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Dempsey discusses how libraries have used technology for promotion and outreach. Large library systems can often afford to experiment with the higher technology that others cannot. For instance, Meghan McCorkell, until recently, the chief of marketing, communications, and strategy at the Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore, mentioned some really cool stuff she had been doing there. And now in 2025, the latest tech for marketing is artificial intelligence (AI). She does not think libraries are going to be using AI for advertising at the same level as we recently saw in Super Bowl ads, but they have already started experimenting with it.
Back in the early 1990s, if someone asked me which technologies librarians could use for promotion, I wouldve thought about large-format printers to make professional-looking posters. That was before the internet was widely available, so there was very little email usage and no social media. (Simpler times!) Libraries didnt really need to advertise, because they were still one of the only places in town that people could use to get specific information. But if there was something important going on, librarians would spread the word via newspapers, newsletters, fliers, posters, and word of mouth.
When I began producing the Marketing Library Services (MLS) newsletter in 1994, there was almost no mention of technology. I unearthed some pre-tech quotes in early MLS issues that almost made me laugh out loud. For instance, the cover story of the March 1995 issue reported on a talk by Carol Ginsberg, a well-respected special librarian and an SLA fellow. One piece of advice that she shared was this: The basics of marketing are brochures, logos, handouts, orientations, welcome letters, consultations, meetings, and newsletters. They are vital. And a second piece of advice was this: Regarding the Internet, [Ginsberg] advised info pros to get on the bandwagon and to learn everything they can about it. Get an account, get training, and be the one who brings the Internet to your company. (Notice the capital I in Internet back then.)
As the years went by, technology began to creep into library promotion. Intranets emerged as a useful way to communicate with colleagues. In the March 1997 issue, MLS published an article by Stephen Abram called Transforming Your Marketing With the World Wide Web. (Notice the three full words, all with initial caps. This was really new stuff.)
In the late 1990s, Christine M. Koontz of Florida State University started to integrate geographic information system software with library data. That GeoLib project allowed a data-savvy librarian to take a list of cardholder addresses and overlay them onto a local map, showing them which neighborhoods had the fewest patrons. This concept caught on in the early 2000s, and Koontz published widely about it in publications such as Library Hi Tech News (emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/07419050510588269/full/html). Geographic mapping was a very practical way to do early targeted marketing to reach non-users. (And the concept has been adopted into newer outreach platforms over the years.)
I found another insightful article in the Oct. 1, 2003, issue of Library Hi Tech News: If you Build It, Will They Come? Promoting Digital Reference at UCLA by Diane Mizrachi (emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/lhtn.2003.23920jaf.002/full/html). It details the journey of university librarians who had launched a real-time digital reference service and then needed to promote it. Here are the main tools and activities they used:
* A brand icon and tagline on library and class webpages
* A brief announcement in the student newspaper
* Mentions in library instruction classes
* Branded pens, mugs, and zipper pulls for backpacks
* Bookmarks and posters in the library
* Table tents in campus coffee shops
* Branded mouse pads at public workstations
* An awareness survey with a prize drawing
* Staff T-shirts
* Staffers speaking at meetings
Many of these methods proved successful. But in hindsight, it feels somewhat ironic that a digital reference service was promoted without any technology. (Im not counting putting an icon on webpages as technology.)
Designed for Success
EBSCO Publishing launched a software platform called LibraryAware at the Public Library Association Conference in 2012. It was one of the first services to incorporate many steps of the promotional process into one easy-to-use tool. After users were prompted to choose a target audience, they could decide what to create for them; the long list included bookmarks and brochures, email blasts and enewsletters, fliers, and social media posts. Its built-in templates for all of those items and its own prelicensed stock photo library were a big part of what made this tool successful, because they enabled accidental marketers and non-designers to create pro-level promo materials. LibraryAware is a tool designed to allow diverse people to design collateral more efficiently, consistently, and professionally across an organization, I wrote in an Information Today, Inc. NewsBreak after LibraryAwares launch (newsbreaks.infotoday.com/NewsBreaks/NoveList-Launches-LibraryAware-to-Simplify-the-Creation-of-Marketing-Materials-81432.asp).
The following year saw the release of Canva, another software package that simplified graphic design for the masses, although it was not created specifically for libraries. A few years later, the company branched out to include Canva for Education and Canva for Nonprofits, which allowed librarians to access a free version of a powerful but user-friendly design software. The availability of these two design packages-one for a fee and one for free-played a big part in improving branding as well as the readability of a lot of library posters and brochures. Tools like this were (and still are) especially useful for smaller organizations that didnt have design or marketing staffers in house.
