David Lee King » Digital Space

Facebook in the Library – an ALA Techsource Webinar

David Lee King — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 15:00:48 +0000

Wanted to make sure you know about this – on November 2, I’ll be leading an ALA Techsource webinar on Facebook. It’s titled Facebook in the Library: Enhancing Services and Engaging Users.

And here’s the blurb about it:

Around 154 million Americans—51 percent of the population—are now using Facebook, according to a recent study by Edison Research. How effectively are you using this direct, free means of communication to reach out to your library’s patrons and users? Digital branch and social networking innovator David Lee King will share what he’s learned from years of experience and experiments with the Topeka and Shawnee County’s Facebook page. He will answer your questions and share time-saving tips on getting the most out of using Facebook.

Topics include:

Fundamentals for setting up and managing your Facebook page
The difference between a personal Facebook profile and an organizational Facebook page
Planning content for your library Facebook page
How to engage the library’s Facebook fans
How to market your library through a Facebook page

You’ll need to register for this event, but it should be a good one if you are interested in expanding your library’s Facebook presence!

Internet Librarian 2011, Day 3: Social Media Strategies & Goals

David Lee King — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 20:34:50 +0000

This was my session – here are my slides – enjoy! Look at the slides, and read this person’s notes, and you will get a good feel for the discussion.

Social Media Strategy & Goals

View more presentations from David King

Internet Librarian 2011, Day 2: Designing for Optimal UX

David Lee King — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 23:44:12 +0000

Nate Hill, Web Librarian, San Jose Public Library

Chris Noll, Noll & Tam Architects

Slide on the screen:

Because of the Internet, access to:
Books and other documents have gone from Read to Read/Write
Photo and video output has gone from View to View/Edit
Music and other audio has gone from Listen to Listen/Remix

Nate is introducing the topic of libraries starting to support content creation, and the models behind that.

Chris:

Contra Costa has used vending machines in shopping malls, etc. Washington County is using reserve boxes.

Boston Chinatown Storefront Library – community driven library

Houston – small small branch…

DC – Kiosk branches…

Greenbridge Library – took a community center, and developed part of it into a library

Idea Stores in London. Mix up libraries, cafes, etc.

Morgan Hill Library – self checkout, check in, self help holds, etc – very self-driven

Nate:

talking about the Digital Public Library or America project and their beta sprint. Realized we will still need physical spaces to create digital content.

LibraryLab idea:

broken into modules like audio and video creation, scanning, collaboration, etc

Chris: talking about creating furniture for these creative types of spaces …

Give people access to tools. Some libraries check out tools or musical instruments. Why not video cameras, microphones, etc?

Why not have design tools – desktop publishing, CAD/CAM tools, 3D printers, etc? The library could support these things.

They want this project to happen … but need funding, etc.

Internet Librarian 2011, Day 2: Keynote by Lee Rainie

David Lee King — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 18:09:09 +0000

Libraries and Learning Communities – Lee Rainie

three revolutions Pew has noticed

1. Broadband – 78% of adults use internet, 62% have broadband at home

Blog as a category is being obliterated. Most people don’t know they’re reading a blog – ie., a blog on a news site – people think they’re reading the news.
13% of users are on twitter. But – those people are highly influential

2. Mobile phones – 84% (I think) of adults use mobile phones

There are actually more phones than people in the US.
59% of adults connect to the internet through mobile. phones, laptops, tablets.
35% of adults are smart phone owners.
laptops are more prevalent than desktops
12% of adults have ebook readers
9% have tablets
Still an elite audience
Hypercoordination – we don’t plan specific meet ups – we keep it vague, then use our new tools to figure out the meet up on the go.

3. social networking

half of all adults in this country, 73% of teens – use social networking sites
people ever age 65 – fast growing group. They’re online, friending their children, expecting photos yesterday…

important in 3 ways

1. sentries of information. people log on to their social networks first thing in the morning, rather than read the news.

