A presentation given at the NEOS mini conference in June 2013 on the management of the library's message across various social media platforms.

2. Program
weÊve
n to the philosophy
• An introductio
r social
therford Library fo
developed at Ru
media management. nd Ideas.
ples a
Tips, Tricks, Exam
•
t about a
nd food-for-though
ofou
• Some more pr
social media work.
Not in the Show
to use these
l not teach you how
• We wil
media.
e social
of us are using som
• By now most
e you know
braries, We assum
media in our li
the basics.

3. Context
of Alberta
ia at the University
• Social med
ganically.
raries developed or
Lib
ties
eated distinct identi
cr
• The result has
ies.
between unit librar
witter
one system-wide T
• We have
has their
but each unit uses
account ell.
own accounts as w
erford
s will be from Ruth
• Example
and
Facebook, Twitter
LibraryÊs
e system
t accounts — and th
Pinteres
nt.
wide Twitter accou

4. Broader Con
text
• What
is the curr
ent state of
libraries an
the relation
d social me
ship betwe
• Ho w a
dia?
en
re libraries
using socia
meaningfu
l media mo
lly now tha
re
• What
n 5 or 7 ye
are libraria
nsÊ feelings ars ago?
social medi
and impuls
a?
es about

5. Polkinghor
ne & Hoffm
an 2006-2
008
• 2 Stud
ies using a
critical dis
framework
course ana
.
lysis
• Used 2
data source
s: publishe
conversatio
d articles a
ns among l
nd
ibrarians o
listserv.
n the ILI-L
• Identif
email
ied several
main them
how librar
es and tren
ians were
ds about
using socia
l media.

6. Polkinghor
ne & Hoffm
an 2006-2
008
Marketing
One of the
main trend
s the study
libraries an
revealed w
d library s
as that
taff primar
as a marke
ily saw soc
ting tool: to
ial media
get users t
collection a
o using the
nd program
library
s.

7. Polkinghor
ne & Hoffm
an 2006-2
C
ontrol
008
The study
also found
that social
inherent ne
media teste
ed for thin
d library w
gs to be org
orkersÊ
anized, ord
erly and in
Our enthus
control.
iasm was c
urbed beca
potential w
use using s
ould requir
ocial media
e we give u
conversatio
to
p some con
n.
trol over th its full
e
As a result
: early soci
al media us
superficial
e by librar
.
ies was qu
ite

8. .
cial media
so
table with social media
for
more com re now using
e
s.
ave becom ary users a
y day live
ibraries h many, libr
ver
• L
y,
into our e
n
Many, ma has been integrated
•
nd
arly, It
they are a
o
regul
world wh munities.
e
to show th ives and com
SM
l
ow using
are n
eir usersÊ
Libraries ey contribute to th
l
s in socia
uch th
ser
how m
ng their u
agi
g and eng
in
encounter
re
ibraries a
L
media.
y
edia Toda
Social M

10. tity
Social Media Iden
Clarify your
r
to look like to you
t
What do you wan
ic?
rmative? Academ
followers? Info
un?
al? Laid-back? F
Profession
Approachable?
e?
How do you decid
owers? What are
Who are your foll
hat
o they share? W
d
they like? What
do they „like‰ ?
!
Hint: Follow them

11. y
eflect your identit
r
Choose content to
sily
authenticity is ea
Be genuine, in
et.
ven on the intern
detected, e
.
tone of your texts
Be mindful of the
gÊ or
like youÊre Âtellin
Does it seem
sharing?
nent
h post is a perma
NOTE: eac
Ê.
ur library isÂlike
at yo
impression of wh

12. A
cy
ilosophy and Poli
Social Media Ph
cy document that
oli
1. DO have a p
r
our library will o
frames what y
.
o in social media
will not d
what
philosophy about
2. DO have a
h,
ying to accomplis
your are tr
t
entity is and wha
what your id
are appropriate.
types of posts
No.2
ÊT let No.1 stifle
3. DON

13. SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS
Decide what medium is right for you.
What is the best way to express your
social media persona?
Facebook, Pinterest, Tumblr, Instagram
are more visual mediums
Twitter is more of a text-based medium

14. Use Mediums to their fullest Potential.
Mediums like Facebook, Pinterest are
visual and require images or links to
capture peopleÊs attention.
Use relevant hash tags to spread your
tweets out to a wider audience
www.hashtags.org  trends, tracking
and dictionary

15. Use Mediums to their fullest Potential.
Mediums like Facebook, Pinterest are
visual and require images or links to
capture peopleÊs attention.
Use relevant hash tags to spread your
tweets out to a wider audience
Images bring out Facebook posts

16. Use Mediums to their fullest Potential.
Mediums like Facebook, Pinterest are
visual and require images or links to
capture peopleÊs attention.
Use relevant hash tags to spread your
tweets out to a wider audience
Proper hash tags spread your message
to a wider audience.