How the Pandemic Changed Promotion
The COVID-19 pandemic forced all sorts of library activities to go online-only. One of the earliest tasks for marketers was moving public programs to platforms such as Zoom. Then they had to do all of the promotion online. Suddenly, library workers couldnt rely on the old standbys such as bookmarks tucked between pages, fliers piled on countertops, staff chattering at checkout, or program calendar carry-aways. Understandably, social media became a much bigger part of promotion, as did videos and podcasts.
Employees also had to figure out how to promote services they never even had before, such as curbside pickup, grab-and-go craft kits, online storytime, and boosted Wi-Fi in library parking lots. It was a challenging time, but it also sparked some epic creativity. For instance, Ill share a promo video that I still remember to this day: Curbside Larry from Harris County Public Library Systems Barbara Bush Library in Texas (youtube.com/watch?v=DPMHAQ-j1S8). With the immense amount of new online content in summer 2020, this was the sort of internet gold that an organization needed to cut through the overload.
On May 5, 2021, Library Journal published a Product Spotlight on marketing platforms that opened with this: With the COVID-19 vaccine rollout gaining momentum in the United States, libraries continue the process of reopening. Theyll need to get the word out to patrons about changing hours, resumed services, and in-person events. This product spotlight focuses on marketing platforms for libraries designed to help streamline outreach efforts via social media, email, newsletters, mobile messaging, and more (libraryjournal.com/story/Marketing-Platforms-Product-Spotlight). The article listed the following products, and Im adding the year they were introduced:
* LibraryAware from EBSCO (2012)
* Patron Point from Patron Point, Inc. (2015)
* SocialFlow from TLC (2015)
* Gale Engage from Gale, a Cengage Co. (2019)
* Wise from OCLC (2018)
* Community Engagement Platform from SirsiDynix (2020)
* Vega from Innovative Interfaces, Inc. (2020)
I believe Savannah, from OrangeBoy (2014), belonged in that list too, since it was built to analyze data and send emails to chosen targets, but Im not sure what functions determined inclusion in that article.
Most of these products integrate ILS data (especially patron email addresses) and enable staffers to choose a segment of cardholders and create emails, welcome messages, courtesy notices, invitations, etc., and schedule when theyre sent. This sea change enabled great strides in what came to be called customer engagement.
Marshall Breeding mentioned these ILS-related products in the December 2023 issue of Computers in Libraries (CIL) in his Systems Librarian column titled Library Tech Trends 2024 (librarytechnology.org/document/29554/library-techtrends-2024). He outlined an important trend-that many libraries are sticking with their ILS vendors and adding modules to do new tasks: Rather than implementing a new system spanning functionality and patron engagement, the trend in the U.S. has been for public libraries to invest in components that integrate with their existing ILS. These components include replacement catalogs or discovery services, automated marketing and messaging platforms, website management tools, and other applications that improve interactions with patrons. Breeding went on to highlight three of those products for their market activity: OCLC offers Wise as a patroncentered automation tool to public libraries in the U.S. This product includes traditional ILS capabilities in addition to components focused on patron engagement. Patron Point has attracted significant interest among public libraries for its patron engagement services, including automated marketing messaging, online patron registration, and related activities. Patron Point has been implemented by hundreds of libraries and was acquired by Springshare in August 2023. He continues, Innovative has developed a suite of patron-oriented applications as part of its Vega Library Experience (LX), including Vega Discover as a new discovery interface for Polaris and Sierra, Vega Program for event and program management, Vega Promote for programmatic engagement and messaging, and Vega Promote Web for website management.
Today, the stories about COVID-19 strategy shifts and workarounds are still emerging. In the winter 2024 issue of the Journal of Library Outreach & Engagement, Kelly Marie Blanchat and Caitlin Meyer from Yale University published Collaborative Design on a Dime: A Centralized Approach to Implement Videos for Library Outreach and Instruction (iopn.library.illinois .edu/journals/jloe/article/view/1236). Its opening outlines the project: In spring 2020, Yale Library launched a program to produce a series of video tutorials to market the remote library services available during COVID-19 library closures. Up until this point, some individual librarians and departments had been successful in creating discipline-specific video tutorials, but the lack of central coordination for research services and tools had stalled the ability to create video content and distribute it broadly. The next paragraph offers this: With library closures there was a new sense of urgency to communicate asynchronously about the librarys collections and services, especially those that remained available for remote users.
