Marketing and promoting a virtual library

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Marketing and promoting a virtual library

• Alison Turner
• Library Partnership Co-ordinator
• National electronic Library for Health

2
Outline

• Need for effective promotion
• Activities and their impact
• Planned activities
• Lessons learned

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Need for effective promotion

• Visibility and value
• in the late twentieth and early twenty-first
  century, libraries are no longer a given (Siess,
  2003)
• Strong need for knowledge information
• Up to 60 times per week 8 decisions per day

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Need for effective promotion

• Lack of awareness
• Robinson 2002 62 unaware of access to databases
• Lack of skills
• Outsell 2004 75 believe that search engines
  allow them to find the information they need to
  do their jobs

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Our approach

• One size fits all to tailored
• Partnership working
• Digital Libraries Network

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Awareness Weeks

• 2002
• Pass it on. campaign
• CILIP Award
• 2003
• Partner scheme
• Phone in learning

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Impact

• Over 45,000 visits to NeLH
• 670 sessions of Phone In telephone training
  delivered
• 104 organisations signed up as Partners
• Number of visits per month increased from 159,000
  (September) to 200,000 (October and November)
• 60 000 pieces of literature distributed by
  librarians and other champions
• 3500 completed user surveys

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Health Libraries Week

• 15 21 November 2004
• Aims
• Profile of library staff and their importance in
  C21st healthcare
• Breadth of services in libraries, combining
  virtual and physical resources
• Targeted promotion Open Access publishing
  primary care

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Promotional Items

• Pre-printed
• New posters A1, A3
• Pens
• Stickers
• Bookmarks
• Postcards
• Posters on demand
• A4
• Business cards
• Stickers
• http//library.editme.com

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Lessons learned

• Contribution of communications work to bigger
  picture
• Role of partnership working
• Time required
• Starting with baseline
• Local innovation and creativity

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Lessons learned

• Record keeping
• Knowledge sharing
• Keeping fresh
• Realistic planning
• Reflective approach
• Use of paper