marketing | PC Sweeney

Save Oakland Public Libraries is AWESOME!!

Posted on June 6, 2011June 8, 2011 by pcsweeney

Via the Amazing Rosario Garza

“Here’s a situation that has not gotten much attention at all: Oakland Public Library is slated to have their budget DRASTICALLY cut, by 85%. Fourteen branches will be closed, leaving only 4 branches open to serve a population of over 400,000. Those four branches will be understaffed. This proposed budget will surely devastate the public library system in one of California’s largest cities.”

So here is where is gets really good! Rather than lay down and take it, the fantastic librarians at Oakland Public Library deserve mad props for their outreach, advocacy, and awareness campaigns. Many of these are broadcast through their Save Oakland Library Facebook Page that has over two thousands likes! I’m showing your their Facebook event pages instead of all the media about it because THIS is how you run a Facebook campaign!! AMAZING!

I’m going to link you to a couple below. You should do some of these if your library is in danger too. (San Jose Public Libraries are your there?)

Zombie Crawl to Save Oakland Library

Purple Pajama Storytime–plus PIZZA!

SILENT Funeral Procession for the Library–at ART MURMUR

Save Oakland Libraries Bike Ride

Save Oakland Library: Guerrilla Storytime #2!

Save Oakland Library: Guerrilla Storytime #1!!

Be sure to look for all the news about that was generated from these great events too. They are receiving a huge amount of media attention and that is where their power is coming from.

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So the ALA Think Tank sold out. #ala11 #alatt

Posted on June 3, 2011June 3, 2011 by pcsweeney

So the ALA Think Tank sold out. But it’s cool, we do it for you.

Andrea Davis brought this to our attention. Mango Languages is holding a Mango Mania Competition at ALA Annual 2011. In order to enter the contest we had to submit a video all about where we would Mango. Luckily, our group had a little “unconference” trip to Tijuana at ALA Midwinter in San Diego and I filmed some awesome footage of that trip. So, basically, without even planning for it we already “Mangoed.” It’s interesting how these past unplanned #MIH shenanigans come back to work for us in strange ways. Here is our video entry –

I’m not going to lie to you. We do get some personal benefit out this competition. The swag and grand prizes are nice (iPad anyone?), but more importantly, the winning team gets credit towards our Mango Languages Subscription at our library system. In the financial state that we are living in now, I’m sure you can appreciate my desire to not get laid off and to be able to bring something back to my library system?

But anyway, down to the meat of this post… So how is this good for you? Well, Mango Languages is giving us some cash for our trip to ALA, but since we all already paid for our trips we decided to spend it on our ALA parties and other off-the-books kinda ALA Think Tank events. We want to make this the best ALA that we can for all the folks going out to the awesome city of NOLA so let us know what we can do to help make it EPIC for you!

We also wanted to get some good publicity for the Think Tank group that is doing all kinds of awesome stuff. The folks involved in the group are fantastic librarians who are doing great things! You can read about this group and what we want to do to revolutionalize from our manifesto. There are many amazing people involved in this group who are working to make conferences more beneficial to the members of ALA and to ensure that the organization is working for its members. You can be a part of this amazing group of awesombrarians by joining the ALA Think Tank group on Facebook.

If you want to follow our Mango shenanigans on the Facebook Fan Page (we had to make one as per the rules of the contest) you can check it out here – ALA Think Tank FB Fan Page

You can follow us on Twitter with the Hashtags #ala11 and #alatt or individually as
Librarian JP
Tiffany Mair
Jenn Wann Walker
Patrick Sweeney
Andrea Davis

ALA Think Tank events so far…
ALA Dance Party
ALA Flash Mob and Freeze
What else? It might be a surprise!

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Rebooting Libraries Back to Issue #1

Posted on June 1, 2011June 1, 2011 by pcsweeney

I was just thinking about DC comics idea to reboot all of their comics back to Issue number one. As part of the news they are also reissuing all of the #52 comics in the reboot in digital format starting with Justice League. Now, I was a HUGE comic book fan when I was kid, and my super hero of choice was Firestorm (also by DC comics), so this whole idea got me thinking about this concept for libraries.

