Libraries may be known as sanctuaries of silence, but a group of Adelaide librarians are making some serious noise.
The team at City of Marion Libraries has grown a legion of fans on social media and seen their videos go viral, clocking up millions of views.
The libraries’ marketing and communications support officer, Jasmine Argent, said it began as an idea to showcase their services and activities.
“I just wanted more people to know about them and the amazing services that we’ve got, and especially if you haven’t been to libraries in a little while, they’ve changed a lot,” she said.
“I was like, we need to create this fun, energetic content to really catch people’s eyes and get more people talking about libraries and more people coming into our spaces.”
Jasmine Argent is often in front and behind the camera. (ABC News)
And catch people’s eyes it did.Â
At the time of publication, the City of Marion Libraries had amassed almost 70,000 followers on Instagram, 34,000 on Facebook and just over 18,000 on TikTok.
When the team started making videos, it decided to do a series emulating the global reality television show Keeping Up with the Kardashians, in which there was scripted drama among librarians that gained some vital traction.
But it was the video titled When the Boss Says It Isn’t a Two-person Job that launched them into the social stratosphere, gaining 5.3 million views.
Loading Instagram content
In the video, Ms Argent and librarian Denise Martin look directly at the camera with deadpan faces while managing daily tasks such as book returns, scanning library cards and pushing a book trolley.
“That was super exciting and our follower base grew to about 20,000 on Instagram over a month,” Ms Argent said.
“We’ve been able to build a really amazing community online and really showcase libraries for people who have not come in here in a long time.”
Another video that tapped into a TikTok trend, where a woman spectacularly fails to jump a sandwich board, also went viral with almost 4 million views.
Loading Instagram content
The video further cemented its star, Ms Martin, as a social media celebrity, a status she never expected, but one she was taking in her stride.
“That’s been quite amazing. You’ll get just people commenting … while I’m serving people at the customer service desk with general queries and then they’ll just say, ‘Love your videos, love your content,'” Ms Martin said.
“And when we’re out and about someone might say, ‘Oh I’d just love it. Keep going.’
“I never thought I would be in this in this situation. So it’s a new thing, but it’s fine. You just say ‘hi’ to people and they love that. And I love that too.”
Denise Martin wants more people to visit libraries. (ABC News)
Ms Argent said overwhelming audience responses to Ms Martin in her role in the Keeping Up with the Librarians series signalled she was onto something.
“That first video was when we started really seeing the views stack up like our first 100,000 views … and everyone was just loving Denise in the comments being like, ‘Oh my God, Denise is amazing’, ‘She’s so iconic’, ‘We love her.’ So I knew we had to keep including her in video content,” Ms Argent said.
The libraries’ work is now being emulated by other libraries who have noticed their success in creating fun content to reach the community. It has also been attracting some big-name attention.
“Ariana Grande liked our posts, the sign post, and we were fangirling over that,” Ms Argent explained with excitement.
“Leigh Sales is Denise’s favourite that she commented on other videos … there’s been like a few famous people that we are like, ‘Gosh really, we’ve reached these people’.
“But yeah, it’s really cool.”
‘Much more to libraries’
Amid all the fun, there is a serious side to the libraries’ work.
City of Marion Mayor Kris Hanna said the council was delighted with the immense community response.
Kris Hanna says the videos show there is “much more to libraries” than books. (ABC News)
“Instead of declining membership before COVID, we’re actually seeing increasing membership, nearly 900,000 books borrowed in the past year,” Mr Hanna said.
“There’s an implicit message there that libraries are about more than books. In fact, there are lots of activities in the libraries.Â
“There are computers here for use, people can borrow music, people can borrow toys and soon we’re going to have a library of things where people can borrow useful household or kitchen implements.
“So it’s not just the old days of coming in to look at a book. There’s much more to libraries than that and I think the social media campaign has really proved that.”
Ms Martin wants more people to visit and take advantage of what is on offer.
“It highlights what we do in libraries and it doesn’t have to be boring because it’s not,” she said.
“I think come to your local library, wherever you are … they are free and a safe place to be. You can meet, you can read, borrow.Â
“We’ve got so many different resources and it will surprise everyone, I think … just come and visit us and see us on social media as well. Come and say hi.”