Looking back at 2010

2010 has been a busy and eventful year at APL. Looking back, here's a few of the things that jump out:

1. Changing of the guard: new leadership, or APL:TNG -- Colleen Rortvedt has been tapped as the next Library Director -- I probably list this first because looming retirement somehow seems like a big deal to me. But after I've been gone for six months, it'll either be "Terry who?" or "this is great -- why did we never do it before?" I appreciate the extensive hiring process our Board went through to find the next Director: they made a great choice. Colleen will bring some great new energy and innovative ideas; she is poised to make positive changes. 2010's accomplishments testify to her vision and effectiveness. In any case, fifteen years of me in this chair is enough.

   Last May, Brian Kopetsky succeeded Meg Shriver, our longstanding reference supervisor with whom I worked for 30 years. Meg was well loved for many reasons, nonetheless Brian has begun making some positive changes as well, showing leadership in social media, marketing, technology, and the Wisconsin public library community.
   

2. Friends Executive Director & board bring new activism and energy -- After our Friends and Foundation merged last year, they spent some months getting organized and hired their first Executive Director -- Janice Daniels Quinlan -- who then set up a great annual meeting, recruited new board members, and has greatly expanded fund-raising and advocacy. With Jan's leadership, the Friends are increasing their visibility and effectiveness while fostering increased connections with the community.


3. RFID sparks massive weeding, slated for complete implementation in 2011 -- There are four great things about the way RFID is going. First is the concept of tagging the collection mainly with volunteers, making the process shorter and cheaper to implement. Second is the tight teamwork of the group that planned the details of implementation, and went through the RFP and vendor selection process. Third is the totally massive weeding project that saw tens of thousands of marginal, worn, or outdated items pulled from the collection, buying us some needed space and making the tagging faster and more cost-effective. And finally, the bold plan to complete the project next year with sophisticated self-checks, security gates and automated materials handling. The Library Board, Mayor and City Council all approved the $400,000 capital project, which will transform many tasks when implemented in 2011.
   
   
4. Meeting room changes -- We had several responses to increasing meeting room use, with associated workload issues as well as supply and demand problems. We created a new small meeting room, permanently set up as a conference room and thus readily available with minimal effort. We implemented the Evanced meeting room booking and calendar software, allowing anyone to check on room availability and put in a request 24/7 without staff mediation. Lower level rooms are now available to community groups on Saturdays. We set up a new color-coded directional signage system on the lower level, clarifying room information and eliminating confusion.
   


5. New long range plan -- Beginning with a staff retreat in February, through meetings of a staff task force in the Spring and a Library Board/community committee in the summer, we revised our long range plan. While the new plan did not represent a radical departure (only prudent in the midst of management transition), it includes a redefined mission, a serious update and some useful new directions. Some of these were already underway with building recommendations, RFID, changes to the Friends and updated marketing efforts.
   


6. Marketing plan & social media -- After a long evolutionary process, we have a new marketing plan with some good mechanisms to maintain communications. An active team has made our Facebook page into a great information source and opportunity for community conversation. We are poised to integrate calendar feeds, improved email communication and other social media, along with a re-branded Friends organization, to possibly re-brand the library and finally bring home the oft-delayed website revamp.
   


7. Program attendance & meeting room use jumps -- Our annual program attendance is pushing 40,000, an increase of 16% over last year. This is related to marketing efforts and to hardworking and innovative program staff, putting together cultural and educational offerings for all ages. There's also been a huge increase in use of our meeting rooms. Both these changes reflect the increasing community center role of the library.
   


8. Monitors depart and “Maintenance” turns into “Operations” -- We significantly tweaked, rather than transmogrified, our former Maintenance Clerks to provide some increased security and oversight backup for public services staff. We had done this with part-time Monitors for after-school hours nine months a year, but had been unsuccessful for years in getting funds to expand the Monitor hours. Instead we eliminated a few part-time unbenefited jobs, folded those duties into the Maintenance job descriptions, and gave the full-time, renamed, Operations Clerks additional training on policies and Black Belt Librarian techniques. As city Facilities Management staff has taken on more of the maintenance duties here, our Operations Clerks have used the time to start some new routines, checking in with service desks while doing their regular rounds, and provide public assistance for the increased meeting room use.
   


