By allowing ads to appear on this site, you support the local businesses who, in turn, support great journalism.
Geek the Library campaign is under way
Placeholder Image
Live Oak Public Library officials hope a new advertising and marketing campaign headed to Hinesville will get more people “geeked” about supporting local library branches.
The campaign, “Geek the Library,” is a $5 million community-based public awareness effort designed to shed light on the financial issues facing libraries across the nation.
“A lot of times we take libraries for granted and we forget that they need funding,” said Christy Divine, marketing and development director for the Live Oak Public Library System. “We just assume they just magically happen.”
“And so the whole idea is to have people realize the value of their libraries and to hopefully help them be inspired to talk to other people about it and start a conversation with their elected officials, especially in these tough economic times,” she said.
The Hinesville branch of the Live Oak system is one of 40 libraries in southeast Georgia selected to participate in the pilot program funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Cathy De Rosa, vice president of global marketing for the Online Computer Library Center, Inc., the nonprofit library cooperative charged with administering funding for the campaign, said the program will bring in several marketing tools and resources for the library to use in its awareness and lobbying efforts.
“We need to make sure people know that there are resources here that are brought to you by your tax dollars and they are here for you to use them,” she said. “We believe that if people realize that if the public libraries close or they reduce their hours, that really the needs of the community will probably not be met.”
The campaign, according to De Rosa, uses the word “geek” as a verb to encourage people to think about the topics they’d like to research, read or write about.
“We all have stories about things that we are incredibly passionate about and the library can support all of those,” she said. “It is important that we make that connect. It’s just fun and interesting to ask yourself, ‘What do you geek?’”
The marketing campaign will last for six months and will support seven library systems in Georgia and seven others in Iowa.
De Rosa said if the program is successful, it could become a nationwide effort.
Sign up for our e-newsletters