The progressiveness of social media in academic libraries is the gear to achieve the libraries’ objectives, particularly in term of facilities and services. In addition, academic librarians have been using social media as a key medium for marketing, communication, and collaboration. However, social media use in academic libraries, especially in developing countries, is not without controversy. Studies indicate that social networking by academic librarians is ineffective use of librarians’ time and effort. The usefulness of and the hindrances in social media engagement for academic libraries in developing countries have yet to be established. For this reason, this review aims to identify the boons and the banes of social media engagement for academic libraries in developing countries in two continents, Asia and Africa. A structured literature review was conducted using methods promulgated by the Center for Reviews and Disseminations but adapted to the particular needs of this review. Various online databases were used for the review. The keywords/phrases used for the search were: social media, web 2.0, social media engagement, academic libraries, and developing countries; and after a profound scrutiny, 50 articles were found useful for the review. The result shows that there is a continued increase of published literature on social media in academic libraries in the developing countries. A substantial amount of literature emphasises the benefits of social media usefulness in academic libraries under five major themes – marketing and promotion of library services; professional/self-development;, social interaction; media sharing; and communication. A few articles express the distress in implementing social media in academic library services. The usefulness of and the hindrances in social media engagement reported in the literature should inform practicing librarians contemplating implementation of social media and guide formal social media application in library services. More so, this study will shape Library and Information Science (LIS) researchers to scope out areas of needs for future research.

Trust and authority are emerging as key elements of success on social media environment. In spite of a burgeoning field of social media research, the topic on how institutions earn users’ trust and establish their social media authority has received very little attention to date. This study describes how academic librarians strategize in creating trust in social media contents and orient their actions towards the goals of achieving social media authority as information experts. The study is guided by the following research question: What are the trust-creating activities that academic librarians do on library’s social media to establish social media authority? Data were collected through interviews with 15 librarians from three Nigerian university libraries. Six themes on trust-creating activities emerged from the findings. Three themes are related to trust-creating activities by individual librarians: (a) post credible and useful social media contents; (b) provide relevant and responsive feedback; and (c) have authorized identification or social media icons. Another two themes are associated with trust-creating activities by librarians as a group: (a) collaborate in assessing social contents; (b) be an authority in library and information services. One trust-creating activity taken by the library management emerged i.e. involving the university authority for content. The researchers offer suggestions for librarians to orient their actions towards the goals of achieving social media authority and the distinctions are made in the trust- creating activities between individual, group and organisation. This paper contributes to the under-researched field investigating the actual implementation of social media authority in libraries. The study has shown that social media authority is built on the platter of users’ trust. Based on this observation, we believe that successful implementation of social media in the library is associated with not only how proficient librarians are in social media use, but also how they build their social media contents through trust-creating activities.

No abstract