For almost two decades, social media has been an excellent tool to reach and engage with people. Our library has been following this trend for several years by being active on many social media platforms, including Twitter (@BradfordCollLib), Instagram (@bradfordcollegelibrary), YouTube (@BradfordCollegeLRC), Pinterest (BradfordCollegeLibrary) and this very blog.
We reached out to students at the end of the last academic year to hear what our learners have to say about our social media. We listened to students and staff from across the College, and as a result we have launched the highly requested TikTok account! @bradcolllib
Why have we gone on TikTok?
We wrote and designed our social media survey, which aimed to give us an up-to-date understanding of which social media our learners are most invested in, and what they’re looking for from the Library’s social media.
Our survey was shared with students in many ways – we completed paper surveys with our learners face-to-face by reaching out to them in the David Hockney and Trinity Green buildings, and we made an online version which we shared via all social media channels, our LibraryOnline website blog, and via QR codes spread across the libraries. As a result, we received a sizeable number of responses – 61 students and staff in just less than a month.
One of the clearest results we received was how popular TikTok is amongst our learners; around a third stated that TikTok was their most visited social media platform. Compared to other social media of similar popularity, TikTok is the most recent (released in 2012) and therefore the most unfamiliar to us. Previously, the possibility of TikTok being a brief fad due to its recency has discouraged integration into our marketing strategy. But given the persistent growth of TikTok’s user base across the world, and importantly the result from our survey of our very own learners, we believed it was obvious that we needed to dive into these uncharted waters and launch our own TikTok account!
What type of content can you find on our TikTok?
When TikTok first launched, it quickly spawned a new social media subculture, which quickly made the platform ground-breaking in the long overcrowded social media market. So, to make the most out of the platform, we wanted to create content that followed TikTok’s unique style – flashy, friendly and often funny videos in a minute or less.
Over the summer of 2022, we began to look at what content we wanted on our TikTok account, considering two questions: what information do we want to share, and how should it be stylised?
Firstly, we decided on the essentials – key how-to information, for example, how to borrow and return items, how to reserve a book, and how to search the Library Catalogue, needed to be live by September for new students. Following this, we could then focus on key events, according to both the internal College (e.g., Freshers’ Fair) and wider national and cultural (Black History Month) calendars.
We saw launching a new social media account as an opportunity to experiment. We were able to revisit using a drone, aiming to create impressive aerial shots of our Library which could be used for helpful TikToks about how to navigate the Library and as an eye-catching introduction. Summertime was ideal for capturing the look of the Library in a quiet environment, but there were other considerations which made drone-filming a challenge – health and safety issues connected with flying an object; the quality of the drone camera being lower than most smartphones, and therefore lower than many of our learners’ expectations of social media videos; and the summer heatwave’s adverse effects on the drone’s battery life. However, we believe the drone experiment was successful enough to be featured in future TikToks, as you can see here. So, stay tuned!
While filming and editing our TikToks, we wanted to ensure our style matched what has made TikTok so popular, by making our content relaxed with some elements of fun and comedy but remaining professional. Concerning sound, we’ve chosen limited narration in preference for on-screen text in a variety of colours.
This both increases colour in and attraction to our videos, whilst decreasing time and effort to make TikToks, which is necessary to follow our tight schedule of posting at least once a week. For music, we plan to match our choice of music to the topic of the video, and where possible choosing popular and recognisable music. For example, we chose the Superman theme tune for our TikTok demonstrating how to borrow a book in which a Superman comic was used.
For our TikTok showing our stall at Freshers’ Fair, we chose the popular song Cool Kids to appeal to our mainly younger audience.
However, we also know that to keep our TikTok sustainable, it should be as integrated as possible to our wider social media marketing strategy, which means making sure our TikTok content is transferable to our other social media as well. This works in conjunction with our current methods of mass editing content, for example the multi-social media content scheduler Hootsuite, which counteracts the not-so user-friendly in-built TikTok editor, which we have found so far to be time-consuming compared to other social media.
So, although creating and sharing TikTok content has been more time-consuming than expected, a big positive is that all TikTok videos will be shared to our other social media platforms, reducing the time we spend on other platforms. We’ve noticed that our new TikTok initiative has encouraged more visually stimulating and video-orientated social media content across all platforms, demonstrating how our current investment in TikTok culture has potentially strengthened our social media marketing across all platforms for the foreseeable future.
How are we advertising our TikTok?
A notable revelation from the social media survey is low recognition of our social media.
Therefore, alongside our introduction of TikTok, we are expanding our social media advertising. As well as advertising as icons on our website LibraryOnline and on all of our promotional posters, we will introduce cross-platform advertising (promoting all our social media on each platform) and physical advertising via posters and leaflets on walls and Library tables.
What does the future hold?
We plan to monitor TikTok’s popularity to determine if it will keep growing or if it will start to decline. Although currently it’s the biggest social media platform, there have been some concerns about its future, especially due to the platform originating from China which has caused both UK-based and international concerns over data protection. We recognise that we should understand TikTok’s future as best as we can to determine our ongoing social media strategy. Similarly, we will monitor the growth of TikTok’s competitors, such as Snapchat, both of which were recommended by students in the survey.
A key factor impacting our social media marketing strategy overall, which includes whether we continue to have opportunities like pursuing new platforms, is Library staff availability. It’s worth noting that the entirety of the Library’s marketing policies and action, of which social media is only one section, is carried out by our enthusiastic Library team alongside their core duties. We’re always keen to expand our role, which is also demonstrated by our inclusion in ESOL and PLW curriculums via reading sessions with learners, and while we’re optimistic about our ability to add TikTok to our strategy, staff availability may be a factor in continuing the amount of social media activities that we’re pursuing, and therefore our engagement with our learners.
Staff availability may be a factor in continuing the amount of social media activities that we’re pursuing, and therefore our engagement with our learners, but we’re optimistic about continuing TikTok and our other social media platforms, due to social media now more than ever being something that you can’t ignore due to its popularity.
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