How libraries are measuring the effectiveness of social media

Our white paper on the use of social media in the library revealed that, whilst most librarians agreed that social media was an important tool for an institution, one of the challenges they face was having the time and human resources to manage it effectively.

So, what are libraries currently doing to measure the impact of their channels efficiently, and why do they believe it to be necessary? Taylor & Francis used three focus groups of librarians in the UK, US and India, to find out the following questions:

Click to enlarge infographic:

How do libraries manage their social media accounts?

A number of social media management platforms are available that are free and easy to use, with Hootsuite being the most popular with librarians, followed by Tweetdeck and Feedly.

How do libraries measure the impact of social media?

Over half of librarians use either Google Analytics or Facebook statistics to measure the impact of their social media activities.

Why do libraries measure impact?

Why measure in the first place? Results revealed that the main reason librarians monitor the impact of their social media is because they believe more roles in the library will be dedicated to social media in the future.

To find out more about how libraries are measuring the impact of social media, download our infographic, or get the full picture by downloading the free white paper on use of social media by the library.

See also:

How libraries are using social media

How libraries are applying social media