I love this book. It has a lot of virtues: it offers pithy rules for social media marketing; it's brief and concise; well-written, so easy to read; and it offers a sophisticated understanding of social media marketing. (Perhaps it's not an in-depth examination of social media, but I've been on Twitter for five years and my understanding of its virtues and importance changed immediately when I read her chapter on Twitter.com).
This book answers the question: why should we be doing social media marketing? The first answer is that that is where our patrons are.
Social Media Marketing as SEO
Kabani asserts that social media marketing is the new SEO: social media is what you use to drive traffic to your website. Shen mentions, in passing, that websites are as important to every entity today as having a phone and a listing in the phone book used to be.
Since SEO is not a term I use every day or even anything that I thought was relevant to libraries, it's taking me a little while to absorb this.
Since library websites have many uses, such as a place where you can place a hold on an item, check the status of items in your account, consult the catalog, and perhaps most importantly, access online databases that are only accessible from the web, it seems to me that part of the answer for libraries about why we should be using social media marketing is to drive traffic to our websites. While we're doing that, we can also be educating online users about all of our library products, especially our new ones.
In Chapter One, Kabani points out that good social media creates ambassadors for the brand. This may be hard to understand but engaging with users creates an area in which they can endorse your organization, your brand, or a product or service. That's very valuable. Because it's a commonplace that we will turn for advice to someone we trust because they are close to us before we will turn to an expert (or the vast quantity of useful information available to us at the library!). Creating ambassadors for the brand, and positive feelings and comments, is another reason for a library to be on social media.
Quality Control
One of the themes of the book is that, while you utilize an effective publicity strategy on social media, you need to also stick to the knitting: make sure that you product is top-notch. It's high quality and high value that is, in some cases, the key to success.
For instance, in Kabani's discussion of Groupon, Living Social, and other group buying sites, she points out that if you create a coupon to attract new customers, be sure to have a plan in place that includes high-quality service performance and customer service. Encourage your coupon customers to follow up on social media with comments about your product or service. BUT - be sure that the experience that your prospective customer has when they use a coupon is likely to merit a good review. If you think that staff are not ready for the highest levels of scrutiny, it might be wise to review some important customer service principles. To make the most of the opportunity afforded by the group buying coupon, a business leader must prepare to staff to cross-sell or upsell, without being too aggressive.
This book focuses on using blogs, Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin to market your business. There's also a chapter on Google+, which I suspect is not on the radar of many libraries. Part of its appeal to businesses is that your Google+ page will appear with search results.
I think that blogs, especially when they're part of your website (as she recommends), have the potential to be very useful to libraries. That's because, as this book points out, providing information that is useful to your patrons (in the case of a library), your consumers (people who read your content on social media and hopefully, are positively influenced by it), and finally your customers (people who actually consume your products and services).
One way I would love to take advantage of social media is to use it to help answer the reader's question, "What do I read next?" whether that's a question about which book is next in a series, what's hot right now, or what's a strong recommendation for a good book to read.
Social Media Policy
There was a time when a lot of libraries were concerned with this issue. I assume that most libraries that want to have a social media policy now have one.
Shama Kabani makes several interesting points about crafting a social media policy. One is that one size does not fit all, and it would be ideal for a social media policy fit your organization. Another is that it is not necessary to make social media rules punitive or draconian. She emphasizes commen sense, and points out that at Zappos, employees are encouraged to participate in social media and are trusted to present the company in a positive light. She points out that as of the writing of her book, Zappos has not had any problems with social media comments posted by colleagues. This reminds me that again, having a healthy company culture can do wonders in preventing these kinds of problems.
I think something that's implied is that when and if you adopt a social media policy, you spend some time talking with staff about their role in social media. Kabani talks about the important positive role that employees have in engaging audiences outside the orgnanization.
Some More Pithy Rules
"If content is king, video is the king of the bigger country."
"Many executives between the ages of 45 and 65 are digital aliens. They were not brought up in the digital age and feel overwhelmed and sometimes fearful of the new technologies."
