1. Bill Pardue
Arlington Heights Memorial Library
bpardue@ahml.info / @billahml

2. What’s the point?
 Users have more places than ever to ask their
questions
 Yahoo Answers
 Cha Cha
 Facebook Questions
 LinkedIn Q&A
 Twitter
 WikiAnswers
 Etc., etc., etc….

3. Reference is declining…
http://ahml.info/renovation

4. How do we respond?
 Hope it goes away?
 Argue that we’re better (we clearly are…aren’t we)?
 With whom do we argue?
 Presume that we’re just not part of it?
 Actively engage?
Guess which one I’ll advocate!

5. What’s “Slam the Boards?”
 Genesis in Denver, Sept. 2007
 Now monthly
 Find questions, answer them, ID yourself as a
librarian.
 Promote our skills, don’t diss the boards.

6. The Wiki & The Group & The Tweet
 http://answerboards.wetpaint.com
 Add your name to the list
 Link to your Q&A profiles
 Have discussions
 Facebook: Answer Board Librarians
 Group may be archived soon…jump in!
 Twitter: #slamtheboards hashtag

7. Disclaimers
 We’re all busy! (Can you do a few per month?)
 They’re not our patrons! (It’s for the good of the whole)
 Relatively few people see our answers (Every patron is
part of the “long tail.”)

8. Make “Slamming” local
 Look for a hyperlocal site—seed w/Q&As?
 Is there a local “Patch” site?
http://www.patch.com
 Local daily/weekly papers?
 Reply to local comments/questions on news,
discussion, review sites (papers, yelp, etc.)
 Monitor twitter searches for your town’s name.
 Set up a Google alert for local questions in Yahoo
Answers.
 Remember to ID yourself!

9. Slamming’s not always virtual
 Attend local meetings and offer to look up research
topics
 Chamber of commerce, Rotary, Social Services, etc.
 Get yourself appointed to a local committee
 Listen to what’s going on…offer assistance…don’t just
wait.
 Be “on” even when you’re out of the building--a
“Library Ambassador.”
 “Library Dude” hot dog cart! http://bit.ly/qwssAZ

11. Slamming isn’t always answers
 “Chiming in,” asking questions of your community
(esp. in FB or Twitter)
 Offering assistance
 Promoting: Making the library known
 Helping the user get value from our skills, any way we
can!

12. Requires an attitudinal change
 We can’t wait for questions to come to us.
 We can’t just assume that users know what we do.
 We have to cast our net wide and take a proactive
(even “predatory?”) approach to reference.
 We have to be willing to trumpet what we do and who
we are.
 We might even need to “butt in” a bit (carefully!).

13. So, you wanna slam?
 Look over some social Q&A sites
 Yahoo Answers: the big favorite
 WikiAnswers: fast-growing, harder to attribute
 AnswerBag: I’ve played a little…
 LinkedIn Q&A: very tech/business-oriented
 ChaCha: SMS, you get paid (can it promote us?)
 Learn how to navigate, post answers, the culture, etc.

14. How will you find questions?
 Poor “signal to noise” ratio on most services
 Browse through categories
 Search for selected terms (“articles,” “books,” etc.)
 Be patient… “real” questions are out there!

15. Answering
 Provide a well-considered answer.
 Link to info—attribute sources! OK to build on other
answers
 Try to relate to a library service, if you can.
 See if you can figure out asker’s locale (e.g., sometimes
in Yahoo Pulse). Review the local library’s options and
make suggestions.
 Use a “signature,” if that’s OK. Make sure asker knows
this was answered by a library advocate.
 Don’t be TOO heavy-handed, though!

16. Points, etc.
 Yahoo and other sites award points for activity.
 Nice to follow, don’t get hung up on it.
 Feel free to vote for your own “best answers.”

17. Questions?
 I’m always happy to talk, promote, etc.
 bpardue@ahml.info
 @billahml