Marketing Your Library's Electronic Resources: A How-To-Do-It Manual for Librarians

As library budgets get tighter and the cost of e-resources rises, it is becoming increasingly necessary for libraries to promote such materials to patrons rather than rely on the discovery system to do it for them. Before one can begin to let patrons know what the library offers in the way of e-resources, a plan is needed. Kennedy (serials & electronic resources librarian, Loyola Marymount Univ.) and LaGuardia (research librarian, Harvard Univ., and an LJ reviewer) show how to create a marketing plan by using six components: determining the purpose of your plan; creating and implementing the plan; writing up the plan report; assessing the plan; and, once the plan has been executed, revising and updating it. The authors clearly lay out these steps and offer guidance as to what should be undertaken and what should be avoided for each component. They provide numerous examples throughout. There are also recommended further readings and resources such as websites and templates. Additionally, four sample marketing-plan reports are included: one for an all-electronic library, two for public libraries, and one for a university library. These samples put all the steps into perspective and will give librarians valuable insight.