What you have to remember is that, while they are starting the comics at number 1, they are not republishing the first comics. They are retelling the stories in different ways. There will be new storylines, new ideas, and bigger and better concepts. Or, as DC Comics co-publisher Dan DiDio told USA Today;

“We really want to inject new life in our characters and line. This was a chance to start, not at the beginning, but at a point where our characters are younger and the stories are being told for today’s audience.”

So basically, they are not doing away with the core of their product. They are not changing Superman’s powers, or the speed of The Flash, they are just re-examining the story that they are telling.

What if we could reboot libraries back to issue #1? What would we change about our story now? If we could rewrite our library’s stories for today’s audience and inject new life into our characters what would we say?

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Seth Called Us Out On Our Bullshit And Folks Got Mad

Posted on May 17, 2011May 17, 2011 by pcsweeney

Ok, yeah, I was going to just ignore this whole thing, but then a couple of other blog posts from librarians kinda got to me (Librarians I love and respect BTW). So, I’m going to throw my two cents at this whole debate since just about every other person in the library world has. And, I’m going to say this – Seth is Exactly Right!

The thing is that librarians are debating about how Seth perceives the library. Some librarians are making this statement;

“the article reinforces Godin’s belief in the stereotype of librarian as clerk, declaring that films are “a mere sideline that most librarians resented anyway”, exhorting us to stop “defending library as warehouse”, and arguing that”what we don’t need are mere clerks who guard dead paper” – absolutely right Mr. Godin, but then this ceased to define a librarian many, many moons ago.”

Or this one;

“Godin then addresses access to information:

‘Wikipedia and the huge databanks of information have basically eliminated the library as the best resource for anyone doing amateur research (grade school, middle school, even undergrad). Is there any doubt that online resources will get better and cheaper as the years go by? Kids don’t schlep to the library to use an out of date encyclopedia to do a report on FDR.’

He’s right, they don’t schlep to the library to use an out-of-date encyclopedia. They schlep to the library to use a current, up-to-date online one, and databases to write that report on FDR. Online encyclopedias and databases that the library pays for.”

The problem is that the real root of this article, and the aspects these good folks are arguing against, are problems of perception. Of course, we all know that the library isn’t just a “warehouse of books” and we know some folks use our databases, and we all know that kids shouldn’t use Wikipedia. But unfortunately Seth’s statements are exactly what a HUGE percentage of the population believes. This is our fault. This is the brand that generations of librarians have been reinforcing for years. In fact, some of my favorite library marketing has been about the book brand of libraries. Seth is merely calling us out for not doing our jobs to ensure that we are adequately re-branding libraries.

In this sense I think Godin hit it just right. Seth is pointing out what a library is in the minds of the average public non-user. Maybe that’s what’s ruffling some feathers? Remember that this guy isn’t a librarian at all. He is library user and an advocate for libraries. He is exactly the kind of person who should be telling us what a library is. He is Joe Public and he has very Joe Public perceptions of the library.

What we need to do is listen to him, listen to what he says a library is, then talk to the public and see what they perceive the library to be. I bet you’ll get a lot of the same answers. I know that I get these answers when I talk to non-library users. When I talk to people who haven’t been to a library for a couple of years, I usually get the response “it’s a shame people don’t need libraries anymore, all the ebooks and Wikipedia have taken its place. I used to love the library when I was kid.”

So, to all the librarians who are arguing with Seth (who probably won’t read your blog anyway), I’m going to tell you to do something more productive and market your libraries better. Spend some kind of money on library marketing. I mean real marketing that sends the message about what libraries are in the 21st century. Because a lot of us are what Seth says a library should be. We’re already doing a lot of the things he says we should be doing. We just haven’t told anyone yet, and that’s our fault. Thanks for pointing that out Seth, kuddos to you good sir.

