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© 2012 by the American Library Association. Any claim of copyright is subject

to applicable limitations and exceptions, such as rights of fair use and library
copying pursuant to Sections 107 and 108 of the U.S. Copyright Act. No
copyright is claimed for content in the public domain, such as works of the
U.S. government.

Printed in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Steiner, Sarah K.
Strategic planning for social media in libraries / Sarah K. Steiner.
p. cm. — (The tech set ; #15)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-55570-779-8 (alk. paper)
1. Online social networks—Library applications. 2. Social media. 3. Libraries
and community. I. Title.

Z674.75.S63S74 2012
302.30285—dc23
2012007202

This paper meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (Perma-

nence of Paper).

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CONTENTS

Foreword by Ellyssa Kroski . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . v

Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii

1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
2. Types of Solutions Available . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
3. Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
4. Social Mechanics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
5. Implementation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
6. Marketing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
7. Best Practices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
8. Metrics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
9. Developing Trends . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91

Recommended Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
About the Author . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111

Don’t miss this book’s companion website!

Turn the page for details.

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PREFACE

Since the beginning of social media’s rapid rise in popular culture,

hundreds of articles and studies have been published on its vital
importance to corporations and institutions. Profit and nonprofit
organizations alike have come to recognize the value of social media
networks and communications to their target audiences and have
taken steps to leverage it to create customer awareness and loyalty.
Social media use is on the rise almost everywhere, with almost every
group. In this new world where people tune out advertising automati-
cally, they turn to social media to get information from friends, col-
leagues, and strangers. Strategic Planning for Social Media in Libraries
will show you how a little bit of time and a good plan can make the
best use of this smorgasbord of resources.
Librarians have been trailblazers in the field of social media services,
and many library employees believe that a library presence in these
new platforms is integral to libraries’ continued relevance in the age
of social media. According to a study published in 2011 (pp. 3–4) by
Curtis R. Rogers at the State Library of South Carolina, 78.6 percent
of libraries are using social networks to communicate with patrons.
Close to 52 percent use blogs, 40.2 percent use photo-sharing tools,
and 29.1 percent use video sharing.
While we’ve clearly made strides in entering the world of social
media, we often neglect the planning phase that is so common in our
other services and in the business world. We’re excited to participate
in these new forums, so we leap in, but we make few or no plans to
target, maximize, maintain, or assess our efforts. The library science
literature has recently revealed disappointing returns on investment
from many of these unplanned social media services, and those returns
have led to increased interest in assessment and planning. Many library
social media advocates previously felt planning was cumbersome and

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irrelevant in the ever-shifting landscape of social media. But now, for-

profit and nonprofit businesses alike have found that strategic planning
can help them change from a culture of confusion and last-minute
reactivity to a culture of agility and proactivity.
Strategic Planning for Social Media in Libraries emphasizes informal
and formal internal communication as a means to create buy-in and
interest in the planning phase. Communication is fundamental to the
success of any plan, and often the most meaningful communications
do not take place in formal meetings.
Library employees may feel nervous or even threatened by the
process of planning, especially for social media, so let’s review some
basics of strategic plans. A strategic plan:
! guides you to the most plausible and noteworthy platforms/
services and helps you maintain them sensibly and well.
! is broad enough to set direction without limiting your explo-

ration of new service opportunities or inhibiting creative test-

ing/piloting. There is always a place for new services to be
explored, even if they are not detailed in the plan.
! is not an exhaustive list of all the things you can or should do,

but a guide to help focus your efforts. The point of a strategic

plan is not to reduce options or limit choices, but to assist in
decision making.
! is not a replacement for administrative guidance and leadership.

! ORGANIZATION AND AUDIENCE

Strategic Planning for Social Media in Libraries offers a practical guide to all
phases of social media planning in your library. It provides a practical,
scalable, step-by-step plan for creating and maintaining a successful
library social media strategic plan. It includes detailed tips and advice
on how to strategize for social media services in a way that will:
! guide library employee decisions,
! minimize time spent while maximizing return on investment,
! maximize positive patron outcomes,

! protect libraries from legal repercussions, and

! leave opportunities for flexibility, change, and testing of new

social media platforms.

