Marketing Agency Needed By Milwaukee Library

The Milwaukee County Federated Library System is seeking proposals from an organization with data collection and marketing expertise to provide consultative insights, recommendations, and support to raise general awareness and advocacy of the System and its member libraries. The selected organization will work with the System’s Marketing and Advocacy Committee (MAC) to achieve a number of outcomes specified in the System’s 2020-2024 Strategic Plan.  

Proposals must be received by April 17^th, 2020. The System will review proposals and expects to select an organization based upon a proposal document and references, then negotiate and sign a contract by April 30^th, 2020. The contract period will be for a two-year period, with a one-year
renewal option.

Background:

The Milwaukee County Federated Library System (MCFLS) consists of 15 member libraries, 18 communities, and 27 library buildings serving 950,000 county residents. MCFLS is a unique system in Wisconsin because every resident is served directly through a municipal library in their community.

Because of the system’s small geographic area and dense population, MCFLS member libraries need to work together closely to meet the needs of residents that often don’t notice or understand the differences between each library.  Given this environment, member libraries recognize the value in marketing system services to all users while noting a need for assistance in developing marketing plans to serve their own communities.

Scope of Work:

SummaryThe System’s MAC committee is focused on providing public awareness, voice and visibility for the System, its member libraries, and shared services and resources to broadly communicate the value and opportunities public libraries provide to our communities.

The selected organization will be asked to work with the System as both a data analyst and marketing consultant on a slate of projects reflected in the objectives and goals within this document.

Objective 1.  Cultivate learning from data insights
Goals

1. Identify current and new data collection priorities to support marketing development and implementation. 
2. Establish baseline metrics and standards for assessment of System strategic plan objectives related to data.

Strategies

1. Concentrate initial efforts on substantial data that already exists: library software statistics, annual reports, database use, demographics, social media and other sources.
2. Identify resources in use and community needs which may not be delivered currently.
3. Benchmark/assess other libraries or library systems for best practices.
4. Create focus groups related to priorities for 2020 that can be tapped to respond to surveys.
5. Work with member libraries to determine standards for useful data points.

Deliverables

1. Initial core set of data for determining marketing strategies and evaluation will be identified and analyzed for marketing plan development and 2021 implementation.
2. Initial marketing plan development by the end of 2020.
3. Data sets to help with system advocacy will have been identified, gathered and compiled into a usable report and formats for implementation in 2021.  This would include development of information and communication templates for member library use.

Objective 2.  Increase awareness and understanding
Goals

1. Increase awareness and use of system-wide and member library services and resources.
2. Reach underserved populations and those that do not or infrequently visit and use our member libraries.

Strategies

1. Redevelop the existing system marketing plan using data collection priorities in Objective 1.
2. Communicate with member libraries what the system is actively doing to promote awareness of libraries and meet member and county resident needs for system-wide library services and resources.
3. Collaborate with other library system and statewide marketing and related data gathering efforts.

Deliverables

1. Marketing plan development and 2021 implementation.
2. Develop a regular report that will communicate with member libraries on marketing efforts as well as evaluate the impact of those efforts.
3. Seek collaboration with neighboring systems on marketing campaigns and participate in statewide efforts on marketing library services and resources.

Due Date:

April 17^th

Address:

709 North Eighth Street

Milwaukee, WI 53233

414-286-8149

Agencies worth considering include M Booth and Hunter PR.