User perception of the Public Archives

The research highlights the importance of public archives for society and the relevance of applying marketing in their favor. Public archives have the function of safeguarding, preserving, and disseminating administrative, historical, and cultural information about the state. However, it is assumed that few people are aware of their main function. Therefore, the objective was to understand the perception of citizens of the city of Salvador, Bahia, regarding public archives. The methodology applied was quantitative descriptive research of an applied nature. Thus, we identified and analyzed the data collected from a sample of 104 participants. In general, the results allowed us to conclude that citizens recognize the archive as a very important information service, contradicting what several authors claim when they say that most people see it as a repository for paper and documents. However, there is an expectation that more in-depth studies will be conducted on the subject addressed here, and a greater need to develop programs based on marketing promotion so that it is widely disseminated, resulting in recognition of the various activities of the public archive.