2. evaluators of information – when people find confusing info, they turn to their social networks first. I’ve certainly seen and done that. asking if it’s true, and how much weight should I give it

- librarians – think about being nodes in people’s networks… dang. we need to be there!

3. serve as audiences – we are all performers. we are showing off for our audiences in a way.

Final thoughts about the futre:

1. What’s the future of knowledge

learning is now a process
old way – learning was objective and fixed, meant to be found
subjective and provisional now – sense of flow, a process, you learn together, change together. a need for vigilance to watch and stay with how knowledge is evolving
learners now create knowledge. if you are participating in the learning experience, and creating things, you learn more.
knowledge is organized ecologically – disciplines are mixing
we learn best actively doing and managing our own learning. We have to be active agents in the learning process.
our intelligence is now based on our learning communities, rather than on our individual abilities
you are as smart as your network – as long as you are willing to ask them.

2. what’s the future of reference expertise

embedded librarian model. librarians embed themselves in the community, rather than making community come find them.
we are on call for just in time information.
we can “bond” with the community. we can be nodes in people’s networks
we help people know about the broader picture.
We are often he first in our communities to learn social media … so we are the teachers of this to the community.
aggregator and curators of information.

3. what’s the future of public technology

hard to say – most of us would not have seen the iPhone right before it came out, for example. What we do know is that this technology will be changing rapidly and we really don’t know what’s around the corner.
The era of big data – sensors, cars, tweets, etc – making lots of data. How do we make sense of this “big data?” Librarians will possibly be asked to help figure this out. Mastering big data and analytics is important.
Different types of screens, post-pc world, more broadband, etc. No one int he expert world really knows either.

4. what’s the future of learning spaces

attuned to new kinds of learners
patrons are more likely to be self starters. They know where to go first – checking with their social networks, don’t need formal learning structures
collaborations are important.
value of amateur experts is rising.
amateur/expert scientists – Smithsonian has embraced the amateur community.
peer to peer health communities too – we are going beyond our doctors to our networks.

5. what’s the future of library as community anchor institution

ALA put out a guidebook on these issues – check it out (will be mentioned in Lee’s slides, but his slide deck froze up)
how much of your work is aimed at helping individuals vs helping communities
are libraries places for individual study or group based study
collection library or creation library?
portal or archive?

Pew will be doing a 3-year study on libraries and communities. This will be HUGE.

Promoting your Social Media Presence – Signage

David Lee King — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 16:43:12 +0000

Social Media signage at TopekaLibrary

You’ve seen those “follow us on Facebook” signs at stores and restaurants, right? Or heard a radio dj mention following their radio station’s Twitter account on-air?

Guess what? Libraries can do the same thing!

As a first experiment, my library recently placed two “follow us” signs in our building – one at the main entrance to the library, and one on our administrative office doors (shown in the photo).

Why do this? Easy – it’s a relatively unobtrusive way to tell our customers that we have a social media presence, and that we want them to follow us. It’s also a way to link the physical to the digital – by promoting our digital presence (i.e., our Facebook Page) in our physical presence (i.e., our building).

Where else could we put these signs?

Our meeting rooms (maybe a stand-up card on a table)
Our cafe (stand-up card there, too)
In the stacks, with our books
As a background on our public PC monitors (we might do this)

One thing we can improve on – Kathryn Greenhill mentioned this to me recently – when you make a sign advertising your social media presence, make sure to include a URL or at least your social media name. Otherwise, people might not be able to find you (we were talking about this particular sign)! For example, my library’s full name is Topeka & Shawnee County Public Library … but we’re simply topekalibrary on social media sites. We’ll add that on the next version of the signs.

And a funny – watch the arrangement of your icons! We almost put the Facebook icon first … until someone in our Creative Group mentioned that we were spelling “F You[tube].” Certainly not our intent to tell customers to “F You!”

Like these ideas? Come hear more on November 2 at my ALA Techsource webinar on Facebook Pages! Make sure to register!

