Tag: AskAnArchivist

Giving It a Try: #AskAnArchivist Day

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This post was authored by guest contributor Caryn Radick, Digital Archivist, Special Collections and University Archives, Rutgers University Libraries, and current member of SAA’s Committee on Public Awareness (COPA).

In late September, my colleague and I declared this would be the year that Rutgers Special Collections and University Archives would participate in #AskAnArchivist Day! Although most of our social media outreach happens on Facebook and Instagram, taking part in #AskAnArchivist Day would would give us a ready-made opportunity to expand our social media reach further into the Twittersphere.

How we prepared:

Given our late declaration, we had to scramble. We decided to do the following:

  • Reach out to our libraries’ communications office about our participation to see if they could offer suggestions and/or support.
  • Leverage our Instagram presence by preparing posts that could go on Twitter throughout #AskAnArchivist Day using Later.
  • Look for “fun/interesting facts” to post about Rutgers’ collections throughout the day, but to set “office hours” for our participation.

The results of those decisions helped us prepare the day:

  • The communications office offered suggestions (like making videos) and promoted the chat on the Rutgers University Libraries web page and through social media.

  • Using Later let us schedule some posts, in case we got pulled away from our Twitter account during non-office hours.
  • We enjoyed gathering the fun/interesting facts, particularly making a video demonstrating how our dumbwaiter works.

During the office hours (1-2:30) we spent a lot of time interacting on Twitter, but most of our tweeting was with other #AskAnArchivist Day participants. Questions from researchers or people interested in archival life were few. This “are we just talking to each other”? observation came up on Twitter as well. I’d be curious to know which archives have high non-archivist engagement and how they achieve it.

After the session was over, we compiled some quick statistics about the day on Twitter. Our preliminary tally indicated we got about 150 likes and 13 new followers. We later learned that we had made the “What’s Trending” section of the Rutgers Today newsletter (with a tweet about President Obama’s chair from when he attended Rutgers’ commencement).

We also had three of our items posted on that day shared in the Upworthy Story about strange objects found in archives.

Lessons learned from #AskAnArchivist Day:

  • Figure out what you want to achieve and frame your day in a way that supports it.  For example, if our goal was to gain more Twitter followers and share info about our collections, we were successful. If we intended to interact with researchers and people who want to know more about being an archivist, then it was less fruitful.
  • Start planning early! This allows more time to decide upon and gather images, videos, and facts to share.
  • Think about your set-up for monitoring Twitter. We had multiple screens open and were working on two computers. Sometimes we got a little lost in the toggling, but having two people offering different perspectives was useful.
  • Vary the breadth of objects and media you plan to share. It is tough to predict what will generate the most likes and retweets, so mix it up.
  • Get a good sense of your Twitter statistics (number of followers, averages likes and retweets, etc) prior to #AskAnArchivist Day. This provides a good baseline for comparison.
  • Promote the event through other social media channels. We did this for about a week before the event and it seemed to generate interest.

What lessons have you learned from #AskAnArchivist Day? If you’ve participated for multiple years, what changes have you made since you started?

#AskAnArchivist Day 2017 Summary

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This post was authored by guest contributor Anna Trammell, Archival Operations and Reference Specialist at the University of Illinois Archives Research Center/Student Life and Culture Archives, and current member of SAA’s Committee on Public Awareness (COPA).

 

#AskAnArchivist Day was once again a huge success, allowing archivists from across the country to communicate directly with the public about their work. #AskAnArchivist was trending in the United States from 10:00 am to 1:00 pm with 8,927 total tweets on October 4 from 4,077 unique users. An additional 759 tweets appeared on October 3 and 1,595 on October 5 (at last count). While the total number of tweets using #AskAnArchivist on Wednesday was down from last year, the number of unique users and hashtag use before and after #AskAnArchivist Day was up significantly.

The top tweet received over 2,300 retweets and 6,300 likes.

https://twitter.com/KevinIsHistory/status/915605700381958144

Other top tweets highlighted specific items,

https://twitter.com/j_vvsm/status/915627211507482624

provided a behind-the-scenes look,

and answered (almost) every preservation question.

#AskAnArchivist Day not only provided a forum for archivists to interact with the public, but it also encouraged dialogue between archivists. These top tweets are just two examples of these discussions:

https://twitter.com/ireashiamonet/status/915580855631990784

https://twitter.com/frecklewars/status/915594679772745730

Members of SAA’s Committee on Public Awareness used #AskAnArchivist Day to ask members of the profession about their outreach activities,

special visitors,

surprising archives positions,

https://twitter.com/NickPavlik/status/915593645222449153

and how they’d describe an archivist in 5 words.

For more #AskAnArchivist Day tweets, check out SAA’s highlights.

What was your favorite question on #AskAnArchivist Day? How did you promote #AskAnArchivist Day at your institution? Any suggestions for archivists wanting to participate for the first time next year? Let us know in the comments!

Thank you to all who participated in this year’s #AskAnArchivist Day and helped make it a success!

