Australian academic librarians' perceptions of marketing services and resources

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to examine how Australian academic librarians marketed their services and resources, which marketing approaches were most effective, and the factors influencing the perceptions of the approaches used. Design/methodology/approach - An online survey was sent to 37 academic librarians in Australia. The response rate was 54.1 percent. The information sheet and consent form for phone interview participants were e-mailed to 17 participants and ten signed consent forms were e-mailed back to the researchers. The response rate was 58.8 percent. The qualitative data were analysed using content analysis. The collected quantitative and qualitative data were analysed using descriptive (frequencies, percentages, means, standard deviations) and inferential statistics (correlations). Findings - Academic librarians were involved in a variety of marketing activities and had varied perceptions of the effective approaches used to market services and resources. Correlation analysis confirms that demographics, human capital and library variables play significant roles in predicting librarians' perceptions of the effective marketing techniques used. Research limitations/implications - Because of very small sample size, the results may lack generalisability. Future research is a large-scale study. Practical implications - This paper provides a better understanding of academic librarians' attitudes, views and effective techniques with regard to marketing their services and resources. Originality/value - Librarians may use the results to reflect on the effectiveness of the marketing approaches used, to balance the weight of the factors' influences, and to better understand various effective marketing approaches to enable them to market academic library services and resources more effectively in the future.