EDITOR'S NOTES
Promotion Is Like Chinese Food
by Kathy Dempsey
Good promotion is like Chinese food. When it's done right,
it's slightly enticing and pleasantly satisfying. And
shortly after it's finished, you want to go back for a
little bit more. Creating good promotion can be like preparing
Chinese food. You may or may not have all the right tools
and skills. If not, then you probably want to order out
to get it. But you'll choose your vendor carefully, to
be sure that you'll get just the right flavor combination
that you're looking for.
In this issue, we serve up some examples of promoting
library tech both ways.
There's a branding article that starts on page 18,
written by Sejan Yun. She and her colleagues knew exactly
what goals they wanted to reach, but they also realized
they didn't have the knowledge to do it all alone. So
they hired a local public relations firm to design a
new logo, and to create a "brand" and plan how to integrate
it into all the library's branches. One of their resulting
successes was a much stickier Web site that got used
a lot more than the old one did.
On the cook-it-up-yourself side, we have an article
about how a duo is building and promoting a GIS lab
in their library building. Having discovered the wonders
of geographic information systems technology, they decided
that their campus library should "own" it. So they wrote
grants, got equipment and training, and started shopping
around the new service to faculty and students. Now
these librarians are looking savvy as they become the
campus experts (well, the only ones outside the geosciences
department) and promote their new technology to eager
learners.
And you simply can't miss our cover story and its
powerful message. How can you prove that you're better
than the Web? Deliver reference service to your customers
in real time, on their turf, and most importantly, in
their language. Setting up a bilingual chat reference
service was no piece of cake, but it sure is a winning
way to serve up what people need—and what they
can't get on the open Web.
So go ahead, promote your technology! Give people
a taste of what you can do for them, and leave them
hungry for more.
Kathy Dempsey, Editor
kdempsey@infotoday.com
 Kathleen L. Dempsey is the Editor
of Computers in Libraries. Her email address
is: kdempsey@infotoday.com |
