Promote in Your Community

Here or just a few suggestions on how you can use your participation in Wisconsin Libraries Say Cheese! A Day in Pictures to garner local media/community attention for your library:

Contact your local newspaper or TV station to tell them about your plans for participating in the Say Cheese photo sessions on November 17, 2010. Suggest they might like to send someone to cover the special program/activities/event your library has planned for that day.
Send a letter to the editor or a brief article advertising your upcoming plans for this special event --- encourage patrons to visit the library that day to see what’s happening!
The Campaign for Wisconsin Libraries Action Committee will be sending out press releases promoting the campaign; however, you may choose to send your own release to your local media contacts. A sample press release is available to help you do that.
Use the Wisconsin Libraries Say Cheese! graphics provided to create and customize promotional material for your library.
Develop interesting and informative print and online material for your patrons. They need to learn more about the economic impact of public libraries to Wisconsin residents (brochure or full study) and the impact of school library media centers on student performance published by the Department of Public Instruction.
Numbers and statistics can be very impressive –- hearing that Wisconsin ranks 1st nationally per capita in public library interlibrary loans and 8th nationally in per capita circulation, or that in a typical week the 64 Wisconsin academic libraries handled a total of 21,437 reference transactions does tend to grab your attention.

But … numbers don’t give you the full picture. What you don’t see in that number is the senior citizen who can no longer afford to pay for Internet access in her home but now comes to the library so she can continue to feel part of her community in an environment in which she feels comfortable and safe ... or the unemployed auto worker who spends countless hours job hunting online at his local library, peppering his helpful and knowledgeable reference librarian with questions about resume writing and successful job interview strategies.

“21,437 reference transactions” doesn’t help you visualize the late-in-life student returning to finish his education after years away from school who needs extra help maneuvering the unfamiliar databases that will enable him to gather information for his class assignment; nor does the 80-100 class visits per week statistic let you see the amount of time, intellectual energy, curiosity, and commitment spent by school librarians across the state as they help their students find the information and resources they need.

That’s what Wisconsin Libraries Say Cheese! A Day in Pictures intends to accomplish through the online sharing of photographs --- to capture more of the “full picture” of library usage along with the essence of what libraries are today. The goal is to strengthen libraries’ existing base of support by giving library users and funders a better visual understanding of the kinds of resources, services, and programs libraries and library staff offer each and every day.

The Campaign for Wisconsin Libraries, which sponsors Wisconsin Libraries Say Cheese! A Day in Pictures, is an ongoing, statewide marketing and public relations initiative that provides a collective voice for Wisconsin libraries of all types, focusing on developing and disseminating effective messages about the importance of all Wisconsin libraries. Visit the Campaign for Wisconsin Libraries for more resources to promote your library.

Promote in Your Library

Download the following to create your own promotional material:


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Use this graphic on your website to promote your participation: