LibX: measuring use & marketing usefulness

Dan Sich

dsich2@uwo.ca

Measuring & encouraging LibX use

• measures

• caveats

• usefulness

• marketing

Measures

How many unique IPs are:

1. finding LibX?

2. downloading LibX?

3. updating (keeping) LibX?

4. using LibX?

LibX ‘boilerplate’ page

• is created automatically when you create your edition, and has link to download.

• sits on LibX server.

LibX ‘boilerplate’ page

• can be replaced by your own page, on your server, to which you can add Google Analytics code.

Measure 1: # finding LibX

Google Analytics can show:

• # hits on your LibX page

• how users are getting to your page

• how long users stay on your page

• & more

LibX loganalysis

Measure 2: # downloading LibX

• libx.org/loganalysis

• “Unique IPs downloading [Firefox/IE] edition”

• = # new users

• may increase with good marketing

Measure 3: # updating LibX

• libx.org/loganalysis

• LibX sends query (from browser to LibX server) every 24 hours

• These queries are logged as “Unique IPs accessing update.rdf within last 7 days [of snapshot]”

• = # keeping LibX

• is something we’d like to see increase

Caveats: loganalysis

• doesn’t tell you everything

• shows # of IPs, not # of users

• is run irregularly, provides snapshot

• isn’t reliable at the moment for # of “Unique IPs accessing update.rdf within last 7 days,” so you may have to analyze the excerpt manually (not difficult)

Measure 4: # using LibX

You can measure LibX-to-SFX-OpenURL-server traffic by:

1. assigning an SFX OpenURL SID for LibX

2. counting the # of requests with this SID

3. comparing to overall SFX OpenURL server traffic(?)

More on measure 4: # using LibX

• LibX-to-SFX-OpenURL-server traffic isn’t the whole picture

• We may also be able to meaure LibX-to-SFX-Journal-List traffic

• LibX-to-Innopac traffic counts not available

• What about LibX-to-Encore traffic?

Usefulness

• usefulness ≠ use

• usefulness > use (at the moment)

• usefulness can exist independent of use

• usefulness to staff?

• user comments?

Market LibX by

• informing & training staff

• positioning on website, news items

• using it in reference/instruction work

• installing it on public workstations

• knowing & appealing to your audience

• encouraging word-of-mouth

Contact info

• Dan Sich

• University of Western Ontario

• dsich2@uwo.ca