Libraries and Social Media

Library	Holroyd	Manly	Canterbury
Facebook	Has page shares information about events, they also have a word of the day on their page as well as sharing images that others may find amusing or interesting. They also show new items that are in the library – especially in the toy library.	The library does not use the facebook page that is made for it. However they do use the event creation facility on facebook to advertise events such as Author Talks and in this way they get out information to their users.	The library uses facebook to share events that are happening as well as amusing pictures and local history pictures with competitions.
Twitter	No account - however information about what is happening at the library can be found by doing a search for holroyd library and seeing what other users have said about the library.	No Twitter account.	Use twitter to share links to the catalogue with followers – especially of new items within the collections.
Blog	No blog.	They have a range of blogs catering for a wide range of users with different needs being met through the blogs. The blogs include local studies blog, fiction book reviews blog, Children's club blog, Youth blog and a youth art photographic competition blog.	The library uses it's blog to share information with users. This includes information on library events, technology updates and book reviews.

Through this it can be seen that libraries utilise social networking and other media applications to interact with their patrons. This is done so that as times change and the use of these kinds of services become more familiar to users and become the norm for sharing information and interactions. Libraries therefore need to keep up to date with these changes so that they stay relevant. They do this by using different platforms which are available to them, such as facebook, twitter and blogs using different blog platforms. Facebook is used to share information about events that are upcoming in all the libraries that were researched however this was done in different ways – both by creating events to invite patrons to, and by advertising them within their page which they use for this purpose. Those libraries that were using the page to advertise also shared other images and and amusing anecdotes to share to keep users interested in the library. Of the libraries researched in the one twitter is used it is used for advertising to patrons about items which are within the catalogue so that users know about the items which are for loan. Other information can be received via twitter from libraries that were researched by patrons sharing information abour events they are attending. When blogs are used by libraries they are used to advertise upcoming events as well as showing off past events. They also assist users to find out more information about the local area as well as displaying book reviews. They are also able to create blogs to cater for the needs of different age groups who use the library.