Turning Strangers into Friends

David Lee King — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 15:00:46 +0000

The Thank You Economy

I just read The Thank You Economy by Gary Vaynerchuk. Good read. Here’s an interesting thought I got out of it that relates to libraries.

On page 53, he writes about Nielson conducting a study on what drives consumer trust. 70% of people said they turn to family and friends for advice when making purchasing decisions.

Then Gary says this: “The ROI of your relationship with your mother is going to be much higher than that of the one you have with a good friend. Both, however, are more valuable than the one you have with an acquaintance, which trumps the relationship you have with a stranger. Without social media, you and your customer are relegated to strangers; with it, depending on your efforts, you can potentially upgrade your relationship to that of casual acquaintances, and even, in time, to friends. The power of that relationship can go so far as to convert a casual browser into a committed buyer, or a buyer into an advocate.” (pg 54-55).

This idea of turning strangers into friends works great in libraries, too. The goal is simply this – become casual acquaintances, or even friends, with our customers. We have done that for years in our buildings – I’d say that’s business as usual.

Online? We can do the same thing by using social media tools like Twitter and Facebook. Start friending people in your community. Your customers. That’s how you start turning strangers into friends … and into customers of your library.

Here’s what Gary did – he created Twitter alerts for wine words like Merlot. When someone had a question about that term, he answered it … and started growing a reputation about actually knowing something about wine.

We know stuff too – we are librarians, after all! Use a tool like Twitter. Do a zip code search for your local area or a town search … then add some words to that search, like book, reading, etc. Or business terms … or whatever the hot issues in your town happen to be.

Then start answering questions or making comments as they seem relevant. Point to your stuff, like the book that answers it, when it makes sense. Be helpful … like you already are in your building.

It’s a way to get out in the community without actually leaving the air conditioning!

Pic by Steven Rosenbaum

A Book Review of Designing the Digital Experience

David Lee King — Fri, 05 Aug 2011 14:15:21 +0000

My publisher just told me about a review of my book Designing the Digital Experience, and I thought I’d share it with you. The review was published in New Library World (Vol 111, No. 7/8, pg 359-360), and was written by Sarah McNicol.

She nailed it (and I’m not just saying that because it was a positive review). Here’s the start of the review:

“David Lee King is a librarian at the Topeka & Shawnee Country Public Library in Kansas, but he also writes an excellent blog (www.davidleeking.com) on emerging trends in library web sites and digital technology. In this book, he writes in the same accessible and interesting style, focusing on experience design and its role in building web sites. This is not a book about technical speciﬁcs, nor a step-to-step guide to building a web site, rather it is a book to make librarians and others, including web developers and marketing professionals, think more deeply about how they design an experience so web site users are “enchanted and captivated.”

Yes! I never intended to write a step-by-step guide to building an experience – how the heck do you do that, anyway? Building experiences, even digital ones, really depends on your individual setting – your staff, your stuff, and your community. My hope is that you read my book, and think. Think about how you can transform a simple website into an interactive experience – much like you already do in your physical buildings.

And … since I’m writing about the book … why not throw in a discount, too? If you buy the book from Information Today before September 5, use this promo code – ITISP. It will give you a discount. Otherwise, buy it from Amazon.

Thanks for reading! And … drumroll please … look for my second book sometime next year! I am a week or so away from sending it to the publisher to do the editing thing to it. Fingers crossed, and more info coming!

Google Plus – Should you and your Library be there?

David Lee King — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 18:24:42 +0000

Google Plus is all the rage this week – invites have started spreading around (here’s a link to my Google Plus account – feel free to friend me!).

Some tech leaders have been making big claims about Google Plus, saying things like it will replace blogging, they’re moving from Facebook to Google Plus, it will take over Facebook or Twitter, etc.

