A patron asks for today's paper and someone else already has it. Another wants a magazine for a long bus ride. A newcomer asks whether we have anything from home. Most of us already pay for a digital newsstand that answers all three, and most patrons have no idea it exists.
That's the real problem with digital newspapers and magazines. They don't sit on a shelf, so nobody trips over them. Promotion has to put the collection in front of people at the exact moment they need it. Here's what I've seen work.
A product name means nothing at the desk. An outcome does. "Read today's paper from home with your library card" beats any logo. So does "Find news in your own language" or "Make the text bigger on your tablet."
Pick two or three needs your community actually has and build everything around those:
Treat the digital collection as an extension of the print one:
Staff recommendations move usage more than anything else we do. But nobody at a busy desk is going to memorize a login flow.
I'd keep it to a one-page internal guide: what the service is, the main benefit, the first step, the three most common access questions, and who handles the tricky ones. Then one line staff can say without thinking: "If the print issue is out, you can read it digitally with your library card. Want me to show you where to start?"
Most important, give staff five minutes to actually use it. Someone who has browsed a magazine, changed the text size, and found a paper in another language will describe it honestly and with real enthusiasm.
The easiest promotion rides on an existing program:
When libraries ask me what makes this kind of promotion easy, I point to PressReader, because the catalog is broad enough to support almost every idea above without buying titles one by one.
What libraries get:
Where I'd start: pick one heritage month or community language, build a display and a QR shelf talker around those titles, and train the desk on the one-line script. Learners Engaged has worked with libraries and PressReader since 2006 and can set up a demo or trial.
One launch post isn't enough, but a weekly campaign burns everyone out. I'd pick one focus a month (a language, a category, a staff pick, a seasonal angle) and reuse the same message across the website, newsletter, social, signage, and desk conversations. Repetition is how patrons start to recognize it.
Plan for friction, too. Account setup, an app download, or a browser quirk is where people quit. Short how-to cards and a monthly drop-in help session catch most of it. And separate awareness from instruction: a social post introduces the service, but a patron ready to try it may need a two-minute walkthrough.
Raw issue counts are fine, but look for patterns. Did use rise after staff training or a heritage display? Which languages and categories are growing? Which branches lag, and is that awareness, access hassle, or a mismatch with local interests?
Pair the numbers with what staff hear at the desk. When you report to the board, connect the activity to the community: "Residents read current papers and magazines from home, in their own languages, without waiting for a shared print copy" explains why the service belongs in the budget.
News access carries a responsibility. We don't tell patrons what to think. We make it easy to find a range of established publications and to tell reporting apart from everything else. Be upfront about any limits on titles, devices, or locations.
The best promotion is often just a staff member saying, "Yes, we have that. Let's find it together."