17. Tailor Your Message to the Medium
Tools exist to link social media accounts
• This is handy in terms of saving time.
• Not always compatible across mediums —
ex. hash tags in Facebook

18. Resize image to appear properly in the
Facebook Feed

19. Source:
h*p://omnomedia.wordpress.com/2013/03/21/
facebook-­‐photo-­‐size-­‐cheat-­‐sheet/
Facebook size cheat sheets are available
all over the web — just Google
„Facebook Image Size Cheat Sheet‰

20. Resizing enables users to see your
message without extra effort.

21. If using Pinterest for virtual book
displays, ensure your book covers are
engaging: Pinterest DOES judge a book
by its cover.

22. Let the mediums play off each other:
Tweet and share Pinterest Boards via
Facebook and Twitter
Use link shorteners that allow you to
measure how many clicks these posts
receive.

24. In the early days of the Rutherford
Facebook page our posts did not get a lot of
engagement.

25. During a campus outage we attempted to take a humorous twist
to the situation and discovered that memes and humour got our
users to be more engaging.

26. Viral Marketing Research
Adam J. Mills
"Virality in the Social Media: the SPIN framework‰
Analyzes viral marketing campaigns to dissect what makes them
viral. (Old Spice: ‰The Man Your Man Could Smell Like")
Suggests 4 factors to virality: Spreadability, Propagativity,
Integration and "Nexus".

27. Leonardo Bruni, Chiara Francalancia, Paolo Giacomazzi
"The Role of Multimedia Content in Determining the Virality of
Social Media Information‰
• Analyzed 2 million tweets from July 2011 about particular
cities from a tourism perspective and clustered tweets with
multimedia content and with out it to see if there were trends
in how frequently and how quickly either were retweeted.
• Findings supported the hypotheses that multimedia plays an
important role in determining the volume and speed of
retweeting.

28. Jonah Berger and Katherine L. Milkman
"What Makes Online Content Viral?‰
• Took a look at virality in social media from a psychological
perspective: "emotional valence and social transmission": Does
the emotion aroused by a story or digital artifact influence
whether it is "shared".
• Analyzed 7000 articles from the New York Times, clustered
them by their topic matter and then investigated their
virality.

29. Jonah Berger and Katherine L. Milkman
"What Makes Online Content Viral?‰
• Conducted additional studies with participants who were asked to read
articles about the same news stories, but written in a different tone (to
arouse different emotions). They then asked participants whether they
would share the story.
• Findings showed that positive content is more viral. Also content that
evokes anger is more viral than content that evokes sadness.
• Amusement scored high in terms of virality.

30. Applying what we learned from our own interactions and what
we read in the research we continued to produce memes and
humourous posts — to find that students engaged with us more.

31. Community relevant humour and social causes seem to be what
our users enjoyed and wanted to share.

32. Making Memes
The Tools: someecards.com, Frabz, or just Google „meme generator‰
Do some research first. Search „memes‰ on Google. There are thousands!
1.
Memes need to be genuinely funny. Irony, satire, exaggeration and even
sarcasm is required. Don't be afraid to make fun of yourself!

33. 2 . Know your audience. Let your users and community be central in
the humour, find inspiration from your users.

34. 3. Be in good taste and good grammar
There is a fine line between what is funny and offensive. Be careful and ask
others whether they find it funny.
Keep the spelling and grammar clean, unless it is central to the humor of
your meme or be prepared to be corrected!

35. 4. Memes wonÊt work in every medium. Not everything that works on
Facebook will work on Twitter and vice versa.

36. 5. Participate - share appropriate content made by others you follow. This
makes them likely to share your content.

37. Negative Feedback
It happens!
.
• Acknowledge it
ering
• Diffuse it by off
a venue for further
e.
discussion —off stag
Awe the crowd with
answers and workarounds!

38. Some examples of negative feedback and how we handled it.

39. And there typically are more positive comments as well

41. Social media is always changing so make sure to keep up to date.
Follow the main feeds for Twitter, Facebook etc. and be prepared
for what is coming down the pipe. Read about what otherÊs are
doing — keep the show fresh and vibrant!

42. for
is a difficult job
Social Media
nage.
one person to ma
just
osting
content prior to p
Discussing
is helpful.
ular
edia requires reg s a
Social M
ed
and everyone ne
supervision
vacation!

43. Social media management can seem like a lot of work
but remember there are rewards!
It is about getting to know your users in a place they
are comfortable, and breathing life into the LibraryÊs
image.
ENJOY THE APPLAUSE!