If you want to win some money by doing this marketing and telling folks what a modern library is…

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Dear Anatomy of a Librarian – You forgot kicking ass and being awesome.

Posted on May 3, 2011May 6, 2011 by pcsweeney

I always find these kinds of graphics interesting. Usually though, its because I’m interested in their design instead of the information. In this case, I think that this graphic brings to mind more questions than it answers but it’s still pretty.

1) The average librarian makes 60+ a year? I’m now wondering how they came up with that average. Obviously, they are taking full careers into consideration and not just the entry level positions. In which case, I wonder how many years an average librarian has to work to reach the average pay? And that makes me wonder, what is the average career span of a librarian? By this, do they mean only those working as a librarian or are they considering library manager, directors, and other higher management as well?

2) The highest largest amount of librarians are between 24 and 54? Are you freaking kidding me? So the average librarian is aged somewhere in the average age range for a person who has professional level career before retirement? I would be far more interested if this was broken down into at least 5 year increments since you need an MLIS to be a librarian and so few people get post graduate degrees before 24 anyway. People also begin to retire after 54 so this 30 year age range makes this data completely uninteresting. Basically they are saying that people in the average working age range have jobs.

3) The left and right brain stuff is kinda interesting, but what is more interesting is what the crap is written in all those little subsections of this girl’s cranium? I mean, there could be anything in there! I think, at least its my guess, that this is where the how to clean the toilet, dealing with unruly patrons watching porn, and changing lightbulbs is listed in the graphic because I don’t see that anywhere else. The big stuff on the outside is everything I thought librarianship was going to be, and the I’m guessing the stuff on the inside is all the other stuff nobody tells you about.

4) The where they work part is actually interesting, I liked this part.

5) Brief history? No kidding… Franklin to Dewey? What about Carnegie!? This crap is only 150 years long and at its most recent it’s 130 years out of date!! Libraries have been around since 350 BC and this is the crap they decided to show? WTF?

6/7) Gender and recreational activities are also fairly uninteresting because it’s exactly what you would expect. But I want to add a section. I think that overall, librarians most significant recreational activity is kicking ass and being awesome! So where is that catagory?

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Partnerships = Library Awesome!

Posted on April 26, 2011May 6, 2011 by pcsweeney

I’ve been thinking about some of our libraries most successful programs and services that we offer. I realized that almost all of the most successful ones have come from partnerships that have been cultivated by the staff. These partnerships have led to larger program numbers, a wider array of programs, and increased services and collections. Even more importantly, we are being offered money and resources to provide some things that we wouldn’t have been able to provide before. The following list are some of the partnerships we have at EPA Library.

Literacy Fair
East Palo Alto is holding its first ever Literacy Fair called Reading Rainbow in the Park. This came about through a partnership with the Stanford Alumni Association. We were contacted by a liaison from this group who had the idea for a fair and came to us for help. We are providing many of the books and giveaways as well as some of the entertainment and they are providing the organizing of the event itself.

Health and Wellness Programs
We have a local community health organization that provides a lot of the medical services in the area and we offer them a space for community outreach and education about health issues. They especially do many programs for our seniors. My librarians work with this organization to bring those presentations to our library.

Guitar Lending Library
This partnership isn’t complete yet, but it bears mentioning. I received a grant to circulate guitars at the library and one of my librarians brought in a band called the Vintage Music Collective to perform. One of the members of this group teaches music lessons in EPA through their non-profit called Live in Peace and we will be providing the guitars while he provides the lessons.

Catered Events
One of my librarians works closely with an organization called Jobtrain that provides vocational training in the Culinary Arts. The community members who are involved in this program need somewhere to showcase their culinary skills and talents and we have events where food is always welcome. So, these students “get to” provide food and food services to some of our larger events.

