{"id":33648,"date":"2025-07-01T12:30:27","date_gmt":"2025-07-01T16:30:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/?p=33648"},"modified":"2025-07-01T08:11:30","modified_gmt":"2025-07-01T12:11:30","slug":"honored-the-john-cotton-dana-library-pr-awards-alaac25","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/2025\/07\/honored-the-john-cotton-dana-library-pr-awards-alaac25\/","title":{"rendered":"Honored: The John Cotton Dana Library PR Awards #alaac25"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

On Saturday evening, library public relations specialists from eight institutions across the United States and Canada were bestowed with ALA’s most prestigious marketing recognition: the 2025 John Cotton Dana Library Public Relations Award<\/a>. My library, the Worcester Public Library<\/a> (WPL)–specifically its marketing and communications pro, Linnea Sheldon–was among the awardees. I write with soaring pride, yes, but also with a desire to inspire institutions of all sizes to take a fun, even silly, idea and make a lasting community impact. We did it with a marketing team of one who garnered staff-wide support and a $0 budget!<\/p>\n\n\n

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Linnea Sheldon accepting the award as WPL colleagues look out and on.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

In March 2024, WPL launched “March Meowness,” a month-long fee forgiveness campaign where patrons could show a picture of a cat\u2014a personal pet, internet meme, drawing, or any other animal picture\u2014to have their lost or damaged book fees waived. The idea stemmed from the library’s New Users Task Force, which recognized the need to address barriers caused by lost-item fees. Linnea used the feedback to create this lighthearted, low-barrier method for patrons to reconnect with the library. Youth and adult services librarians contributed to the fun with special programming like cat-themed storytimes, playtime with real kittens, a visit with a cat behaviorist, and a Sweet 16-style literary cat bracket. <\/p>\n\n\n

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And it worked! Over the course of the campaign, WPL saw a 10.7% increase in visits, a 9.2% rise in circulation, and a 10.2% increase in new library card registrations when compared to the previous month. Website traffic surged, and social media saw the largest increase. We were amazed daily as the campaign generated news articles worldwide. Ultimately, library staff successfully unblocked 930 patron accounts during the campaign, and the library’s Board of Directors later approved the forgiveness of an additional 3,787 accounts. The project far exceeded its objectives and proved that a creative, low-barrier marketing approach can lead to significant, measurable improvements. <\/p>\n\n\n

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With WPL’s Executive Director, Jason Homer; Linnea Sheldon; and Manager of Adult Services, Tara Jankowski.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

(Images taken by A. Rogers at 2025 John Cotton Dana Awards)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Alicia Rogers<\/strong>\u00a0(she\/her\/hers) is the Tween Services Librarian at\u00a0Worcester Public Library<\/a>\u2013the library\u2019s first!\u00a0She hosts programs and builds collections for children ages eight to twelve in the children\u2019s center and provides reference and reader\u2019s advisory service in the library\u2019s teen room to ease patrons\u2019 transition between the spaces. Through her work, she strives to build community among the tween patrons who are craving some independence. Alicia is a member of ALSC and the Notable Children\u2019s Book Committee and reviews for\u00a0Booklist<\/em>,\u00a0The Horn Book<\/em>,\u00a0Library Journal<\/em>, and\u00a0School Library Journal<\/em>. She loves books of all kinds (can you tell?), so is most looking forward to meeting and hearing from authors at the conference.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Please note that as a guest post, the views expressed here do not represent the official position of ALA or ALSC.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you are interested in submitting a guest post, please read and fill out our Guest Blogging Interest Form<\/a>. We would love to hear from you!<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Saturday evening, library public relations specialists from eight institutions across the United States and Canada were bestowed with ALA’s most prestigious marketing recognition: the 2025 John Cotton Dana Library Public Relations Award. My library, the Worcester Public Library (WPL)–specifically its marketing and communications pro, Linnea Sheldon–was among the awardees. I write with soaring pride, yes, but also with a desire to inspire institutions of all sizes to take a fun, even silly, idea and make a lasting community impact. We did it with a marketing team of one who garnered staff-wide support and a $0 budget! In March 2024, WPL launched “March Meowness,” a month-long fee forgiveness campaign where patrons could show a picture of a cat\u2014a personal pet, internet meme, drawing, or any other animal picture\u2014to have their lost or damaged book fees waived. The idea stemmed from the library’s New Users Task Force, which recognized the need…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":413,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":"","_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[2952,134,151],"tags":[3035,3036,3031,221,3029,3034,3028,3030],"class_list":["post-33648","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ala-annual-2025","category-guest-blogger","category-live-blogging","tag-cat-month","tag-john-cotton-dana-awards","tag-march-meowness","tag-marketing","tag-mywpl","tag-pr","tag-public-relations","tag-worcester-public-library"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33648","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/413"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33648"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33648\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33648"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33648"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alsc.ala.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33648"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}