Practical Marketing for the Academic Library: Introductions, Definitions, and Context

Sponsored by ABC-CLIO

Recorded on 11/07/2022
Posted in The Authority File

Episode 290

Marketing—whether volunteer-based or through designated staff—is an essential component of the modern library. Informing students of resources, aiding faculty with curriculum goals, and demonstrating impact to administration all fall within the scope of library marketing. Beyond reaching these groups, marketing allows library staff to reassess offerings, improve services, and better understand patron needs.

After presenting on “marketing from the heart” on an ACRL panel, Stephanie Espinoza Villamor, eLearning librarian at the College of Southern Nevada, teamed up with Kimberly Shotick, student success librarian and assistant professor at Northern Illinois University, to write Practical Marketing for the Academic Library. Combining community college and four-year institution perspectives, Stephanie and Kimberly crafted a guide that underscores the need to accurately and successfully market your library in an age of increasing competition—student union spaces, online depositories, and, of course, the Internet writ large.

In this four-part series, Stephanie and Kimberly walk through practical steps to understanding your audience, crafting messaging, and forming effective teams to accomplish this work. They also discuss how to apply a DEI lens to marketing elements and integrating DEI into assessment and overall outcomes. In this first episode, our guests introduce themselves and differentiate between “marketing” and “outreach.” They also highlight how library messaging has evolved over the years, and answer the basic question: why does a library need to market itself in the first place?

About the guests:

Stephanie Espinoza Villamor
eLearning Librarian
College of Southern Nevada

Stephanie Espinoza Villamor (she/her) is an eLearning librarian at the College of Southern Nevada. She has led the library’s marketing initiatives and coordinated communication and outreach among all three campus libraries. She holds a Master of Library and Information Science from San Jose State University and has worked in positions ranging from magazine editor and public library assistant to instruction librarian. Villamor is author of several articles and stories published online, in local magazines, and in creative writing anthologies. She previously wrote a chapter for the library text Young Adult Literature and Multimedia: A Quick Guide.

Kimberly Shotick
Student Success Librarian and Assistant Professor
Northern Illinois University

Kimberly Shotick (she/they) is the student success librarian and an assistant professor at Northern Illinois University. She has published on universal design for learning and has presented nationally on a number of academic library topics from accessibility to Wikipedia. She holds a Master of Library and Information Science from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and an MA from Northeastern Illinois University.

Enjoy the conversation? Listen to the rest of the series:

• Audience and Messaging
• A Team Effort
• Incorporating DEI Practices into Strategy and Assessment

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