Ok … Google Plus is only a week or so old. WAY too early to predict the demise of anything – especially of something like Facebook, with its 600 gazillion followers. Also remember that this is a third try for Google – Waves and Buzz both sorta fizzled out. let’s give it a good 6 months to a year to see if it survives.

On to the more important questions – should YOU be using Google Plus? Should your Library/organization?

You – this one’s easy. If you get an invite (or have an account already), by all means sign up and play around with it. Friend people, do some posting, try a video chat. Get familiar with the tool. Then either use it or not … that part really depends on you. But since it has some early potential in becoming another useful social media tool … why not at least play with it a bit?

Your library/organization – this one’s a bit more tricky. Or not – Google Plus isn’t supporting organizational accounts right now, according to this article from Search Engine Land. This article from ReelSEO goes one further, saying Google Plus will shut down an organizational account (though there are ~~a couple out there~~ [DLK - oops. Google found those, and they're now 404-nothing found pages. You might check this out for some news orgs, from Moonflowerdragon in my comments] anyway).

So for the time being anyway, Google Plus is an individual-only network. That’s great, because it gives you time to play with the new tool, and gives Google time to see if it’s a winner (translation = profitable) for them.

Once that happens, and Google OKs organizational accounts – should you be there? The answer is … it depends. Are your users there? If so, then yes. Recent national stats claim that 51% of people age 12 and up are on Facebook – that’s 51% of your community, so it definitely makes sense for most libraries and organizations to have a Facebook presence.

But for other social networks, it really depends on your organization’s goals, and on where your customers tend to gather. If they start gathering in Google Plus, then yes – you should figure it out and be there for them.

If not? Maybe not so much. Time will tell!

And a question – are you playing with Google Plus? If so – what do you like/dislike about the service? Let me know in the comments!

Skyping from my Car (and other Wow moments)

David Lee King — Mon, 23 May 2011 13:00:08 +0000

Yes, that’s right. I recently participated in a conference call (for Library Renewal). Via Skype. In my car, using my iPhone.

… and yes, no texting was involved, and I used a hands-free setup, so I was as safe as anyone talking on the phone while driving …

And it worked, and I was amazed! Something that took fancy headsets, a computer, and a great Internet connection a few years ago is now easy enough that I can do it on my iPhone in my car. And a day before that, I talked to someone from Australia, to go over a webinar I’m doing soon … I’m even planning to share my slide deck via Skype.

I have to admit … stuff like that blows me away sometimes. Pandora on my iPhone would be another one of those things (streaming music on my phone – no way!) or perhaps a uStream video shared from my cell phone (live, streaming video from a cell phone that anyone in the world can watch – really? Wow!).

Maybe I’m just easily amused…

But yeah. I had a Wow moment. Are you having Wow moments these days? If so … what is it? What’s giving you a Wow moment?

I’m listening …

Video Coolness at My Library

Give Away some Ebooks

David Lee King — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 16:00:02 +0000

A couple weeks ago, I saw a pretty cool idea at the Denver International Airport, and thought it could be adapted to libraries.

1st Bank had some large advertisements up in the airport, giving away free ebooks (see the pic in this post – this was one of two signs I saw). All you needed was a smartphone with a QR Code reader – aim and read the code, and you were directed to download a free ebook (there was also a button to open a new banking account).

Pretty ingenious, if you ask me. Just guessing here, but I’m pretty sure the only books I saw were “free” out-of-print classics. For most people – people who are stuck at the airport with nothing much to do – what a cool idea! Give em a book (even if it’s freely available online), and brand it as your business.

How can this work for a library?

Why not copy this idea? Use a QR Code, put up a sign at the mall or the grocery store, and offer a “free” ebook (maybe something legally free from Project Gutenberg). Send the user to a mobile webpage, branded as your library – with a link to the ebook, and some info about your other cool services.

In essence, it looks like the library is giving away a free ebook – that works with multiple ereaders! Even those pesky Amazon Kindles that don’t play well with libraries.

David Lee King » Digital Space

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