Lindy Liedl from the Rice Lake Public Library returns with her monthly column on all things virtual to help you connect with your patrons!
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| Photo credit: School Library Journal What Makes These Librarians TikTok (Kelly Jensen. 8/11/20) featuring our library. (That's me on the left!) |
Why should your library try learning a whole new social media platform?? To meet patrons where they are, to share new materials, catalog tutorials, special collections, what specific programs look like when they attend, to recommend materials staff enjoyed, to make yourselves and patrons laugh, for a fun approach to readers’ advisory, to interact or share ideas with other libraries around the world, or to reach patrons who wouldn’t know what you have to offer otherwise! Plus, there’s a lot of fun video tools to use without any expensive software.
The Very Basics:
Like any platform, there’s all types of content: Readers, performers, pet videos, life hacks, gardeners, comedians, artists…anything you can think of! Maybe start off with a personal account, just to see how things work without any pressure to post content.
The “For You” tab is like the explore page on Instagram: videos similar to what you’ve looked at before, or Liked. The “Following” tab is where you find accounts you’ve followed, of course. A lot of videos on TikTok consist of using sounds that can be selected to play over videos that everyone can put their own spin on. For example, a movie sound clip of Evelyn from The Mummy saying her famous line “I…am a librarian!” can be used over a TikTok by a new librarian proudly showing off, or over a TikTok by a lip-synching cosplayer dressed up as the movie character. The possibilities are endless! Or, you can simply record a video.
If you like a sound someone used, tap the rotating icon in the bottom right of their video and select “Use Sound” to record your own video using that sound! You can also bookmark the sound for later. (Google is a good spot to find quick tutorials for any TikTok functions if you’re stuck)
Starting a library account:
After creating your library’s profile, the first thing I’d recommend is finding other libraries or book people to follow for ideas (recommendations below).
I keep track of ideas I might recreate by liking the video, because I can always find it later under our profile’s Likes tab.
Since it's easy for original ideas to get repurposed without credit, you can give a little shout out to another account by tagging them with their @ in your video’s description. You won’t get in trouble for not doing this–it’s just a small courtesy I recommend on the wild west of the Internet. If it’s a sound that you’re reusing, the sound itself should link back to the original video, so you shouldn’t need to credit them.
Add captions (which can be edited) whenever possible to make your videos accessible to everyone!
Once you’ve started, don’t forget to let your patrons know! Short announcements on your other platforms, and posters in the teen area are good starts. Our Facebook has a good following, so I’ll occasionally share a TikTok there to remind people, or to let newcomers know.
Most importantly: Have some fun!! :) Laugh, share, and show people the magic of libraries.
Recommended follows:
@OswegoPublicLibrary
@DavenportPublicLibrary
@Bookish_Afrolatina
@CoalCitypubliclibrary
@Doverpubliclibrary
@hpulibraries
@PortageCoPubliclibrary
@MaywoodPubLib
@LibraryCCPL
@mychal3ts
@WhitbyLibrary
@akbusybee
@StoonLibrary
@theNextGenLibrarian
….and us! @RiceLakelibrary
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