The Accidental Library Marketer

Citation

Mullen, P. (2011), "The Accidental Library Marketer", Library Management, Vol. 32 No. 3, pp. 231-232. https://doi.org/10.1108/01435121111112952

The quick review for this book would be: Do yourself and your library a favour buy this book. If you need to know anything more then read on.

The Accidental Library Manager, is 294 pages, with a thorough 11‐page index. It is an easy to read book with extensive lists and helpful hints.

The author Kathy Dempsey has worked in libraries for over 15 years. During much of that time she has been involved marketing or communication of library related information. At present she runs her own library marketing company, called Libraries Are Essential. Along with the book readers can find additional information on her website, called surprisingly enough www.librariesareessential.com Kathy along with Nancy Dowd also writes the blog The “M” Word – Marketing Libraries.

Dempsey has dedicated her book to all those Information Professionals out there who express an interest in designing the information services web page or posters and end up the go to person for the whole Information Services marketing.

There are many generic books on marketing we can use that provide guidance on creating marketing plans. But none provide the information in a way that it is particularly relevant to an Information Service Department. The beauty of this book is that Dempsey has taken all the advice one would receive from the generic marketing books (the 5 or is that 3 Ps, etc. etc.) and built a book that is practical and relevant to any Information Services Department (although the emphasis is on local government libraries).

The first half of the book discusses the foundation of your marketing plan. These early chapters emphasis marketing is not about designing posters or running book readings. It is about setting up a plan that is self‐generating and applies similar marketing principles across the whole Information Services organisation. So that posters, web pages and outreach programs have similar look and feel. Helpfully Dempsey also provides throughout this part of the book lists of things to do whilst you are developing your plan.

After Dempsey has explained how to create a marketing plan she then discusses how to use all the information and ideas you have collected to reach your clients. As Dempsey says this is where “the fun of creating your material begins”. I was particularly interested in the put put golf idea in the library. Again many of the initiatives Dempsey discusses are directly relevant to Information Services Departments and again there are lists of ideas and guidance on what works and importantly what does not.

If you are an accidental marketer you need this book and if you are looking at improving the marketing of your information service this book is for you. Just do yourself a favour and buy the book, it will be money well spent.