What do you think are the best ways to market your library's fiction collection? Name and describe three ways you do or would like to market your library or your future library's fiction. These can be tools, programs, services, displays - anything that you see as getting the word out.
Catalog Displays: A few months ago, my library updated our catalog overlay to Vega Discover. Our ILS, Polaris, didn’t change, but as I understand it, Vega is Innovative’s new interface. The switch hasn’t been without its bugs, but one of my favorite new features is the ability to create Showcases. These are virtual displays that appear on the home screen of the catalog.
We always have four Showcases displayed, with Discover New Releases and Musser Staff
Favorites as permanent ones. I am responsible for creating and updating these showcases
and I have a lot of fun with it! They each start with the word Discover to play on the new overlay being called Vega Discover and also to set our Showcases apart from the other libraries in our consortium.
Each month I create two new showcases. Because it is Poetry Month, I made Discover New Verses which includes poetry anthologies, fiction books written in verse, and plays. I made Discover Your Superpowers to help promote an event at our library this month -- Superhero Trivia Night! I already know that next month I am going to make one called Discover Science Fiction because National Twilight Zone Day is May 11, but I haven’t decided on the other showcase yet, so if anyone has some ideas, I would love to hear them!
New Book Tuesdays: I was recently given access to my library’s social media accounts! I’ve started posting photos of the newly released books on Tuesdays to try and bring attention both to the highly anticipated releases like James Patterson and Danielle Steel, and some that may have otherwise gone unnoticed. I also try to feature new picture books as well and usually post two or three photos of books!
Unpack a Box of Books: This is an idea of mine that I haven’t officially done yet. I like the idea of filming short videos that convey how much fun it is to open a Baker & Taylor box when you aren’t entirely certain what books came in! I think it would be a fun way to introduce people to new books and genres they may not normally look for. In a similar vein, two of the Children’s Librarians have approached me with the idea of doing videos where we either read a new picture right out of the box or have to explain what we think a book is going to be about by just looking at its cover which would sort of play with the idea of ‘not judging a book by its cover.’
No comments:
Post a Comment