The last session of the conference, which is a presentation by the Antony Brewerton from the Unversity of Warwick about branding and libraries. He wrote an article called "Wear lipstick, have a tattoo, belly-dance, then get naked: The making of a virtual librarian" – he suggests if you enter ‘Antony Brewerton naked‘ into Google, you’ll be suprised what you’ll find!

So – to start with we should consider what we mean by brand, particularly the ‘library brand’ and review the options for re-imagining the brand.

Brand is more than just the logo. "A set of ssets (or liabilities) linked to a brand’s name and sybmol that adds to (or subtracts from) the value provided by a product or service" – David Aaker from Building strong brands, 1996.

Walter Landor (an ad guy) said "Simply put, a brand is a promise". The Building Brands website has more on brand definitions.

To start with, What is a library?

The OCLC perceptions report (Question 807) found that the first thing people thought of was – wait for it – books. The point that Antony makes, that if this is what people think a library is, then when you try to have a open, flexible learning space without books (such as described by Les Watson this morning see the comment from Les Watson below, more accurately I think Les described flexible learning spaces, but wasn’t suggesting that there should be no books) then you are going to get resistance rather than support.

The library includes:

• Stock
• Space (for study, but not necessarily traditional library space)
• Support

OCLC perceptions report 812b found negative associations with the library were grumpy/mean librarians – but support should be one of our USPs.

But the world is changing:

• Stock

books more affordable – buy instead of borrow
students only want electronic texts

• Space

non-library users coming into HE – digital natives, they are used to reading on the net, not going to the library
library as the ‘third place’ (see reference to this in the post on Les Watson’s talk)

• Support

community support
decline of authority figures – students don’t relate to authority figures

Historically three waves of brands:

• Wave 1 – Brands as a guarantee of physical quality – e.g. St Michael
• Wave 2 – Brands as statements to express personality/community – Gap
• Wave 3 – Brands as partners with consumers, with consumer influencing desing, plaing a more active role in the brand community – e.g. howies

Libraries probably got in at Wave 1, never really got Wave 2, but there is now an opportunity for Wave 3 – engage our users (Warwick got users involved in the library redesign – specifically they seemed interested in the stairwells for some reason)

We need to research users concerns/interests more – user surveys and focus groups – but also feedback to users about the results – what have you done because of the survey results etc. At Oxford Brookes they found (for example) that students didn’t care about food and drink in the library, but they did care about noise. They decided to use 7" singles to promote different zones of the library:

• It’s oh so quiet – bjork
• Happy Talk – Captain Sensible
• Silence is Golden – The Tremeloes
• Hanging on the Telephone – Blondie (area where you could use phones)
• Dead Ringer for Love – Meatloaf (area where you should put your phone on silent)

Posters with illustration of single and song title, with explanation.

When doing marketing, have to focus on results and outcomes – so don’t say ‘Database Training’ but focus on what the students will get out of the training ‘Save time and improve marks’.

So – promote resources, services and benefits – not the Library.

At Oxford Brookes started to bring in references to specific collections – e.g. National Brewing Library, with accompanying ‘drinks’ campaign – e.g. Get A Head with a picture of a pint of Guiness advertising library training etc.

Outreach activities are important – like Freshers Fair (at Imperial we have a library stand at Freshers Fair). Also get out on campus, on the library floor offering help – more approachable than someone sitting behind an enquiry desk.

One of the things that is really noticeable is the quality of the material Antony is using – clearly a flair for design.

The last session of the conference, which is a presentation by the Antony Brewerton from the Unversity of Warwick about branding and libraries. He wrote an article called "Wear lipstick, have a tattoo, belly-dance, then get naked: The making of a virtual librarian" – he suggests if you enter ‘Antony Brewerton naked‘ into Google, you’ll be suprised what you’ll find!

So – to start with we should consider what we mean by brand, particularly the ‘library brand’ and review the options for re-imagining the brand.

Brand is more than just the logo. "A set of ssets (or liabilities) linked to a brand’s name and sybmol that adds to (or subtracts from) the value provided by a product or service" – David Aaker from Building strong brands, 1996.

Walter Landor (an ad guy) said "Simply put, a brand is a promise". The Building Brands website has more on brand definitions.

To start with, What is a library?

The OCLC perceptions report (Question 807) found that the first thing people thought of was – wait for it – books. The point that Antony makes, that if this is what people think a library is, then when you try to have a open, flexible learning space without books (such as described by Les Watson this morning see the comment from Les Watson below, more accurately I think Les described flexible learning spaces, but wasn’t suggesting that there should be no books) then you are going to get resistance rather than support.

The library includes:

• Stock
• Space (for study, but not necessarily traditional library space)
• Support

OCLC perceptions report 812b found negative associations with the library were grumpy/mean librarians – but support should be one of our USPs.

But the world is changing:

• Stock

books more affordable – buy instead of borrow
students only want electronic texts

• Space

non-library users coming into HE – digital natives, they are used to reading on the net, not going to the library
library as the ‘third place’ (see reference to this in the post on Les Watson’s talk)

• Support

community support
decline of authority figures – students don’t relate to authority figures

Historically three waves of brands:

• Wave 1 – Brands as a guarantee of physical quality – e.g. St Michael
• Wave 2 – Brands as statements to express personality/community – Gap
• Wave 3 – Brands as partners with consumers, with consumer influencing desing, plaing a more active role in the brand community – e.g. howies

Libraries probably got in at Wave 1, never really got Wave 2, but there is now an opportunity for Wave 3 – engage our users (Warwick got users involved in the library redesign – specifically they seemed interested in the stairwells for some reason)

We need to research users concerns/interests more – user surveys and focus groups – but also feedback to users about the results – what have you done because of the survey results etc. At Oxford Brookes they found (for example) that students didn’t care about food and drink in the library, but they did care about noise. They decided to use 7" singles to promote different zones of the library:

• It’s oh so quiet – bjork
• Happy Talk – Captain Sensible
• Silence is Golden – The Tremeloes
• Hanging on the Telephone – Blondie (area where you could use phones)
• Dead Ringer for Love – Meatloaf (area where you should put your phone on silent)

Posters with illustration of single and song title, with explanation.

When doing marketing, have to focus on results and outcomes – so don’t say ‘Database Training’ but focus on what the students will get out of the training ‘Save time and improve marks’.

So – promote resources, services and benefits – not the Library.

At Oxford Brookes started to bring in references to specific collections – e.g. National Brewing Library, with accompanying ‘drinks’ campaign – e.g. Get A Head with a picture of a pint of Guiness advertising library training etc.

Outreach activities are important – like Freshers Fair (at Imperial we have a library stand at Freshers Fair). Also get out on campus, on the library floor offering help – more approachable than someone sitting behind an enquiry desk.

One of the things that is really noticeable is the quality of the material Antony is using – clearly a flair for design.