Crowdsourcing and the Libraries

Crowdsourcing is a new concept for me.    Crowdsourcing is the use of a network or a group to create content for a  specific task within a business (Paniagua & Korzynski, 2017).  Social media provides another way for crowdsourcing to take place.  The engagement between the owners of the  social media account and its followers would be important for when given a task to follow up and assess these contributions. It would be important to invest in others and make them feel part of the group.  

My first thought when reading one of the other articles for class that discussed crowdsourcing is it would help my sister’s business.  Since COVID-19  has occurred they have set up an online store so that they could continue to do business.  I thought it might be useful to begin using crowdsourcing since they would have time to focus more on the social media aspect of their business.  I have not followed up with my sister to see if they were able to start crowdsourcing but here is her business Sloper’s Stitch house.  

So how would libraries do it? 

First libraries would have to agree on how it would use social media.   Once they have developed their policy then how would they engage with the public?  Do they have the time to engage with the public to develop a relationship where they feel loyal enough to contribute?

Social capital:  Refers to the libraries giving service to the public.  Libraries need the public to provide feedback at times to continue providing service through preferred programs, book budget, and helping to stabilize the library budget. 

Customer’s revealed preference:  Libraries would have to use their IT departments to figure out how to study the use of Social media by data mining to see what trends are popular with the public.   They can also run analytics to assess their presence in social media and their reach in the community. 

Social marketing:  Is when libraries use social media and or other modes of engagement to assess public interest.  This would also involve libraries taking the time to build relationships in social media.  This approach will become more popular in our current situation. 

Social corporate networking:  Is when libraries develop relationships with either other library systems or businesses within their community.   These relationships may also involve social capital to continue to grow the relationship.  

Paniagua, J., & Korzynski, P. ( 2017, January). Social media crowdsourcing. 

          Encyclopedia of creativity, invention, innovation, and entrepreneurship               (pp.1-5). DOI: 10.1007/978-1-4614-6616-1_200009-1