9. Ebook platforms and discussions proliferate -- While a bunch of have been excited by the iPad this year, we continue to have supply, demand, format and DRM issues with eBooks. Through our system and a statewide consortium, we are able to offer downloadable eBooks in our catalog, and these can be read on Sony Readers and Nooks, as well as Androids, iPads, and iPhones. There are not yet enough titles or copies, and they're not perfectly easy to use, and they don't work on Kindles, but it's a good start. There's been a lot of conversation with much more to come.
   


10. Building project stalls with ongoing economic concerns -- The City Council referred the Library Board's building request to a special Capital Facilities Committee, which met for some months, and is currently on hiatus until late winter or early spring. Community Development Director Karen Harkness summed up the situation nicely, saying she:

    "believes the Committee would be in agreement that the most prudent way to proceed would be to build a new library. However, she also believes the Committee would be in agreement there are too many unknowns such as stimulus dollars, fundraising and the economy."

    Stay tuned!
    

Social Media Revolution

We decided this week to put a bit more work into the library Facebook page. I hadn't seen this yet, but this explains why pretty well...

Farm Market Stories & Songs

Miss Kathleen keeps 'em spellbound at the Appleton Downtown Farm Market:Our Children's staff is doing story hours at the market on three Saturday mornings this summer -- and even without the stories, the weekly market is a cure for the summertime blues (part 5).

Getting our act(ors) together

Like most public libraries, we depend upon -- and need -- a broad range of community support. And like many, we are lucky to have organized supporters who work to improve and assist the library. At the Appleton Public Library, we are fortunate enough to have both a friends group (Friends of Appleton Library, or FOAL) and a Foundation (Appleton Library Foundation, Inc.). Now the two are on the verge of merging into a single, and stronger, organization.

The Friends have been around since the mid-1970s, were formed to support the library, as well as in support of the need to improve library service and possibly get a new library building. They were heavily involved in political support for the 1978 referendum which resulted in our current building. They created the "walking books" program of delivery to the homebound. They started an endowment fund which supports programs. Currently they have about 250 members, run two book sales each year as their main fundraiser and coordinate the annual holiday "Give a Child a Book" campaign. The provide the library with volunteer and financial support, particularly with regard to programming. They have a grass roots focus and an emphasis on fellowship.

The Foundation was started in 1985 by supporters who wanted to focus on providing broad financial support for any library services which would give our library "the edge of excellence", including materials, technology and marketing in addition to programs. They had a successful five year capital campaign to jump start their endowment fund and make annual grants from a budget approved by the Library Board, according to their Gifts Policy. They do an annual end of year donation request letter and hold an annual fundraising dinner. The Foundation also serves as the fiscal agent for the Friends.

With two wonderful, successful groups, why would we want to change? For one reason: to focus community and staff efforts and library goals and plans. With two groups, two boards, two structures, two sets of meetings, there are areas of overlap and there are gaps. There is a lack of clear public identity as to who is the library support group -- and there's occasional public confusion. There is additional overhead for staff in care and feeding of two organizations.

Public funding is increasingly tight at the same time that library use is growing dramatically. To maintain and grow our services, we need ever more volunteers, ever more private dollars and ever more people willing and able to speak up about the value of the library to decision makers. We need an active community willing to focus on and engage library service needs.

Inspired by a program exploring similar mergers at last year's Public Library Association conference, we started looking at pros and cons of changing. Our Friends and Foundation have been talking for most of the last year and are now looking at a merger agreement. We did a study, conducted by Library Strategies, to identify issues and opportunities. After reflection and discussion, we had a facilitated planning session in which members of both boards rolled up their sleeves and set priorities. The help of an attorney to see to the legal issues has been crucial.

