good and inspirational with others. If you decide to write more than a line, feel free to send it my way.

Happy Thanksgiving. -Nancy

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.

Three ways 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

Throughout February and March 2010, the New Jersey State Library plans to honor the legacy of Abraham Lincoln as part of the national Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commemoration. Lincoln firmly believed in education, equality, opportunity and peace. To help continue his legacy, the State Library is encouraging all New Jersey libraries to participate in the Lincoln Pennies for Peace Campaign. All funds collected will be donated to Pennies for Peace which collects funds for the Central Asia Institute co-founded by Greg Mortenson, the subject of the bestselling biography, “Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace… One School At A Time.” His newest book, “Stones into Schools: Promoting Peace with Books, Not Bombs, in Afghanistan and Pakistan” is due out Dec. 1, 2009 and continues the story begun in “Three Cups of Tea.” The money collected for the Pennies For Peace Campaign will be used to build school libraries in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The New Jersey State Library encourages New Jersey school and public libraries to join this campaign:
• Register at the Pennies for Peace website. You can receive free postcards and stickers and other materials.
• Let us know too. To receive a free poster for your library and to have your library included in statewide media releases please register with the NJ State Library here.
• Design a creative donation container and send in pictures for posting on the State Library Website. Either post the photos to your Flickr account and send Gary Cooper the link or send us the digital photos and he’ll post them for you. (gcooper@njstatelib.org)
• Get children and the community involved in contributing pennies. Pennies for Peace has lots of suggestions to get you started.
• The libraries collecting the most pennies for New Jersey libraries will receive recognition during National Library Week in April 2010.

To be eligible for this contest, libraries should collect the pennies, make a check made out to “New Jersey State Library” and send the check to the State Library by April 1, 2010. We’ll send all the checks to Pennies for Peace.

Send your check to:
Sheri Shafer, Chief Financial Officer
NJ State Library
PO Box 520
Trenton, NJ 08625-0520
Checks must be received at the State Library by April 1, 2010.

The original Pennies for Peace was conceived by students in a Wisconsin elementary school in 1996. Since then, over 16 million pennies have been raised by over 700 schools in all 50 states, including over 10 million pennies in the past year. The program is designed to educate children about the world beyond their experience and show them that they can make a positive impact on a global scale, one penny at a time. To date, the Central Asia Institute has established 130 schools, educating over 51,000 students, with an emphasis on girls’ education.

Media Inquiries: Gary Cooper email: gcooper@njstatelib.org
Contact for Libraries: Sharon Rawlins email: srawlins@njstatelib.org.

The NJLA PR Committee has posted a listing of national and statewide events, each with ideas and resources for your library to use to promote yourselves and your events to their wiki. Great resource, take a look.

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

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

11/25 Update
My friend Andy Woodworth wrote a beautiful piece that you simply must read. Read here. I know our lives are often so busy that we don’t even have the time to think about those whose words have touched our lives. If Andy’s words touched your heart, then consider passing on the gift by sharing your words. Life is all about one human being sharing with another human being. This is your chance to share what is good and inspirational with others. If you decide to write more than a line, feel free to send it my way.

Happy Thanksgiving. -Nancy

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.

Three ways 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

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!

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?”

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

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.