Seed Library
This is one of the few ones that I was the one who approached a local organization for. Our Library offers a seed library to the public that was modeled after the Richmond Grows Seed Lending Library. When I heard about the library in Richmond I looked around in our community and found the local gardening non-profit called Collective Roots that runs the Farmer’s Market. When I told them about the seed library they jumped at the chance and we now offer seeds for “check-out” from our library. We also have plans to expand to tools for gardening and they provide gardening programs from our library.

Poet Library
An organization called School After School for Successful Youth (SASSY) is an offshoot of the jobtrain organization. The students in this program create a large amount of art, literature, and poetry and they need a space to display their work within the community. We are simply giving them a wall to display the work of the community members. Eventually, (they don’t know this yet) I want to expand this partnership to bound and cataloged materials for circulation. Sort of, a local authors collection, but published and provided only by the library. I did something similar when I was an elementary school librarian and I think it would work well with this kind of partnership.

East Palo Alto History Project
We are working with Stanford students to create a history of EPA mural across the back wall of the library. This mural will show the history of East Palo Alto through the eyes of the library as it has moved and changed over the last 75 years. The movement and changes that occurred in the library parallel a lot of what has happened here and is very reflective of the changes in the community.

We have many more, but those are the ones that I am most excited about. Basically, I’ve figured out my job in this community is to find ways to say yes to as many things as I can then figure out how to make it work. While I might say “not yet,” I almost never say no to a community member unless the service they want to provide lies outside the scope of librarianship or community building.

What I want to know is-
1) What partnerships are you building in your community?
2) What would you say no to?
3) What are some of your dream partnerships?

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I’m Starting a Seed Library at My Library

Posted on April 12, 2011April 12, 2011 by pcsweeney

This is the Press Release or this project. I will post more details for folks interested in starting one. But really, the best instructions for starting a seed library come from Richmond Grows. They have instructions, videos, and everything you need to put yours together.

Just as one seed can produce many seeds, one idea can change many lives. Free public libraries were revolutionary in their time because they provided access to books and knowledge that had not previously been available to a large segment of the population. A free seed lending library can also provide people with a chance to transform their lives and communities by providing access to fresh, healthy food that may not otherwise be available.

What is a Seed Library?
A seed library is a lot like a traditional library in a number of ways. Patrons of the seed library need to sign up, learn how to “check-out” seeds, and, of course, the library is free! The big difference is that instead of checking out books or DVDs like a traditional library, patrons can check out seeds to grow in their gardens at home. While, we don’t expect anyone to return the seeds to the library, we do hope that the residents of East Palo Alto learn to grow and share their fresh fruits and vegetables.

How Did it Start?
The East Palo Alto Seed Library began as an idea spurred by the Richmond Grows Seed Library at the Richmond Public Library. You can check this library out at www.richmondgrows.org. The EPA Library partnered with a great local non-profit called Collective Roots to bring a similar idea to the residents of EPA.

Who is Our Great Partner?
Collective Roots is a local non-profit that “seeks to educate and engage youth and communities in food system change through sustainable programs that impact health, education, and the environment.” This group is also responsible for the East Palo Alto Farmer’s Market that is held every Saturday from 2-5pm in front of the EPA YMCA. They also work with youth and adults to design and sustain organic gardens on school and community sites that are linked with kindergarten through 12th grade curriculum provided by Collective Roots.

The East Palo Alto Seed Library will be open to everyone starting April 22nd. It will provide, in addition to seeds, education about growing healthy and sustainable foods and gardens. The Seed Library is open to all residents of East Palo Alto, with no charge. It is maintained by EPA Library staff, Collective Roots, volunteers, and supported by donations.

