Integrated Marketing Designs for Kids, Teens, & Adult Library Summer Reading Programs 2015

Web banner ads for the three Summer Reading Program age levels.

The Summer Reading Program is the Collaborative Summer Library Program’s (www.cslpreads.org) annual effort to encourage people of all ages to read. The organization breaks the effort down into different age groups that have their own themes. For example, this year’s Summer Reading for kids was: “Every Hero has a Story.” For teens, it was “Unmask.” And for adults, it was “Escape the Ordinary.”

To help publicize this, the organization provides a CD-ROM of custom-made art and a few pre-formatted marketing items for each age group, such as a bookmark, an 8.5x11 inch sign, and a PowerPoint background image. Space remains on each designed collateral item for local libraries to add their own language. Unfortunately, space for each library’s needs might not be sufficient, and, as has been the case each year I’ve worked with the supplied artwork, our local library staff has also not found much of the supplied artwork to be very stylistically appealing. For example, this year's teen artwork included some rather scary looking "duck people" while the sophistication of the adult artwork arguably didn't rise above the appeal level of that submitted for the children or teen age groups.

Our library happens to be one of those libraries that needs more space on its collaterals. We prefer to advertise and promote the Summer Reading Program across multiple channels of publicity, such as for print and online applications. Our wide variety of collaterals each have their own unique dimensional requirements, which means that few, if any, of the pre-designed materials by the providing organization will match what we need. Because of this, and to address the shortcomings of the provided art aesthetics, I end up creating much of what we need from scratch, incorporating artwork I select from what was provided, then supplement those with my own additional images and oversee their application onto the broad range of projects I create to unsure a consistent style is used for each age group.

Typically, our library youth department manager will coordinate the gathering and dissemination of planned event information for kids and teens, then provide that content to the marketing department for creation of requested materials. Our adult services department will use one of its own staff to coordinate adult summer reading publicity separately. I’ll work with both these internal clients as well as our marketing / public relations manager to round out the full compliment of marketing design collaterals requested throughout the summer.

Because there are so many separate pieces I create to support the entire Summer Reading Program, I won’t include a discussion of the process for each. Instead, I’ll simply provide some sample images along with a brief caption line to identify them. Comments and questions regarding specific items are always welcome.

PROJECTS INCLUDED (+ quantities):

Summer edition of THINK... library newsletter.

 
Kids 14x8.5 inch brochure (4000)
Kids bookmark (6000)
Kids150x300px online ad (1)
Kids website banner ad (1)
Kids website blog icon (1)
Kids half page handbill template (1)
Kids quarter page handbill template (1)

Teen bookmark (3000)
Teen website banner ad (1)
Teen website blog icon (1)
Teen half page handbill template (1)
Teen quarter page handbill template (1)

Kids/Teen school publication print ad (1)
Kids/Teen 3.25x3.25 inch newspaper print ad (1)
Kids/Teen 10.25x12 inch magazine print ad (1)
Kids/Teen 3.625x4.875 inch magazine print ad (1)
Kids/Teen 8x11 inch online ad (1)
Kids/Teen television public service announcement (1)

Adult 14x8.5 inch brochure (700)
Adult logo for mini tote bag (750)
Adult website banner ad (1)
Adult website blog icon (1)

THINK... summer issue of the library’s quarterly 
newsletter cover and interior pages (2750)

Kids, Teen, and Adult blog icons.

Double parallel gatefold printed Kids brochure exterior (top) and interior (bottom) sides.

Front and back of Kids (left) and Teen (right) bookmarks.

Examples of print, digital online and television broadcast PSA advertisements.

8x12 inch magazine advertisement.

Double parallel gatefold printed Adult brochure exterior (top) and interior (bottom) sides.