When approved, the new body will be called the Friends of Appleton Library, but will be incorporated like the Foundation. It will be organized like the current Friends, but with some of the Foundation's business structure. And we'll ask everyone serving on both boards to join as members of the initial board of the merged entity. And then we'll need to develop new policies and a new budget.

This has been and will be a lot of work in the short run, but we have little doubt of the long term payoff. The single support group would be able to have a staff, start a capital campaign to help with a new library building, grow their membership and be an increasingly strong voice to recruit volunteers, promote library services and advocate for the library.

We're excited to see what happens next!

Book Cart Brigade on parade!

photos from the parade, taken by Michael Kenney:

Cure for the Summertime Blues (part 3)

Appleton is proud of having the nation's oldest and longest flag day parade, but today I was especially proud of our library's Book Cart Brigade. After a couple decades' absence from the parade, the library returned with the first appearance of our book cart drill team.

The team was a huge success, drawing applause from crowds along the parade route, and comments on Facebook and in emails. Big BIG thanks to the hard-working team members, led by Ellen Jepson and including Ashley, Autumn, Charisse, Doris, Joann, Kathleen W., Katie, Lynnette, & Vicki B.

Additional support came from banner carriers Meg & Elizabeth, as well as support walkers Elaine, Jared & Colleen. Paul lent a touch of class with his Model A chase & support car. Maintenance staff secured the cart wheels for street use, Marvelous Marketin' Michael made sure we had good shirts, signs & decorations for carts, car and marchers, and was on hand to document, decorate and make sure everything went smoothly. The Library Foundation picked up the tab for out of pocket costs via a marketing grant. Truly, a great piece of teamwork!

The team executes a weave -- photo by Barb Kelly

Public opinions:

• "so entertaining ... What a stitch! I hope they do that every year. I loved it!"
• "the best unit in the parade"
• "You guys were great!"
• "the highlight of the parade!"
• "It looked really great!"
• "Go, Book Cart Brigade!!"

Ten Trends & Technologies for 2009

Provocative as usual, Prof. Michael Stephens has written a lengthy, dense, and intense posting on "Ten Trends & Technologies for 2009." His list was obviously assembled over time and with great detail, including implications for libraries and for library education. Full of examples including nuggets and head-scratchers, this is recommended reading for library planners, technologists and marketers. Noted trends include:

• The Ubiquity of the Cloud
• The Changing role of IT
• The Value of the Commons
• The Promise of Micro-Interaction
• The Care & Nurturing of the Tribe
• The triumph of the Portable Device
• The importance of Personalization
• The impact of Localization
• The evolution of the Digital lifestyle
• The shift toward Open Thinking

Stephens concludes by deriving:

Five Related Things We Just Can’t Ignore in Libraries:

• Privacy
• The Environment
• The Nature of Information
• Generation C
• Telling Our Story Well to Funding Bodies

Download a PDF of Michael Stephens' entire "Tame the Web" post here.

Marketing Your Library Final 1

Here's a SlideShare presentation developed as a grad school class group presentation, and published online by Michael Stephens. Although it's developed for a fictional community and has some idealized academic aspects, it would be a good springboard for real world discussions, particularly with regard to electronic marketing.

I Love a (Christmas) Parade

Kids, staff, family, Board members, even a dog and an Alderman. Thanks to the Boldt company for the truck and the help from staff and volunteers, thousands of people saw our float as we rode and marched in the Appleton Downtown Christmas Parade. It's great to hear kids yelling "yay, library!"

Branding & marketing 2.0-style

Jeff Scott of Casa Grande Public Library made some good references to presentations from Internet Librarian 2008. He particularly highlighted Greg Schwartz's Branding: not just for cows anymore and Digital Marketing from Aaron Schmidt & Sarah Houghton-Jan.

