Archive of ‘blog’ category

can a blog be a library web page

Yes it can and I, Plamen Miltenoff, am trying to convince my esteemed colleagues and administration at LRS to consider educause blog hosted at SCSU as the main vehicle for information. Main consideration is that integrated the blog (as social media) with other social media.
At this point, I have not received an indication that I am even understood what am I proposing. It is that desperate.

MEANWHILE,

ALA offers the following eCourse:

Using WordPress to Build Library Websites

http://www.alastore.ala.org/detail.aspx

it has happened in the past that SCSU money is spent on activity, which I am educated and experienced to deliver. Lets hope that before someone signs for this workshop, h/she might turn fist to me for information.

If you have a desire to bring your departmental Web presence in the 21st century, please feel welcome to contact me.

 

Discussion Boards, Blogs and Wikis

Differences between Discussion Boards, Blogs and Wikis

http://www.adelaide.edu.au/myuni/staff/resources/tutorials/content/Differences_between_Discussion_Boards__Blogs_and_Wikis.html

Differences

Discussion Forums are TOPIC centred.

  • discussions are organised into topics by ‘threads’
  • anyone in the community can start a thread on a topic of their choosing
  • all participants have an equal voice
  • posts require someone to reply for a discussion to take place
  • you can follow through a thread on a particular topic
Blogs are AUTHOR centred.

  • posts are made by the blog’s author only (may be a group)
  • posts are usually opinion pieces and written in the authors voice
  • readers can add comments to the author’s post
  • organised in reverse chronological order so the most recent posts show on the entry page
  • reflect the authors identity in the tone, look and feel and content
Wikis are CONTENT/DOCUMENT centred.

  • wikis are for group authoring
  • editable website with a complete version history kept
  • aim is to reach a consensus or compromise on the content of the page
  • the focus is the content produced, not the individual authors
  • usually neutral and objective
  • discussion/comment is separated from the wiki content

content marketing

7 Powerful Stats That’ll Make You Better at Content Marketing

http://www.socialmediatoday.com/content/7-powerful-stats-thatll-make-you-better-content-marketing-0

1. 82% of marketers who blog see positive ROI for their inbound marketing

2. 70% of consumers want to get to know a company through articles, rather than ads

3. Content costs 62% less than traditional marketing, and generates 3x as many leads

4. Visual content generates 94% more views than text based posts

5. By 2017, 87% of internet device sales will be smartphones and tablets

6. 69% of marketers cite a lack of time as the biggest challenge when creating content

7. An incredible 27,000,000 pieces of content are shared each day

Search Twitter

Using advanced search in Twitter

https://support.twitter.com/articles/71577-using-advanced-search

is very similar to using advanced search in your SCSU online databases:

Advanced Search – Guided-Style Find Fields

http://support.ebsco.com/help/

Searching successfully Twitter is one of the techniques to mine Twitter and grow your audience:

20 tips for social media marketing

http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/social-media-marketing-tips-pros

 

social media and libraries

Use of social media by the library current practices and future opportunities (White Paper)

http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/access/white-paper-social-media.pdf

#tfsocialmedia

Social media objectives:

  •  promotion
  •  collection management tool
  • Outreach
  •  teaching and learning

Opportunities and challenges

  • opportunity to build a sense of community between the library and its users
  • the variability of skills across library staff for using social media effectively, striking the right tone between professional and personal, coordinating activities across the institution to avoid duplication
  • maintaining visibility for the library brand and copyright issues relating to hosting library resources on social media sites

Policies and management:

  • Librarians are divided on the benefits of introducing formalized social media policies and plans. About a third of libraries responding to the Taylor & Francis survey had a policy in place, but over 40% had no plans to introduce one
  • Some believe that representing the library as a professional function with a
    consistent tone is the priority, while others believe that a more human approach is important, with individual staff free to bring their own ideas and personalities to social media activities.

Effectiveness and assessment:

  • difficult to prove return on effort and that the time required to do this was a major barrier to more comprehensive analysis of impact
  • framework for evaluation, so it is likely that assessment against commonly agreed metrics will become an increasingly important part of social media activity within the library in the near future

Current Social Media Practices:

  • In a study from the mid 2000s (Cantrell and Havens1 ), most library directors in the US when questioned about social media said they did not think that libraries had a role in social networking
  • A more recent study from 2012 (Kai-Wah Chu and Du4) shows how use of social media by the library has now become mainstream. In this survey of libraries in Asia, North America and Europe, 71% were found to be using social media tools with a further 13% saying they planned to use them

Advantages of using social media

n Financially the costs of using social media are perceived to be low;
n It requires little training;
n It promotes library services and disseminates news quickly, delivering this information more directly to library users;
n It increases engagement and interactions with library users;
n It helps gather feedback to enhance user services;
n The promotion of library holdings via social media can help increase usage of content;
n It enhances communication both within the library and with other departments;
n It can be used for outreach activities through onward sharing, well beyond the institution itself, helping build connections and reputation more broadly

Social Media Objectives: graph on page 8 of the PDF document:

A To promote events
B To promote library services
C To promote resources/collections at the library
D To update on library refurbishments
E To promote new acquisitions
F To promote library guides, exhibition guides
G To connect with new students joining the university
H To engage with the academic community
I To connect with the wider community beyond the university e.g. the town in which the institution is based
J To connect with distance learners
K As a customer services tool- complaints, suggestions, enquiries, feedback

L To highlight subject specific information
M To connect with potential students
N As a teaching tool to promote information literacy, technology and writing tips (not library based)
O To promote courses
P As a research tool to locate official documents and studies

From UK-based focus group: “The library is a programme, not just a building.