Gearing Up for #AskAnArchivist Day

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The members of SAA’s Committe on Public Awareness (COPA) have gathered in Chicago this week to review and rework our work plan for the next year. With #AskAnArchivist Day fast approaching (it’s this Wednesday, October 4th, in case you missed the announcement), we’re dedicating a chunk of time today to get ready our favorite day of the year.

Last year, the COPA members and SAA staff had fun creating promotional memes for the annual event…

…so we’re creating a few more today for a last promotional push.

Follow the official hashtag, #AskAnArchivist, on Twitter–we’ll keep sharing our memes (the good, the bad, and the ugly) up until the big day. And it looks like University of Chicago Special Collections is getting in on the meme fun this morning as well…

Think you can top these #AskAnArchivist Day promotional memes? Share yours on Twitter today and tomorrow to build up momentum heading into Wednesday!

Don’t worry, we’re not spending our entire in-person meeting creating memes. We’ve also come up with a number of questions that we plan to ask throughout the day on Wednesday so that COPA can join the conversation and hear about your archival outreach successes…and failures.

We’ll be asking/prompting:

“What’s an archivist?” elevator speech in 140 characters or less. Go!

What has been your favorite outreach event that brought people to your archives?

Any collections or repositories you’ve heard of that made you say “There’s an archivist for that?!”

…so get your answers ready, and be prepared for more questions coming from COPA! We’ll be using an added hashtag, #ArchivesAWARE, to make it easy to follow our questions.

See you Wednesday!

#AskAnArchivist Day 2017 participants list

 

October 4th is Ask An Archivist Day!

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AskAnArchivist_GIF_2017What Is #AskAnArchivist Day?

It’s an opportunity to:

  • Break down the barriers that make archivists seem inaccessible.
  • Talk directly to the public—via Twitter—about what you do, why it’s important and, of course, the interesting records with which you work.
  • Join with archivists around the country and the world to make an impact on the public’s understanding of archives while celebrating American Archives Month!
  • Interact with users, supporters, and prospective supporters about the value of archives.
  • Hear directly from the public about what they’re most interested in learning about from archives and archivists.

How Does It Work?

On October 4, archivists around the country will take to Twitter to respond to questions tweeted with the hashtag #AskAnArchivist. Take this opportunity to engage via your personal and/or institutional Twitter accounts and to respond to questions posed directly to you or more generally to all participants.

Questions will vary widely, from the silly (What do archivists talk about around the water cooler?) to the practical (What should I do to be sure that my emails won’t get lost?), but each question will be an opportunity to share more about our work and our profession with the public. Visit SAA’s Storify that summarizes the 2016 #AskAnArchivist Day to get more examples of questions and answers. Last year generated thousands of questions and answers, some of which have been Storified:

Between now and October 4:

PROMOTE #AskAnArchivist Day among your users and constituents via your institution’s website, Twitter account, blog, newsletter, and any other mediums available to you. Click here for the public announcement (and feel free to pick up language from it for your own promotions). Memes are a great way to drum up excitement and are easily created through an online meme generator. Check out examples of last year’s promotional “Philosoraptor” memes here and here.

For additional inspiration on what your promotion of #AskAnArchivist Day might look like, check out what your peers did last year:

And see our Storify of marketing from a previous #AskAnArchivist Day, as well as these great examples of museums’ promotions of #AskACurator Day:

Examples of possible Twitter promotion:

  • Happy #AskAnArchivist Day! Our archivists are waiting for YOUR questions. Tag us at @TWITTERHANDLE and use #AskAnArchivist.
  • Archivists at @TWITTERHANDLE are gearing up for #AskAnArchivist Day on October 4! Literally—documents and photo boxes stacked and waiting!

ENCOURAGE the public to use #AskAnArchivist and your institution’s Twitter handle (e.g., @smithsonian) when asking questions so you won’t miss any that are intended for you and so we will be able to track questions and answers to measure overall participation.

TALK to your staff and colleagues to develop a plan for responding to tweets throughout the day.  Will one person respond to all tweets?  Will you share the task? Will individuals sign up for time slots and let the public know who will be available when?

Here’s one example:

  • During #AskACurator Day, one person at the Indianapolis Museum of Art was selected to monitor both the general hashtag and tweets sent directly to @imamuseum. When direct questions came in or interesting general questions were posed via the hashtag, the designated monitor sent the questions to participating curators via email. The curators (and their archivist!) replied with their answers, and the monitor posted all answers from the @imamuseum Twitter account. (See the Storify of the IMA’s participation in #AskACurator Day for results.)

CREATE an institutional Twitter account if you don’t already have one. #AskAnArchivist Day and American Archives Month are both great opportunities to start one! Click here to get started.

And if an institutional Twitter account is not an option for you, answer questions from your personal Twitter account! If your institutional affiliation and job title are not already listed on your profile, be sure to add that for the duration of #AskAnArchivist Day.

If you plan to participate, please email SAA Editorial and Production Coordinator Abigail Christian with your Twitter handle so we can create a list of participants.

TWEET and GREET! Take advantage of this opportunity to join with archivists from around the country to talk to and hear directly from the public on October 4.