As we become more dependent on technology not only to provide service, but to make people aware of services, we need to be attentive to the many strands of the web that connect to our libraries.

We have opportunities & skills to influence how people see us online, and the responsibility to engage our communities. Jeff highlights some points...

From the Branding presentation:

• Have a Homebase
• Own your username
• Aggregate your lifestream
• Join the Conversation
• Follow what others are saying about you (Twitter)
  
• Be Authentic

And from the Digital Marketing presentation:

• Make your library website two-way
• Show up in searches whether they are library directories, search engines, wifi finders, community sites, library thing local and community sites.
• What are people saying about you? Search social sites to look for reviews.
• Find Local Blogs and intereact in a human way.
• We're experts too, library staff can show up at answer sites.
• Push the information out: newsletter software, email addresses, etc.

There are some real confluences in these two presentations. This seems to me to create opportunities for a lot of staff to be involved. Marketing needs all hands on deck. So one other presentation caught my eye: Organization 2.0 from Rebecca Dysart. Noting that "Collaborative & connecting technologies are changing the entire concept of where an organization starts and stops", Dysart explores some of the impact of new technology on organizational structure: how we get the work done.

Library Card Sign-up Month / The Smartest Card

Our friends at the OWLSnet shared automation network have just posted the following on their "What's Simmering?" blog for our InfoSoup shared catalog:

The Smartest Card

A library card is the smartest card you can carry, and September is Library Card Sign-up Month! This national campaign was started in 1987 to meet the challenge of then Secretary of Education William J. Bennett who said: "every child should obtain a library card - and use it." Since that time, thousands of public and school libraries join this effort to ensure every child does just that.

InfoSoup is celebrating this event with our "Shhhhh... They're in the library" posters. Maybe you've seen them around your community? Here are the pdfs if you'd like to see the complete set: Farmer, Family, Youth, Young Professional. If you're a library supporter, please feel free to print some and post them around your workplace, church, and/or other places you frequent in your community to help us spread the word.

Make sure your family and friends have the smartest card of all and sign up for a library card during September! If you'd like to share your stories about how your library card helps you, please feel free to post them in the comments.

For my money, a library card is the best back-to-school supply a parent can provide their child -- and it's free!

Library Ninjitsu

The winner of the statewide contest to create a video promoting the AskAway virtual reference service.

Jamie LaRue - market share pyramid

A couple weeks ago, when Jamie LaRue presented the keynote at the Wisconsin Strategic Visioning Summit, he described a "market share pyramid" of successive ways libraries can reach various parts of their communities. There's a copy of the whole pyramid diagram on Jamie's website.He lists the highest thing we can do is to get out in the community; I like that. It's not enough to wait for the reference questions to come to us. People don't know what resources we have to offer, so many of them will never ask. We need to put librarians at lots of tables, where they can contribute and help bring library resources to bear on many questions. That's the "librarian at every table" community development philosophy, just like I learned from Margaret Monroe, in days of yore in library school.

We have a lot to offer and contribute. I'm glad that our staff is involved on community committees, boards and task forces, and always want to be open to opportunities. It's good for professional growth of the staff and it's good for the community.

What are some other ways we could be answering the "community reference question"?

PLA: From Awareness to Funding - a study of library support in the U.S.

Listen, this is important...

The best thing Bill Gates ever did was to marry Melinda. Now we've got this rich couple with a conscience and progressive ideas. They help libraries a lot. Thus we have, among other things, the OCLC Gates-funded marketing/advocacy study. The grant is to study "development of a potential national marketing campaign to increase awareness of the value of libraries, and the need for support for libraries at local, state and national levels." On the surface, this sounds remarkably similar to the Campaign for Wisconsin Libraries, which I'm proud to support. But given the scope and ambitions of the study, I think the OCLC effort goes deeper and has some messages that deserve a lot of attention, that may call us to change how we do some things.

