Digital Presence and Social Media

Digital publishing, or having a digital presence, has become a significant part of many people’s personal and professional lives. If you have a social media account such as on Facebook, you have a digital presence. Library and archive services need to navigate this digital world so that they can help achieve their organisation’s goals and meet the needs of their users, by engaging with them where they are online. This may require using a range of different digital platforms.

This course provides an introduction for information professionals into the processes and principles associated with creating, maintaining and publishing good-quality content in a digital world. It takes a close look at editorial and managerial tasks involved in setting up a website, and also considers legal implications of digital content creation and sharing.

Throughout this course you will gain hands-on experience in planning and creating your own website, following basic rules of information architecture and web design. You will also have a chance to experiment with social media tools including creating and sharing still and moving images, blogs, wikis, email newsletters and use of a number of different platforms. This experience should help you to critically assess their use for information professionals to engage wider user communities, and to promote their services through an effective digital presence. The course will also consider your own use of the web as an information professional to develop a personal digital presence and to connect with others in the field.

Tutor

Anoush Simon MA(Hons) DAA, FHEA, PhD - Head of Department, Department of Information Studies, Aberystwyth University Aberystwyth Research Portal

This course has been developed in collaboration with Dr Alyson Tyler. Alyson is an independent library and information researcher based in Scotland. Alyson has undertaken several stand-alone contracts for the Welsh Government as well as researched and written reports for Aberystwyth University and the Scottish Library and Information Council. Prior to moving to Scotland Alyson worked for the Welsh Government for 13 years in library policy in the museums, archives and libraries policy division. During this time Alyson began blogging, and her library blog was the first blog by a civil servant in the Welsh Government. She also set up a library Twitter account before there were established internal guidelines, and used many of the newly emerging social media tools for her library work. Alyson gained her PhD and MSc Econ at Aberystwyth University, where she also taught on several modules during her PhD in the Department of Information Studies. Previously she had worked as a research assistant for several lecturers on their research projects. 

Prerequisites

An interest in the development and use of digital marketing and social media.

Learning Outcomes

After completing this short course you should be able to:

  • devise appropriate quality criteria for the evaluation of digital resources and use them to evaluate existing web sites
  • explain the processes of digital publishing
  • identify and critically assess legal and managerial issues involved in digital content creation, including organisational goals, human resources, copyright, data protection, and information security
  • select and use appropriate online tools for website design
  • develop webpages and a website taking account of information architecture and usability factors
  • evaluate the use of social media tools, such as RSS, mashups, social bookmarking, microblogging, media (photos, video & podcasts)
  • identify appropriate ways to promote your digital presence and market your services, and how to understand your audience/s and create digital content that will appeal to them
  • learn management, evaluation and planning techniques to be more effective with your digital presence
  • describe and assess the potential use of other social media tools, such as wikis, blogs, digital content creation and sharing, personal and professional social media networks etc.

Apply

To apply please complete the Short Course Application Form. 

This form should be completed and returned - with your reference - as soon as possible to the Undergraduate Admissions Office: 

For further information, please contact the Department of Information Studies tel: (+/0)1970 622731 / 622189; e-mail: dis-dept@aber.ac.uk