All instructions are based on a platform of identification and assess-
ment of a target audience and honest assessment of your library’s
abilities to meet the plan you set.

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Preface ! xi

The chapters are organized to be of use to anyone, regardless of

past experiences with strategic planning or social media. I have built
suggestions for scalability into the text for employees of very small
libraries, but many of the scenarios provide information for libraries
with many employees. If you are in a smaller library, strategic planning
for social media is still often a great idea; if you’re in a very small
library, you can probably just skip over the sections that deal at length
with team formation, though you may want to come up with a differ-
ent model for getting feedback if you don’t have many or any library
coworkers.
Strategic Planning for Social Media in Libraries most closely details the
traditionally structured model of strategic planning but includes sug-
gestions for libraries where a more organic planning style is pre-
ferred. It addresses the initiator or leaders of the strategic planning
process in your library. Strategic planning jargon has been intention-
ally minimized. The focus lies on the process of planning itself and
how planning relates specifically to social media. Each library is
unique and will have different goals; therefore, I will refer to various
social media platforms or goals as examples, but I will not delve into
many specific details of their use.
Chapter 1 provides definitions of social media and of strategic plan-
ning, and it offers an argument as to why libraries should use strategic
planning more frequently. Chapter 2 provides an exploration of the
levels and types of strategic plans available. A distinct and separate
plan for social media may be the best option for some libraries, while
others may want to build goals for social media into their library-wide
strategic plan or even take a less formal route. Chapter 3 and Chapter
4 offer details on preparing to write your plan and of the social
mechanics involved in forming a team and creating buy-in. Chapter 5,
the most in-depth, guides the reader through the process of gathering
data to inform the plan and then drafting the plan itself. It also
covers the integral and often misunderstood area of relevant policy
creation. Chapter 6 offers advice on marketing the plan, primarily to
internal stakeholders, who will care more about the plan itself than
patrons. Chapter 7 includes best practices for the care and feeding
of your new plan. Chapter 8 offers some metrics and assessment tips
for the plan itself. Chapter 9 covers emerging trends in the area of
strategic planning, and finally Recommended Reading and References
provide annotated lists of additional readings and resources. If all of
these steps seem like an overwhelmingly large time commitment for
just one little plan, keep in mind that the impact of all your work will

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stretch out for years to come. The assessment portions of your social
media plan will probably be of unexpected or parallel use in many
different areas throughout the library, and the plan items themselves
will go on to be the basis for many projects. So, while the plan is the
foremost purpose of these steps, the impact of your efforts will be far
broader.
In a world where we constantly compete for funding and will prob-
ably continue to do so indefinitely, Strategic Planning for Social Media in
Libraries will help you consider how all avenues can best be used to
reach patrons, meet their needs, and ensure continued relevance as
institutions. If you take the time to assess and plan accordingly, you can
carefully and critically use the world of social media to more effectively
deliver and market library services. The planning phase may require
more effort and time on the front end, but it can save just as much
time and frustration during later stages of service management and
can dramatically increase your success in social media endeavors.

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!
1
INTRODUCTION
! What Is Social Media?
! What Is Strategic Planning?
! Social Media + Strategic Planning

This chapter will provide an overview of social media and of the

basics of strategic planning. After these basic tenets of the book are
defined, I will offer a rationale for using strategic planning in relation
to social media–based services in libraries.

! WHAT IS SOCIAL MEDIA?

