Your library may have spent a lot of money or time on online marketing or social media outreach, only to have its reputation severely damaged by one angry blogger. How can you track this kind of activity and mitigate negative commentary? Learn what tools are available to help monitor your library’s precious online reputation and some strategies to protect your library’s brand.

1. Laura Solomon, MCIW, MLS
OPLIN
@laurasolomon
(How to prevent Laurafrom
unfollowingYOURlibrary
onTwitter)

2. STATS

3. How many?
0%
2%
4%
6%
8%
10%
12%
14%
16%
Use Twitter
Use it daily

4. Tweeters are active
76%
post status
updates

5. A LOT of tweets
50 million
per
DAY

6. Mostly mobile

7. FIX
THESE

8. Innovative or creepy?

9. Stop talking about the library

11. Don’t be a Debbie Downer

12. Don’t be a fire hose

13. Don’t play robot stalker

14. Don’t address tweets to the wrong people

15. Don’t exclude followers with @

16. Don’t ask for DMs

17. Don’t recreate hashtags

18. Response time matters

19. Tweeting a link alone is…

20. Don’t jump into the stream

21. Don’t rapid-fire

22. DOING
IT
RIGHT

23. Be clear about who you are

24. Give glimpses behind the curtain

25. Be useful

26. Go local

27. Reward your followers

28. Give them attention

29. Time it right

30. Give up control

31. Have a sense of humor

32. Don’t take yourself too seriously

33. Be human

34. It’s not about you

35. Find the right account

36. Follow back

37. Advanced Twitter search

38. Take the Twitter Audit
• Look at your last 20 tweets. How many were @ replies? How many were
retweets of other people’s work?
• In your last 20 tweets, how many promote your own work versus pointing
towards others’ ideas?
• Do you have at least one ongoing Twitter search going? (use http://
search.twitter.com to set one up.
• Are the tweets you hope will be retweeted under 120 characters so people can
retweet them?
• Of the people you follow, how many are “influential” in some way, how many
are potentially good for referrals, how many are just celebrities?
• How often are you tweeting? Is less more? Is more more? Are you burying your
good stuff?
• How are you feeding Twitter? What are you giving your audience to consume?
Do you share interesting articles? Do you point out your lunch du jour? What’s
the plan?
• Are you autotweeting your post titles? Is that bringing you lots of response?
• Have you checked the click-through stats on your short links? For instance, if
you use bit.ly, take the URL of anything you’ve posted, copy it to a browser bar,
and add a +, like this: “http://bit.ly/iOGhJ2+” , and you’ll see the stats. How are
you doing?
• How many folks are you gaining a day? Not that this matters greatly, but it
sometimes gives you a sense of whether someone’s into what you’re saying.
• http://www.chrisbrogan.com/take-a-twitter-audit/

39. Examples

40. The online catalog is unavailable
this morning due to maintenance.
Aw, snap! Catalog is down. We're
working on fixing that ASAP.

41. Mango Languages is a new online resource available
to users of all public libraries in our state. It
includes a variety... [LINK]
Learn a new language. Today. For
Free. Online. With your library
card. Introducing Mango
Languages: [LINK]

42. National Library Week,
April 10-16. [LINK]
Who
CARES?

43. Consider these…
• Join our new Book Discussion
Group! [LINK]
• Be a member of our new Patron
Advisory Board [LINK]
• Try our new research database
for your next assignment [LINK]

45. Join our new Book
Discussion Group! [LINK]
Can't stop talking about that
book you just read? Yeah, us
too. Now we've got a group for
that: [LINK]

46. Be a member of our new Patron
Advisory Board [LINK]
Looking for opinionated folks who
want to talk about the library.
Cookies at every meeting and a
chance to make a difference [LINK]

47. Try our new research database for
your next assignment [LINK]
Wikipedia not good enough
for your teacher? Show ‘em
you're a smart cookie and try
a free resource from us
[LINK]

48. I posted 6 photos on Facebook in the album "Cool
Crafts 2011” [LINK]
Geodomes made with
gumdrops, constructed with
care by our local kids. See the
pics [LINK]

49. Check out our new Blu-
Ray releases!

50. Read the new [insert
famous author here].
To be ordered on
11/21

52. People are REALLY busy

53. Make sure there’s a payoff for the patron

54. Social media does NOT equal promotion

55. http://www.twitter.com/laurasolomon
http://www.facebook.com/laurasolomon
http://www.linkedin.com/in/laurasolomon
laura@oplin.org
http://www.meanlaura.com
http://www.slideshare.net/laurasolomon
Thank you!
Stalk me here