OCLC will publish the study next month. But there was a preview at the PLA conference in a program:

From Awareness to Funding
Join Cathy De Rosa, OCLC Global Vice President of Marketing, for a presentation of OCLC’s advocacy research program, funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Learn who you should talk to in your community and what messages can help your own advocacy and marketing efforts.

In an environment where libraries continue to face major cuts and even closing, the study is a follow-up to 2005's Perceptions of Libraries and Information Resources. I took pages of notes at the program, but we only scratched the surface -- it will be necessary to read the full report.

Selected highlights:

• public impressions of libraries are positive but inaccurate -- there is a lot that people don't know
  
• library referenda are increasingly failing to get on ballots, or where they do the success rate is dropping
• without action, critical funding for public libraries will erode
• sufficient latent support exists in local communities -- 80% of funding is local, but there is high competition
• it is key to position the library as a vital part of the community infrastructure and a key to transforming lives
• most people will claim to support the library, but fewer are truly committed to doing so
• elected officials believe that they support the library more than their constituents do
• there is no correlation between those who visit the library and those willing to fund it
• the desire to fund is related to belief in the library as a self-actualization tool
• perceptions of the librarian are highly related to support -- valuing a passionate librarian is very important -- qualities include:
• advocates for the library
• is knowledgeable
• has a commitment to life-long learning
• is passionate about making the library relevant
• everybody consistently lies in surveys
• there is a spectrum of perception and value, and we should make efforts to move the perception of the library from information toward transformation -- if we're perceived as being for information, we lose to Google
  

There was a lot more about the segmentation of our market, identifying super supporters, probable supporters, those with barriers to support, and nonvoters. A key will be to identify those segments of the probable supporters who can make the difference for us, and tailor our messages to them.

We need to:

• create a brand selling library support, not selling library use
  
• craft our our brand to reflect the beliefs of our most avid supporters
• re-frame the library when we lay out the case for support
• change perceptions to reflect:
• transformation NOT information
• infrastructure NOT institution
• necessity NOT nice to have
• the future NOT the past
• "return on investment" NOT altruism

This will turn into a national campaign, requiring scale and endurance. But local efforts will be critical: we need to be passionate, know our base and motivate our base.

I don't know that we want to jump right on the bandwagon -- letting go of the idea that we're about information will go hard with some. But we'd better think about it and discuss -- it seems that if we keep on doing things the way we have, support will continue to erode. Our library may be better off than many, but it's an ongoing struggle to maintain support.

Innovate or die?

An article in yesterday's Times demonstrates again that public library concerns are similar worldwide.

Culture Secretary Margaret Hodge addressed the Association of London Chief Librarians with a number of well-received suggestions for innovative services and marketing. Hodge said:

“And yet another thing I know is that keeping centre stage with an increasingly discerning and demanding population might require some innovative customer measures.”

The challenge, as in the U.S., is to increase use, become more cost-effective, but not dumb down services nor lose the essential qualities that make libraries and the library profession valuable to communities.

Social Networks, part 3 (Project Play assignment)

This week's assignment from Project Play:

1. Visit any 3 (suggested) library MySpace pages.
2. Note the ways libraries are “surfacing” library services.
3. Reflect on the place of libraries in social networking.
4. Post your thoughts about why or why not you would want to create a MySpace page for your library.

If your library already has a MySpace or Facebook page, also consider using your blog to share any tips & advice you might have...

OK, I looked at MySpace pages for Denver (teen page with rap music to annoy old people away), Charlotte & Mecklenburg County (garishly colored with no musc teen page), Arapahoe (funky teen page, with Paramores' "Crushcrushcrush", kinda nice emo -- this old guy liked it, so they're doing something wrong). By golly, all the ones I looked at are teen pages; or almost all: Oshkosh appears age-neutral. Facebook is more staid.

But beyond appearances, all three are "surfacing" library services. Delivering and linking to them, even. Typical offerings include library event info, teen blogs, reader's advisory, popular media info and homework resources. Mostly, this appears to be good marketing -- you build your network by establishing a point. of presence where your users are. You link from your website to your MySpace page and vice versa.