"Bottom line: Don't mistake the medium for the message: that's not what it is.
Find a way to be of service -- and to be part of something bigger than your business." (p.61, Ch. 5)
This book answers the question: why should we be doing social media marketing? The first answer is that that is where our patrons are.
Social Media Marketing as SEO
Kabani asserts that social media marketing is the new SEO: social media is what you use to drive traffic to your website. Shen mentions, in passing, that websites are as important to every entity today as having a phone and a listing in the phone book used to be.
Since SEO is not a term I use every day or even anything that I thought was relevant to libraries, it's taking me a little while to absorb this.
Since library websites have many uses, such as a place where you can place a hold on an item, check the status of items in your account, consult the catalog, and perhaps most importantly, access online databases that are only accessible from the web, it seems to me that part of the answer for libraries about why we should be using social media marketing is to drive traffic to our websites. While we're doing that, we can also be educating online users about all of our library products, especially our new ones.
In Chapter One, Kabani points out that good social media creates ambassadors for the brand. This may be hard to understand but engaging with users creates an area in which they can endorse your organization, your brand, or a product or service. That's very valuable. Because it's a commonplace that we will turn for advice to someone we trust because they are close to us before we will turn to an expert (or the vast quantity of useful information available to us at the library!). Creating ambassadors for the brand, and positive feelings and comments, is another reason for a library to be on social media.
Quality Control
One of the themes of the book is that, while you utilize an effective publicity strategy on social media, you need to also stick to the knitting: make sure that you product is top-notch. It's high quality and high value that is, in some cases, the key to success.
For instance, in Kabani's discussion of Groupon, Living Social, and other group buying sites, she points out that if you create a coupon to attract new customers, be sure to have a plan in place that includes high-quality service performance and customer service. Encourage your coupon customers to follow up on social media with comments about your product or service. BUT - be sure that the experience that your prospective customer has when they use a coupon is likely to merit a good review. If you think that staff are not ready for the highest levels of scrutiny, it might be wise to review some important customer service principles. To make the most of the opportunity afforded by the group buying coupon, a business leader must prepare to staff to cross-sell or upsell, without being too aggressive.
This book focuses on using blogs, Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin to market your business. There's also a chapter on Google+, which I suspect is not on the radar of many libraries. Part of its appeal to businesses is that your Google+ page will appear with search results.
I think that blogs, especially when they're part of your website (as she recommends), have the potential to be very useful to libraries. That's because, as this book points out, providing information that is useful to your patrons (in the case of a library), your consumers (people who read your content on social media and hopefully, are positively influenced by it), and finally your customers (people who actually consume your products and services).
One way I would love to take advantage of social media is to use it to help answer the reader's question, "What do I read next?" whether that's a question about which book is next in a series, what's hot right now, or what's a strong recommendation for a good book to read.
Social Media Policy
There was a time when a lot of libraries were concerned with this issue. I assume that most libraries that want to have a social media policy now have one.
Shama Kabani makes several interesting points about crafting a social media policy. One is that one size does not fit all, and it would be ideal for a social media policy fit your organization. Another is that it is not necessary to make social media rules punitive or draconian. She emphasizes commen sense, and points out that at Zappos, employees are encouraged to participate in social media and are trusted to present the company in a positive light. She points out that as of the writing of her book, Zappos has not had any problems with social media comments posted by colleagues. This reminds me that again, having a healthy company culture can do wonders in preventing these kinds of problems.
I think something that's implied is that when and if you adopt a social media policy, you spend some time talking with staff about their role in social media. Kabani talks about the important positive role that employees have in engaging audiences outside the orgnanization.
Some More Pithy Rules
"If content is king, video is the king of the bigger country."
"Many executives between the ages of 45 and 65 are digital aliens. They were not brought up in the digital age and feel overwhelmed and sometimes fearful of the new technologies."
"Bottom line: Don't mistake the medium for the message: that's not what it is.
Find a way to be of service -- and to be part of something bigger than your business." (p.61, Ch. 5)
