Social Networking: A Marketing Strategy for Effective Service Delivery in Academic Libraries in Imo State.

Abstract This paper examined the online social networking tools used as techniques for effective marketing of services in selected academic libraries in Imo State. The study was guided by three research questions and objectives. A survey research design was adopted for the study. The population of the study was fifty nine (59); comprising Heads of departments/units and librarians working in the libraries studied. The population also served as the sample due to its manageable nature, hence the adoption of census enumeration technique. The data obtained were analyzed using descriptive statistics involving mean scores. The findings revealed that: the mostly used social networking tools to market library products and services in the academic libraries studied are Facebook, WhatsApp, and Twitter; that some of the benefits of social networking tools in academic libraries are: promotion of library resources; knowledge creation and sharing among libraries/librarians; helping to publicize special events and programmes of the library; enhancing research and scholarly publications among librarians and others; and that the academic libraries are being affected by a lot of challenges in their quest to use social networking tools to market their products and services to the public which include, inadequate funding, lack of qualified ICT librarians, network problems, erratic power supply, among others. It was therefore recommended that academic libraries should endeavour to embrace other forms of social networking tools in addition to Facebook, WhatsApp, and Twitter to market their products and services to users and install solar energy in order to tackle the issue of erratic power supply