Channel preferences: Graph on page 10 of the PDF document

SOCIAL MEDIA USES Table on p 13 of the PDF document
Twitter n Distribute library news and information
n Provide customer service
n Build connections with researchers
n Build connections with other librarians and institutions
Facebook n Distribute library news and information
n More social and less formal than Twitter – share photographs and run competitions
n Arrange events including tracking RSVPs and sending event updates
n Engagement with students
Pinterest n Promote general library collections, digital and archive special collections and information literacy
n Set up of online repositories for students to pin researched references as part of
collaborative group work
n Display book titles to save time browsing and promote new titles
n Provide an arena for students and course leaders to pin reviewed and recommended reading
for a particular topic
n Develop communities with other online libraries
YouTube n Streaming film collections
n Instructional ‘how to’ videos teaching information literacy skills and how to use library
services and resources
There are also a number of other social media products that are being used by librarians that reflect regional
preferences and the need for the specific functions offered by niche applications.

Collection usage and discovery: Graph on p. 15

Teaching and learning

From US-based librarian interview: “The trend in education now is to create environments that foster collaborative learning. Faculty have ditched textbooks and course management systems in exchange for a Facebook page for their class, or a wiki, or a blog. These online environments are fun; students already know how to use them and are more motivated to comment, discuss and share in these environments than a dry CMS.”

Social media policies and management, p. 18

73% of respondents stating that they believed more roles dedicated to social media would appear in the library in the future.

Effectiveness of social media

From UK focus group: “We keep track of something particularly successful, then we redo the campaign 6 months later.”

From US focus group: “We have very few interactions with anyone on our Twitter feed.”
“Twitter is definitely the best platform, because we hashtag all of our posts with the keyword
of the publication, and so for the academic audience, once they click it’s going to pull up all
of the similar publications under that topic.

Promoting library social media channels

From UK focus group:
“We retweet each other to encourage new followers.” My note: Suggested by me regarding SCSU_Library for Twitter and Pinterest and SCSUTechinstruct but “considered” (in local lingo, slow death of the idea)

students blogs

Helping Students Develop Voice While Blogging

http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/work_in_progress/2014/10/helping_students_develop_voice.html

  • Being a proficient writer takes time: practice, practice, practice. Teachers should provide students specific, on-going feedback to help students improve their writing. With each draft, the teacher should offer relevant effective feedback that will allows students to work on specific skills.
  • Just because you are a proficient writer doesn’t mean others will enjoy reading your writing; this takes time too. Proficient doesn’t always mean engaging (refer to the first bullet)
  • All writing has value, even bad writing… maybe especially bad writing because it is a starting point and that is often the hardest place.
  • If you don’t know how to start, just start writing whatever comes to mind without the burden of worrying if it makes sense – that will come later. Sometimes a brainstorm works well too in a notebook if you can’t jump right to the writing on the blog.
  • Revision isn’t a suggestion, it’s a necessity – sometimes writing the same thing three different ways or more offers perspective, this perspective provides choice to the writer later for what best suits the finished piece.
  • It’s okay if even finished writing isn’t perfect. Perfect is a writing myth. All writing can always stand to be improved, so when a piece feels finished, it probably is for now and that’s what matters most. Ask yourself, “Does this piece communicate the message I intended? Are all questions answered about what I’ve written about?” If the answers are yes, it’s done.
  • Mistakes will happen on blogs – it’s okay, we’re all human and we all mistakes. It’s even okay to leave the mistake up there unless it’s offensive. Students can always revise drafts or published posts later if errors are found. It’s all a learning process.

 

 

How To Breathe New Life Into Old Blog Posts

How To Breathe New Life Into Old Blog Posts

Blog post bankruptcy is similar to email bankruptcy in that you do a serious purge of your content and mass delete your old posts in favor of starting fresh or at least culling the old.

few reasons bloggers might consider blog post bankruptcy.

1. Embarrassed by content.

2. Overwhelmed by content.

3. Poor content.

4. Change of team.

5. Outdated content.

What To Do To Save Your Old Blog Posts:

1. Rework the actual content.

2. Update links, images, and SEO (Search Engine Optimization)

3. Consider adding a date to posts.

4. Create a few compilation posts for future publication.

5. Decide whether to redirect deleted posts.

6. Re-promote old posts.

Follow Julie Neidlinger on Google+

1 2