Thing 15 Advocacy for Libraries

First of all, thank you to the writer of the blog post for gathering all of those sites, I had only heard of a couple of the campaigns, so it is great to have this listing for future reference.
I had a look at some of the sites, the first one being the  Library Campaign website.
One thing that struck me was the power of social media as a tool for spreading the word, and promoting librarys and events ...such as the rally they have planned for the 9th of February. Before social media I would imagine that it was a lot harder to get the word out about events such as this rally. I liked the short video on library usage in the UK, by comparing statistics for attendances to libraries with attendances to football matches, the cinema, A & E, and libraries came out on top. It is a clever way of showing how important it is continue allocating funds to libraries.
I then read some of the Librarian day in the life posts, I always like to hear about other librarians roles and day to day activities as roles can be so diverse depending on so many factors. It's also a way of thinking about how you could incorporate some of these activities in your own work perhaps. I can see who these accounts are important to show others all of the work that is being done in libraries as it is not always obvious to the naked eye..ie the public, I still get asked why do you need to go to college to be a librarian/ what do you need to learn etc

I was involved in a campaign with a library for Library Ireland week in the past. The initiative involved a like and share style offer on social media which resulted in free use of one of our services which usually there is a fee for. It proved to be  huge success and we ended up creating increased awareness of our service, we gained some new users who ended up being consistent users.
Library Ireland week is great opportunity to remind yourself the importance of advocacy and reminds you that there are many potential users out there who may not be aware of your library or if they are aware, they may not have awareness about all of your services.