2017
T I R I
LibGuiding the way: how
improved signposting can
develop our understanding
of student interaction with
library electronic resources
2017
T I R I
LibGuiding the way:
today’s session
•
The problem
•
Back in time
•
Understanding user behaviour by looking at
enquiries
•
The project, design process and end result
•
Using guides
•
Impact of guides
2017
T I R I
LibGuides: ten years of the dynamic
guide
• Holistic approach to access help required to recognisethat electronic resources access has many elements (Erb and Erb, 2014).
• LibGuides is “the democratization of the Internet” (Erb and Erb, 2014) as it allows librarians to create and
maintain library web pages with little or no web authoring expertise.
October 2008
Types of
databases listed first, rather than actual databases
Linking out, rather than providing
information
No explanation of what the
2017
T I R I
October 2008: Subject
pages
Again, linking out rather thanproviding information
Subject-specific
May 2012: all change
Information about what all these
resource-types are
The concept of a workbook has been changed to Database User Guide
Linking out: “more information” is
useful, but access should be
2017
T I R I
July 2015: a comprehensive approach
Access
Discover@Bolton from here
Detailed
descriptions of databases
Links to further sources of help (Quick Start Guides and a video)
Tab format to
How do we know what we don’t know?:
enquiries
25%
1%
32% 13%
2% 12%
14%
Referrals to Subject Librarians 2015/16
Basic search/Discover@Bolton
Print journals
In depth search Discover/databases
E-access issues
Other online information
Study skills
Moodle
2017
T I R I
Implementing LibGuides: project
overview
• Software purchased: LibGuides from American company
Springshare, used by nearly 5,000 libraries worldwide for the provision of library-related information.
• Planned launch in time for the start of 2016/17 (link changes etc.) with minimal user education intended.
• Four planned phases, some running concurrently: 1. Phase 1: Subject Guides (i.e. course specific) 2. Phase 2: Help Guides
Implementing LibGuides
• Understanding of the issues and creating a vision.
• Guides were created during the summer of 2016 and branded as Subject Guides: try to avoid using software names.
• Sought examples of best practice, but are very much
tailored to feedback already received and what we already knew about how our users wanted to access resources and information about services in general.
2017
T I R I
Implementing LibGuides: ask no
questions
• The more content is added, the greater the need for granularity of structure: if the question is “Where can I find…?” then there is a lack of clarity.
• Subject guides should be compact in nature (Dalton and Pan, 2014); help guides are more significant in content. Using
LibGuides allows these to be presented together, and this is a key principle.
• Our students sometimes think that “electronic resources” are different to electronic information sources, i.e. journals and articles.
• All academic content is academic content: there is no
2017
T I R I
A guide to Subject Guides
94 live guides: 86 subject-specific guides and 8 help guides
including Copyright, Research Support, Reading Lists
Online and Ebooks at the University of Bolton.
All subjects should have a guide (if not, tell us!).
Some information is replicated across all Subject Guides and
most are similar in layout and appearance.
Using guides: the numbers game
• Subject Guides were made available in September 2016; a small number of Help Guides have been made live since
• Since then, there have been over 12,000 views of the Subject Guides homepage (i.e. the complete list of guides linked to from the Library website)
• 94 live guides have been viewed a total of 29,869 times as of 22nd June 2017
2017
T I R I
Use of Subject Guides: top 10
guides
Data correct as of 22ndGuide June 2017 Views Top page after Starting Point
Law 3920 Databases, journals and articles*
Health and Social Care 1011 Databases, journals and articles
Business Management 979 Databases, journals and articles
Psychology 771 Databases, journals and articles
Nursing 761 Databases, journals and articles
Education 748 Databases, journals and articles
Civil Engineering 748 Databases, journals and articles
District Nursing 723 Databases, journals and articles*
Art and Design 533 Databases, journals and articles
Accountancy 490 Databases, journals and articles
How do we know what we don’t know?:
email enquiries
2016/15 2016/17
Total email queries: 81 Total email queries: 62
Electronic resource-related emails: 51
(63%) Electronic resource-related emails: 41 (66%)
“How do I…” “I can’t do…”
“What can I…” “I have a problem with…”
“I need help with…” “This isn’t working…”
2017
T I R I
How do we know what we don’t know?:
enquiries
22% 5% 20% 16% 8% 9% 1% 19%Referrals to Subject Librarians 2016/17
Basic search/Dis-cover@Bolton Print journals
In depth search Discover/ databases
E-access issues
Other online information Study skills
Moodle Other
E-resource related queries:
15/16: 71 per cent of total
16/17: 58 per cent of total
Change:
55 per cent decrease
Study skills queries:
15/16: 12 per cent of total
16/17: 9 per cent of total
Change:
Reaching further with guides: Research
Support
• One of eight live Help Guides to date.
• New content: includes the previous Guide for Researchers, but also covers open access and REF compliancy, UBIR,
Research Data Management, sharing research and measuring impact.
• Linked directly the from Library homepage: no navigation required.
• Over 2,100 views this academic year.
2017
T I R I
Reaching further with guides: next
steps
• Consider usability across a range of student types.
• Use this work to improve visual presentation of content, for example, consider students’ experiences of social media and how this might translate into expectations for how a guide might look (Conerton and Goldenstein, 2017).
• Create a comprehensive range of Help Guides and Resource Guides that acknowledge variations in learning styles.
• Create Staff Guide to provide detail on resources and resource acquisition, usage of resources and user education, for
Bibliography
Conerton, K. and Goldenstein, C. (2017) Making LibGuides works: student
interviews and usability tests. Internet Reference Services Quarterly, 22(1), pp.
43-54
Dalton, M. and Pan, R. (2014) Snakes or Ladders? Evaluating a LibGuides pilot at
UCD Library. Journal of Academic Librarianship, 40(5), pp. 515-520
Erb, R. and Erb, B. (2014) Leveraging the LibGuides platform for electronic
resources access assistance. Journal of Electronic Resources Librarianship,
26(3), pp. 170-189
Giullian, J. and Zitser, E. (2015) Beyond LibGuides: the past, present and future
of online research guides. Slavic and East European Information Resources,
16(4), pp. 170-180
Ream, T. and Parker-Kelley, D. (2016) Expanding library services and instruction