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Punk-Ass Book Jockey

Librarians Against DRM

The Dark Ages Began With Closing A Library

The #Partyhard Post: How Partying Can Make Libraries Better

Posted on April 7, 2011May 9, 2011 by pcsweeney

This post stems entirely from @librarianjp and our conversations on FB and his youtube video. From what I understand, he got inspired by Andrew W.K. so I’m researching that guy too. Anyway, I wanted to give him credit for getting me to think about this in a more creative way. Here it is…

Librarians need to party more and party harder. Now I know what you’re thinking! Yes, I have been to ALA and I know that librarians do party pretty well, but my thoughts go beyond this and I can only explain them from some of the things that have happened in my experiences with partying with librarians and what I think can come from librarians embracing some aspects of the #partyhard community.

A Celebration of our Profession
One of the first things that JP said to me about the profession of librarianship and the whole party hard theory was to the effect of needing to celebrate our profession more instead of mourning it. This really hit home for me at the time it was said because I was just reading about layoffs, libraries closing, hours lost, budgets cut, etc… I really feel like there are quite a few people who are quietly mourning the loss of this profession. But there’s no reason that we need to go out quietly. If we do really wind up going out, we should go out loud, kicking, screaming, and celebrating everything that libraries have done for the people of this country for the last 236 years. Really, our fellow librarians have accomplished a whole lot when you sit back and think about it! So now let’s celebrate it!

This leads me to something I despise but I will name it here. It’s a book called “The Secret.” Let me state that I HATE this book for a number of reasons. *But really, the power of the theory behind the book is the power of positive thinking. By believing that what you want can be accomplished you can accomplish it.* So, as a profession we need to begin this cycle of believing we can accomplish everything we need to. I don’t think that this can start from the position of negativity or self-doubt that I keep seeing and hearing but needs to begin from a position of positive actions. What better way to begin this cycle than through a party and celebration of our profession?

Party With Each Other
This is a conversation that I have had many times. In fact, I said something similar here in Loida’s video. The summary is that I’m always a little weary of going to sessions and workshops at conferences. This is generally because these were put together up to a year or more in advance. The people I’m interested in hearing from all write about what they’re excited about online and whatever it is that they’re presenting on was talked about on their blogs, twitter, youtube, etc… when they first thought of it. I almost never learn anything new from sessions. I do, however, learn incredible amounts at the socials and meet-ups. The people I’m excited to learn from are talking directly with me and telling me about what they are working on and excited about right now. I get to ask questions and get feedback on what I’m excited about on a personal level. People say what they wouldn’t or couldn’t say at a workshop and there is a significant barrier that is broken down in the social scene. The end product of this is that I have never learned more than when I partied with the people who I am a geeky fan of.

My other problem was brought up by Andy Woodworth and I fairly snarkly answered that the problem could be solved if we partied more. The problem was that library systems don’t collaborate enough. I think that a large part of the lack of collaboration and sharing between library entities is that many of the people involved in those organizations never meet. So, to help with this, Andrew Carlos and I started some Librarian meet-ups in the Bay area. We have only had two and I’ve only been to one, but at just this one meet-up I found out about a project happening in my neighboring library system that is only about a mile away that would allow for some kind of partnership with a project that I’m working on. If we hadn’t partied together, we wouldn’t have had this opportunity to learn from each other and see what we are each doing. Now, I have new collaborative project for Fall, I know what other libraries in my area are doing, how we can collaborate, and I know new people to plan exciting new services and programs with.

Party with our Patrons and Our Community
This was a completely random and recent thought that I had in the ALA Think Tank group. I have not really tested or tried this so I’ll just throw it in here at the end in case anyone is still reading.

What if we partied with our patrons? What if we just went to the bars in our communities and hung out all night, danced, drank, and really got to know our patrons in ways that we don’t get to know them at the reference desk? What could we learn about their real needs and wants? What would they tell us in a social setting at a bar or restaurant or concert that they wouldn’t tell us in the library? What do you think?

