Attention span of only 8 seconds?
Library Marketing
As a Library Director, I try to stay on top of marketing news and techniques. The past five years my marketing efforts have been consumed with social media. We have maintained a library Facebook since 2007, and Twitter since 2009. Last year we felt the need to embrace Pinterest and now in 2015, Instagram. This marketing article captured my attention because of the ridiculous claim that Millennials have an EIGHT second attention span. The article goes on to describe "snackable" content marketing. The author suggests using Instagram and Snapchat for marketing. Meanwhile, I am still stuck on the "8-second" attention span. |
| dailydot.com |
Some things to read
- http://www.digitalinformationworld.com/2015/01/beyond-facebook-marketing-to-new-generation.html
- http://blog.snapchat.com/post/55902851023/temporary-social-media
- http://dailyemerald.com/2013/11/21/2333616/
What does this mean for Library Teaching and Learning
One of my big goals as a Teacher-Librarian is to meet students where they are. This can be a challenge as our lives have meshed between a physical and digital world. Some of the social media like Facebook had a long shelf-life. However, now I feel that students more and more are trying to "run" from adults online rather than trying to interact with adults. I don't mean like "stranger danger" running, but more like hiding online content from parents and other authority figures. There is a constant moving from one platform to the next. When a student sees an adult from their physical world get into their digital world, they take off running to a new social media. This year alone, I have seen the rise and fall of possibly fifteen different social media platforms among teens and young adults. Platforms like Kik, YikYak, Snapchat, AskFM, Whisper, ooVoo, etc. Most of these platforms are part of a new class of "temporary" social media. The answer on many school campuses is the banning of social media altogether. I disagree with banning the access to social media and I am fortunate to be at a school where social media is available to students.My biggest dilemma right now is that I just want to communicate effectively with my students.
However, I have two problems
1.) I do not know exactly where they are because of the constantly changing social media landscape
2.) Sometimes I cannot get my message across in 140 characters or less.
- Social Networking’s Good and Bad Impacts on Kids - “Communication is the crux of parenting. You need to talk to your kids, or rather, listen to them,”
- http://60secondmarketer.com/blog/2010/04/09/top-52-social-media-platforms/
- http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nina-friend/5-things-to-help-millennials-take-back-their-lives_b_5537893.html
- http://www.pewinternet.org/2013/05/21/teens-social-media-and-privacy/