The term “social media” is multifaceted and complex, and it has been
defined in many different ways. For the purposes of this book, “social
media” will refer to any online platform that allows users to link to
each other and contribute and share content and/or commentary.
On the whole, social media is intended to facilitate sharing, collabo-
ration, transparency, and conversation. The aim of social media is to
form a large, internally communicative collective that works together
to create meaning and content. So, instead of a few gatekeepers pars-
ing out information to the masses, in the world of social media the
masses produce, evaluate, and share the information themselves. The
ultimate output of social media is a huge body of content created
directly and often collaboratively by the web’s users. These creations
are known as user-generated or user-created content. Suzanne Vara
(2010) notes that “social media is not a new conversation, but a new
way of conversing.”
A recent article on the types of social media found that six primary
types exist: “collaborative projects, blogs, content communities, social
networking sites,” and two types of virtual worlds: “virtual game
worlds, which ask users to follow the rules of the game, and virtual

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social worlds, wherein users can behave without rules in almost any
way they like” (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010: 59). These categories are
useful in understanding the huge scope of social media, and they cor-
respond to the 2007 OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation
and Development) statement that in order for content to be genuinely
user-generated, it must meet three criteria:
1. it must include “content made publicly available over the
Internet,”
2. it must “[reflect] a certain amount of creative effort,” and
3. it must be “created outside of professional routines and practices”
(OECD, 2007).
As Kaplan and Haenlein (2010: 61) point out, “The first condition
excludes content exchanged in e-mails or instant messages; the
second, mere replications of already existing content (e.g., posting a
copy of an existing newspaper article on a personal blog without any
modifications or commenting); and the third, all content that has
been created with a commercial market context in mind.”

A Shift in Leadership
Strategic planning has traditionally been seen as the duty of top administrators.
However, some professional strategic planners do find a “planning from the ranks”
approach to be useful, and I like it the best. In the spirit of social media, we may
do well to continue this second, more inclusive, model, where administrators and
nonadministrators alike are included in setting the direction for social media.

This list is by no means comprehensive (and will, surely, soon be

dated), but some concrete examples of social media include:
! Social networking platforms, such as Facebook, Meetup, and
LinkedIn
! Social news sites, such as Digg and Reddit

! Location-based social networking services, such as Foursquare

and Facebook Places

! Website and group creation software, such as Ning

! Wikis, such as Wikipedia

! Video- and photo-sharing sites, such as YouTube and Flickr

! Social bookmarking tools, such as CiteULike

! Blogging and vlogging sites, such as LiveJournal

! Microblogging sites, such as Twitter and Tumblr

! Book-sharing sites, such as LibraryThing and Goodreads

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Introduction ! 3

! Community question-and-answer sites, such as Yahoo! Answers,

Quora, and WikiAnswers
! Virtual worlds, such as Second Life (an example of a virtual

social world) and EverQuest and World of Warcraft (examples of

virtual game worlds)
This brief list and escalating usage statistics among users of all ages,
ethnicities, and socioeconomic groups show how pervasive social
media has become. While social networking services have emerged at
present as the most frequently used of these groups, many of the
others command significant time and attention from the populations
in our library service areas and can be used by libraries to deliver
valuable content and services.

! WHAT IS STRATEGIC PLANNING?

Strategic planning is the process of defining strategy for future direc-
tions for an organization or, in this case, suite of services. A strategic
plan will help you:
! identify the needs of your target audiences,
! identify the ways in which you can meet those needs, and
! identify ways to respond confidently and proactively to changes

in those needs.
By planning, you set a rough guide for your library to follow. That
guide will be a largely common sense–based quantification of ideas
and initiatives that are already present and even obvious in your mind
and the minds of your patrons.
Different planning gurus each lay out different steps and varia-
tions on the process, but I like Carter McNamara’s description best;
he says, simply, that a strategic planning team will consider three
points:
1. Where the organization is
2. Where the organization should go
3. How the organization can get there (McNamara, 2011)
A solid strategic planning team will have to consider a fair amount of
data in conjunction with each of these points, some formal and some
informal. Those data will relate primarily to the patrons being targeted
but also to the library employees’ abilities to achieve the goals they
identify. The process usually takes between three and six months but
can be done more quickly.

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