44. arge of
Ringmaster IS in ch
The
l every
w but cannot contro
the sho
detail.
trol:
gmaster CANÊT con
The Rin
ent or
Every single comm
•
engagement.
ts or
he tone of commen
• T
engagements.
posts
tronÊs independent
• Pa
make
(which they would
is on
hether the library
w
.
social media or not)

45. ntrol:
ingmaster canÊt co
The R
nt or
Every sing comme
•
engagement.
nts or
The tone of comme
•
engagements.
nt posts
PatronÊs independe
•
ke
ich they would ma
(wh
y is on
whether the librar
social media or not)
arge of
Ringmaster IS in ch
The
l every
w but cannot contro
the sho
detail.
ol:
ingmaster can contr
The R
le.
ona, identity and sty
• Pers
rvice.
• The level of se
tent.
The focus of the con
•
s are
w negative situation
• Ho
handled.
ment
social media engage
• Ho w
is measured.

47. Credits
The Rutherford Social Media Team:
Sarah Polkinghorne
Jorden Smith
Nicole LaPointe

48. Photo credits
Photos
Obtained
Under
CreaCve
Commons
License
from
Flickr
www.flickr.com:
Applauding
Hand:
Irene2727
Applause:
Neekoh.fi
Fire
Eater:
Scriblenz
Tent
Upward
View:
PJVanf
Lego
Juggler:
Helico
Lego
Clowns:
WiredforLego
Roaring
Lion:
Tambako
the
Jaguar
Sleeping
Lion:
KaC
Koae
Upside
Down
Trapeze:
Paco
CT
Dangling
Trapeze:
hbp_pix
Ringmaster:
Ant
Smith
Bearded
Lady
Poster:
A
Jimenez
via
“LaCn
American
Ilustraćion”
Memes
obtained
and
created
at
someecards.com.
frabz.com
and
h*p://imgflip.com/memegenerator
All
other
illustraCons
created
by
Hanne
Pearce

49. Bibliography
Berger,
Jonah,
and
Katherine
L
Milkman.
"What
Makes
Online
Content
Viral??."
Journal
Of
MarkeCng
Research
(JMR)
49,
no.
2
(April
2012):
192-­‐205.
Business
Source
Complete,
University
of
Alberta
Libraries
(accessed
April
10,
2013)
Bruni,
Leonardo,
Chiara
Francalanci,
and
Paolo
Giacomazzi.
"The
Role
of
MulCmedia
Content
in
Determining
the
Virality
of
Social
Media
InformaCon."
InformaCon
(2078-­‐2489)
3,
no.
3
(September
2012):
278.
University
of
Alberta
Libraries.
(accessed
April
10,
2013).
Mills,
Adam
J.
"Virality
in
social
media:
the
SPIN
Framework."
Journal
Of
Public
Affairs
(14723891)
12,
no.
2
(May
2012):
162-­‐169.
Business
Source
Complete,
University
of
Alberta
Libraries
(accessed
April
3,
2013)

50. Bibliography
Hoffman,
C.,
&
Polkinghorne,
S.
(2010,
June).
Discourse,
idenCty,
pracCce:
Analyzing
instrucCon
librarians’
conversaCons
about
informaCon
literacy
and
the
social
Web.
Canadian
AssociaCon
for
InformaCon
Science,
Montreal,
QC.
Extended
abstract:
h*p://www.cais-­‐acsi.ca/conf_proceedings_2010.htm
Polkinghorne,
S.,
&
Hoffman,
C.
(2009,
April).
InformaCon
literacy
and
librarianship
in
the
age
of
the
social
Web:
A
criCcal
discourse
analysis
of
ILI-­‐L
posCngs.
LOEX
Annual
Conference,
Albuquerque,
NM.
Polkinghorne,
S.,
&
Hoffman,
C.
(2009).
“Crown
jewel”
or
“pure
evil”?
Wikipedia
through
an
informaCon
literacy
lens.
Feliciter
55(3),
101-­‐103.
Hoffman,
C.,
&
Polkinghorne,
S.
(2008).
Sparking
Flickrs
of
insight.
In
P.
Godwin
&
J.
Parker
(Eds.),
Informa.on
literacy
meets
Web
2.0.
London:
Facet
Publishing.
Hoffman,
C.,
&
Polkinghorne,
S.
(2007,
May).
Launching
‘InfoLit
2.0’?
Considering
Web
2.0’s
potenCal
to
support
criCcal
thinking
and
higher-­‐level
learning
in
informaCon
literacy
pracCce.
Workshop
on
InstrucCon
in
Library
Use,
York
University,
Toronto,
ON.