What is social media optimization (SMO)? It’s a programmatic strategy for building and engaging community through social networks, and in this issue of Library Technology Reports, you'll receive practical guidelines for implementing this flexible and comprehensive community-building model. Authors Doralyn Rossmann and Scott W. H. Young structure this report around five interrelated objectives: create shareable content, make sharing easy, reward engagement, proactively share, and measure use and encourage reuse. Ideal for both libraries who are just starting to implement a social media strategy and those looking to enhance current efforts, this guide will help you employ SMO principles to create a self-sustaining online community of engaged users who regularly use the library and its spaces, services, and collections. Rossmann and Young provide:

• an effective social media guide that you can adapt for your institution
• advice for implementing SMO to connect users with relevant content and build sustainable relationships
• practical guidelines for creating shareable content that relates to your users along with concrete examples of social media posts
• instructions for adding social share buttons and implementing social media cards to your websites to enhance content sharing
• strategies for raising awareness of your library’s resources and services; and
• an overview of quantitative and qualitative approaches for measuring and evaluating the success of social network activity.