Heres a paper that details an even more high-tech initiative: Livestream Your Library: Making Media Literacy Lessons Social, published in Marketing Libraries Journal, vol. 8, issue 1, fall 2024 (journal.marketinglibraries.org/fall2024/07_MLJv8i1.pdf). The abstract offers this explanation:
The COVID-19 pandemic led a library marketing and communication team to question how they were doing everything. Brainstorming sessions and serendipitous technology discoveries led to a media-literacy focused livestream show produced by the team in concert with library faculty and staff from other departments. The result was two successful seasons of a show that brought scholars into conversation with librarians to demonstrate the ways in which expertise can and does lead to answers to questions, and how finding information is only the start of finding those answers-finding credible sources is critical. The show attempts to provide the tools necessary to make those distinctions.
But the first librarian live streamers, as far as I know, were Erik Boekesteijn and Jaap van de Geer, who produced This Week in Libraries, known as the first global library internet TV show, between 2010 and 2014. They streamed themselves talking to library-ish guests from around the world, sometimes in a studio and sometimes on location. At that time, they were using a complex technology in an exciting way to spread the message that librarians can spearhead very tech-savvy projects.
Dabbling in the Digital
Large library systems can often afford to experiment with the higher technology that others cannot. For instance, Meghan McCorkell, until recently, the chief of marketing, communications, and strategy at the Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore, mentioned some really cool stuff she had been doing there. Via email, she told me, For instance, if Im marketing Career Online High School, Id look up Census tracts that have the highest number of adults without high school diplomas and hyperfocus postcards on those census tracts. Then wed have a digital marketing company geofence those census tracts for me and blast digital ads (that look like the postcard) to those neighborhoods. Then Id put posters and flyers that have the same design in the library branches in those areas. That way I am hitting people multiple times with the same message in a very targeted area. Impressive! If you want to read more about tech of this level, check out Trenton Smileys MLS column, AdTech Tools With Trent, which ran in 2022 and 2023.
Entering the Era of AI
And now in 2025, the latest tech for marketing is AI. I dont think libraries are going to be using AI for advertising at the same level as we recently saw in Super Bowl ads, but theyve already started experimenting with it. If youve been an MLS subscriber, then reach for your September/October 2024 issue and look at Regina Burgess AI Tools to Help With Library Marketing. The article description says, Burgess explains how shes used AI tools for generating textual and visual content, along with videos and music. She also covers editing text, brainstorming, and even marketing planning.
Youll also want to grab the January/February 2025 issue of CIL if you missed David Lee Kings piece, Using AI to Supercharge Your Librarys Web Presence, Marketing, and Social Media. In this article, he talks about using Adobe Firefly and Canva for making graphics, Gemini to create personas, and Buffer, Play.ht, and FeedHive to manage social media channels.
As I try to get more comfortable with AI myself, I found The Library Marketing Shows Feb. 12, 2025, episode, How to Use AI to Check the Tone of Your Library Promotions and Emails: A Demonstration, helpful. In the episode, vodcaster Angela Hursh gives a nice on-screen demo showing how to create prompts and let ChatGPT write drafts for a promotional flier and for an informational social media post (youtube.com/watch?v=Q66pZSC7kbY). She makes it look easy.
Sometimes, Whats Old Is New Again
Even as technology increases the ways we have to reach our audiences, some of the old standbys are still important too. In Marketing Libraries Journal, vol. 8, issue 1, fall 2024 (journal.marketinglibraries.org/fall2024/08_MLJv8i1.pdf), Karen Okamoto, from the John Jay College of Criminal Justice at City University of New York, published a paper titled, Revamping Email Communications: A Review of Five Free Email Design Platforms. As the abstract explains, This article reviews five free online email design platforms that libraries can use to create visually appealing and engaging email newsletters and other email communications. The five platforms reviewed in this article-Beefree, Mosaico, Smore, Stripo, and Tabular- are assessed according to ease of use, the availability of predesigned templates, and other features. The paper opens with this statement, which is supported by two citations: Far from being old and irrelevant, email continues to be an inexpensive and potentially powerful tool that libraries can use to reach patrons. Good to know.
Marketing has to keep up with the speed of life. If you want to reach people today, you need to get your message to their phones, so you need to employ technology. You can use something as old as email or as new as AI or anything in between-as long as you get your messages into the same space that your target audience members use.
Copyright Information Today, Inc. Apr 2025