As to whether my library had a MySpace page, I'm pretty neutral. If your YA staff and Teen Board wanted to do it, fine. If they don't want to, fine. It doesn't appeal to me that much. And anything you create has to be maintained, or the value can degrade quickly.

I do have a Facebook page and created one for our library, just to try it out. I mainly created my page to stay in touch with the next younger generation of family. But I quickly found I had a lot of real friends on Facebook and a number of professional colleagues. It's a fun way to stay in touch. That being said, I have not yet found it real productive: there seems to be a lot of people asking you to play games and take quizzes. It seems like a lot of applications are marketing themselves virally on Facebook.

But there are opportunities for book & movie reviews and discussions. There are network and organization pages worth checking out. I think the potential is there. I'm networking not only with a long-lost cousin, but with my library school alumni group.

But the waste potential is there too, and the pretension. Katie Scullion notes:

... the amount of effort that goes into updating and these profiles will most likely go unnoticed after a few months ... fads move from site to site as one becomes more annoying/ad-dense than the other. ... social networking maniacs will spend much of their time compulsively checking other people's profiles, prowling through picture galleries, and updating their own. It seems more of a vanity than a communication tool ...

She makes some good points, and links to a hilarious video from Colbert, providing a good perspective.

On the other hand, the "fun extra" assignment this week encourages us to try the Simpsomaker, but I prefer Simpsonize me.

Social Networks, part 2

Coincidentally or not, Tasha Saecker in Sites & Soundbytes recently posted a link to a great article from the Readership Institute, "Build a network, not a destination."

Although the article is focussed on newspaper websites, it speaks strongly to my sense of issues we're addressing in developing our library site and electronic services. More to the point, it speaks to why we should be paying attention to social networks.

Points raised include:

• Link out -- a lot
• Link, especially, to blogs
• Link IN -- to related content of your own
• Open up the archives
• Use Web technologies intelligently
• Cultivate conversations about your content
• Distribute your content widely
• Partner with the portals
• Build your own social networks
• Encourage use of ranking/rating sites
• Build shortcuts across the Web

Tasha annotates this with some notes for library application. The reader's digest version of her summary:

• Link, link, link
• Cultivate conversations
• Build shortcuts to information
  

Both the orginal article and Tasha's take on it speak strongly to the importance of networks, social networks and how we implement library websites.

We've seen for years the concern that everybody wants to be THE portal. We can't be all things to all people, so the question becomes: how do we translate our service offerings into a valuable node in our users' network?

INFOSOUP vs. CARD CATALOG

Winner of the OWLSnet YouTube contest.

We love a parade!

From the Post-Crescent website: "The Appleton Public Library offers cards through the years in the 37th Annual Downtown Appleton Christmas Parade on Nov. 20, 2007. Post-Crescent photo by Steve Kabelowsky"

Several staff members, family and library supporters -- undaunted by drizzle and sleet -- carried large blow-ups of library cards from the 1930s to the present as well as historic and current photos of the library.

Young library supporters in the parade.

After the parade, children were treated to a Santa Story hour at the library. Miss Kathleen, aided by her husband Ty Westbrook, played songs shared stories and welcomed the Jolly Old Elf.

Ty & Kathleen Westbrook entertain the kids.

Miss Kathleen supervises Santa in placing a book atop the tree.

Library photos by Michael Kenney

YouTube marketing

"London Public Library: it's time to take another look!" is an interesting YouTube video from the London Ontario Public Library. I like the fact that while they're promoting their new website and cover a lot of 2.0 stuff, they also emphasize plenty of traditional services.

Read about this on John Miedema's blog -- which has been in my Bloglines list for quite awhile. John's new blog emphasizes the Slow Reading movement, and is worth viewing as a balance to all the 2.0 influences of the biblioblogosphere.