La rentabilidad de la biblioteca en la web social
[EN] This research intends to answer the question regarding the profitability of a library using social media. Libraries have been using social media tools for a long time. Librarians are using social media for their work as community managers, content curators, training as well as marketing. The us...
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| Tipo de recurso: | tesis doctoral |
| Fecha de publicación: | 2014 |
| País: | España |
| Institución: | Universidad de Salamanca (USAL) |
| Repositorio: | GREDOS. Repositorio Institucional de la Universidad de Salamanca |
| OAI Identifier: | oai:gredos.usal.es:10366/125114 |
| Acceso en línea: | http://hdl.handle.net/10366/125114 |
| Access Level: | acceso abierto |
| Palabra clave: | Social web Libraries Profitability Library services Social Media Metrics Indicators Social media Digital Marketing Social Media Marketing Planification ROI Return of Investment Tesis y disertaciones académicas Universidad de Salamanca (España) Tesis Doctoral Academic dissertations Web social Bibliotecas Servicios bibliotecarios Indicadores Medios sociales Métricas de la web social Marketing Digital Planificación Costes de la inversión 5701.06 Documentación |
| Sumario: | [EN] This research intends to answer the question regarding the profitability of a library using social media. Libraries have been using social media tools for a long time. Librarians are using social media for their work as community managers, content curators, training as well as marketing. The use of social media is widely used by organizations and libraries, achieving a level of maturity. Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Blogs and Flickr are the social media tools mostly in use. In the marketing and public relations context, organizations want to achieve four main objectives regarding social media: more sales, save costs, more user satisfaction and to improve their reputation and relevance. These objectives are in fact the same for libraries. In order to demonstrate that they are achieving these objectives, the profitability of the library’s activities using social media, they need to use metrics in order to demonstrate the return of investment, or ROI. Demonstrate the ROI of social media is a very difficult task but not impossible. Social media is very useful in order to engage users and encourage them to participate with the brand. In addition, the standardised and assumed metrics for use of the organizations is to enable them to assess their own activities and to compare them with competitors, which does not exist at the moment. These are only a few recommendations. This research entails, a metrics table based on experts recommendations, practices of librarians, and our own experience, was created. In this table, metrics and indicators classified by strategies and tactics or business objectives, are described. Business objectives are: Reach the target audience; Activity frequency of the library in social media; Customer loyalty, web traffic from social media; Influence, brand perception; Engagement, interaction; Conversion rate, sales, use of the library thanks to social media. Vanity and activity or impact metrics as well as, absolute values, ratios or percentages and variables with the sum of all variables, by business objective, are included in the list of indicators. Metrics for competitive contexts and metrics that relate to other metrics between them like ratios of engagement are included also. A mind map with tools for monitoring and assessing the indicators are created in Mindomo tool. The table with metrics and indicators we have created, was used by a set of 18 libraries, academics, public, specialists and schools, during 2012, entering data about their activity on social media. From these results, we have assessed the temporary evolution of the data, and we have identified behavioural patterns between libraries, by the type of libraries and business objectives. Correlation and regression techniques have been applied to detect dependencies and relationships between indicators. A mathematical model wasn’t found but evidence, correlations and predictor variables of the Conversion rate objective were. Nieves González Fernández-Villavicencio v The audience in social media depends on the activity regarding social media, because we have found relations of dependency between Audience’ variables and Activity frequency’ variables. The activity in social media is the predictor of the rest of the business objectives, but it doesn’t depend on the rest of the variables. A part of the Customer loyalty’ variables, web traffic from social media, depends on the web variables of Conversion rate, which is dependent and is predictor for the rest of the business' objectives. Influence’ variables are predictors of Engagement’ variables because they are the before stage of the interaction and conversations with the users. Engagement’ variables are dependents of all business objectives. Engagement, participation, interaction, is the main objective in social media by the organizations. It is the social ROI. Conversion rate is the final objective in social media, and it is the business objective which is more dependent on the rest of the variables. Most of variables are predictors of Conversion rate’ variables. It can say that library activities in social media are profitable by the organization, because they can achieve return on investment, ROI or not ROI. By the way, the most effective way to achieve ROI is by means of planification of a social media marketing plan or a promotion campaign, both of which should be integrated in the marketing plan of the organization. A promotion campaign lasting three months is enough to achieve the objective and demonstrate the profitability of the inversion. A promotion plan was created for three new academic libraries in order to achieve these objectives in relation to improving the use of collections or services. The results are exceeded expectations, in some cases. At present a table of indicators are in order to control and assess the impact of the results of the activity in social media, and demonstrate their profitability. The table is divided into key metrics and indicators by social media. The key metrics should be used to assess the progress and monitor the general follow-up of the spaces in social media of the library and the results they are achieving over time. It should also be used to monitor the competitors. The tables of indicators by social media should be used with a social media marketing plan or promotional campaign, in order to measure specific marketing programs or campaigns and to check if the objectives are being reached. The use of these indicators depends on the type social media that has been chosen, as they are not applicable for all objectives. The set of indicators we present is subject to change by the evolution of social media. Statistics and functionalities change all the time so, one must consider this table as being in a constant state of evolution. |
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