I guess I should say that at some level I have actually done this but not exactly in the way that I was thinking. While I haven’t really tried to make connections by partying in my community, I have partied in my community and I have made some connections. The first was that I was introduced to someone who already knew about my Guitar Project and had been following it because he wanted his organization to donate money to it! He actually knew me before I ever met him! (I was famous in my own mind for like 10 seconds) and the second was that I found out about a local chapter of the group called Guitars not Guns and they also want to help with the guitar project. But again, I wasn’t looking for connections as I’m proposing here, just out for the night. What if I was actually looking to meet folks?

*that summary just saved you $14.00 on Amazon so buy someone a drink.

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National Library Unconference Day (Will be EPIC!)com

Posted on February 15, 2011February 10, 2011 by pcsweeney

So I’m not sure how many people know about this, but I hope that every librarian does. I’m talking about national library unconference day on May 22, 2012. This is your chance in you state, or region, or county, or library system, or just library, to hold your own unconference. What’s an unconference you ask? Well… I’ll let Allen McGinley and JP Porcaro explain it for me.

Personally, I love unconferences for a whole lot of reasons and there is talk of putting one together in my area (the San Francisco Bay Area) on the same day so I’m pretty stoked because some of the best experiences that I have had in librarianship have been at unconferences. For example, I met some amazing people, I gave my first professional “presentation,” I got the courage to talk to directors and high level administrators as equals, I learned about the programs and services being offered at other libraries, and I learned what kinds of ideas other professionals had about the state of librarianship and its future in the United States.

So this is our chance to have an excuse to #makeithappen in our locations. JP and Allen are basically calling for unconferences to happen all over the country on the same day. This will be a day of learning, sharing, and growing for anyone and everyone participating.

For even more information on the Unconference you can visit the 8bitlibrary website. If you’re a librarian and you’re not reading the 8bitlibrary blog, what are you doing on the internet?

The Great Librarian Write-Out!

Posted on February 10, 2011April 7, 2011 by pcsweeney

It’s time for librarians to get out of the echo-chamber of librarianship and get some good words out to the people. So I’m proposing an award (my own personal money) of $250 for the best library-related article to be published in a non-library magazine or journal. Yes, that’s right… My own personal money!! That’s how important this is to me!

There are thousands of amazing writers in our profession who write their own blogs and write for our professional magazines and journals, but rarely (or never) do I see an article written for the public in a major national magazine about how libraries help society in some great way. I don’t think there has ever been a time when such articles should be appearing amidst the news of library closures, resource cutting, and layoffs. Its time that we got the word out about libraries to as many people as possible!!

It seems to me that there are hundreds of topics for articles that could be written that would be applicable to the content of a major magazine. Off of the top of my head I’m thinking

-Saving Businesses Money (or starting a business) with Library Resources
– Forbes
– Entrepreneur
– Fortune
-Business Week

-How someone learned about their cultural identity at the library
– Ebony
– Latina
– Out!

-Pet Care information
-Dogs
-Cats
-Bark!

But this is only scratching the surface of the possibilities. I could keep going but I think you get the idea. If you want to participate and win $250 for your article published in a non-library journal or magazine, here are the criteria;

-You must be in some way related to the library profession, a library vendor, a patron, a friend of a patron, or at least heard of the idea of libraries at one point in your life.

-It must be a pro-library article speaking positively about the benefits of libraries in some aspect of society and addressing the need for folks to get up and go to the library for some reason or another.

-The article must be printed between February 15 2011, and the first day of the ALA Midwinter Meeting on January 20th 2012

-It must be published in a non-library related magazine or journal with a national (United States) or international circulation. More points will be given to an article in a magazine with the largest circulation, and you will receive bonus points for a feature article.

-You must submit, your name, the title, and date of publication (for verification) by emailing us or commenting below.

The articles will be judged by the members of the Think Tank at the American Library Association Midwinter Meeting in Dallas Texas in 2012. The winner will be announced January 24th 2012.

If you want to help us up the ante for prize money let us know by commenting below or sending us a message. Also, any money raised through our Café Press store will go towards added prizes and awards and other library advocacy projects as well so feel free to shop away! http://www.cafepress.com/libraryadvocate