Assignments 1 & 2: Book Trailers
Read both book trailer articles from the Chicago Tribune & the New York Times. I've seen book trailers before & used a few on a Prezi for a Genre Bootcamp training. As with many things, some are good, some really not so good.
As for their usefulness, it depends on the trailer & the book. It seems truly successful book trailers are few; many are not very well done &, frankly, pointless; their budget better spent on more effective marketing. However based on the readings it sounds like they can & do work for teens. It may be that that age group having grown up with all-things-electronic, are more open or interested in this type of promotion.
On YouTube I watched adult book trailers 1Q84 (found that useless); Night Circus (attractively done, but didn't give any real information to entice me to read it); Inheritant Vice (I found that well-done; the plus of course was Pynchon narrating). Would any of these make me read a book? Maybe, but I can safely say I won't be spending my time watching them. I don't know that I'd actually be able to use them with customers at this branch either. They were fine for GBC to break up the training with visuals.
I also watched children's chapter book trailer Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children (I had read this book so I knew the story, though I still thought it was pretty well done, giving enough of the story to hook you, & leaving you with questions - of course you must read this book to find out what happens!) Book trailers will probably very much appeal to this age group for similar reasons as teens, but also because young children are especially susceptible to online advertising & these messages are reaching them right where they play.
Assignment 3: Summary of Training
Readers' Advisory has arrived! I was a member of the Information Relevance Workgroup ('07/'08) facilitated by WH Branch Manager Dave LaPenotiere. Dave was a big advocate for Readers' Advisory service at BCPL, which became one of the main recommendations put forth by the group. The implementation of this recommendation took some years to realize. Out of it came the Readers' Advisory Committee (later renamed Readers' Services). I was fortunate enough to serve on both the two-year InfoRel workplan & two-year RS commmittee. Our work, a culmination of a number of enthusiastic and talented people, has come to fruition with the Readers' Services training, first with in-house training at each branch, then online with the training blog. The current focus is adult readers' services, but it is hoped that the next members of the RS committee will continue with children's & teen training. All this to say, I find the training very important & integral to our continuing efforts to remain relevant & offer the best customer service at BCPL.
The online training was very comprehensive & an excellent jumping off point for continuing staff conversations & self-exploration of this valuable skill. When we received feedback that staff felt rushed and needed more time to get the full benefit of the program we were able to extend the completion deadline to the end of July.
Most of the anectdotal feedback indicates that this is considered a valuable training. More time would have been useful to thoroughly work on each assignment - many, including me, felt too rushed. Many were also very frustrated by Week 6 Assignments in particular - some actually skipping it or giving up on the training at that point.
In the main, I do feel this was an immediately useful training, & an almost-perfect vehicle to introduce or update this important skill to many more staff. I like the online access & self-paced aspect, but the content was such that it could have been a semester class. In particular, review of appeal factors, teen books for adults, certain aspects of genres (not the fansites), and additional, reliable RS resources were helpful. I found it also useful to share with co-workers as we were able.
