|
Making the Most of Your Usage Statisticsby Abigail Bordeaux & Alfred Kraemer |
Alfred Kraemer, Medical College of WisconsinPowerPoint |
Abigail Bordeaux, Binghamton UniversityJump to data examples | Jump to "Using the Data" BackgroundBinghamton University Fall 2003: 11,000 undergrads, 2200 grads, 700 full- and part-time faculty Major consortia: SUNY, Nylink, Waldo, NERL Materials budget: $4.3 million, periodicals (print and electronic) are about 60%, other electronic is about 13% DatabasesCurrently track stats for 93 databases out of approximately 100 subscriptions As of June 16th, May reports received for about 80 JournalsCurrently track stats for 25 e-journal packages (both "free" with print and subscriptions, not aggregated dbs.) As of June 16th, May reports received for 21 (largest is usually latest) Data CollectionHuge improvements over the last two years COUNTER compliance has increased quickly over the last six months Most data now comes via web, a few still come by e-mail Some send notification that stats are available One database must be requested from vendor rep every month PHP counter is used to get session count if vendor doesn't provide stats QuirksNew u/p every month Monthly stats only made available quarterly "Dormant" products Title-by-title stats unavailable for one very expensive e-journal package Data Entry and AnalysisRaw files are saved in Excel compatible format, if possible, or in HTML. Searches and full-text articles or their closest equivalents are entered into spreadsheets with Product, Consortium, Count and, in the case of databases, Vendor. These spreadsheets are uploaded to our staff intranet for subject librarians to review at any time. Monthly data is used to create charts that show the patterns of usage over the last three years, starting with fiscal year 01/02. Data for some products is available back to 98/99 but is not as consistent or as widely available and is therefore excluded from these charts. Note that May data is still incomplete in these graphs. Link Resolver DataOur link resolver tracks many different types of data. These data provide another way to look at your electronic products. In addition to the samples below, we can find out what, if anything, our users prefer over full text, which journals are the most popular, which journals are requested but have no full text, and more. We do not integrate this data into our other reports since it would double-count journal and database access. Using the DataThe Library Website and PR 1. Increasing access to popular databases and indexes. Two phrases used by NASIG 2004 speakers stand out: "Google-ization" (Tim Jewell) and "...choking on options..." (Kenneth Frazier). The e-resources landscape is complex by most standards and certainly when compared to Google. Usage statistics may make a difference when it comes to improving the library website. We recently had requests to add two frequently used databases to our list of "Places to Start." The list consisted of 4 interdisciplinary databases with full text, but the two requested databases did not have full-text content. However, when we looked at our top 10 databases we saw that the two non full-text databases were indeed in the top 10 and probably merited spots on our short list. Other databases on the top 10 list were discipline specific and therefore were not added. Note the change in format and wording on the page. Previous format:
Current format:
2. Improving Subject Access In January 2003, dynamic pages were added to our web site. Dynamic subject pages allow easy access to relevant e-journals and databases whether or not a subject librarian has the time and inclination to maintain such a page by hand. Before the advent of dynamic pages, maintaining these lists was time intensive and subject coverage was uneven. See our English and Engineering pages for two examples. 3. News and Features News and Features was added to the Libraries' home page in January 2003. It is used for any kind of news, and has been useful for publicizing electronic products that are new or that need a boost from extra publicity. Our 2003 LibQual survey indicated the need to publicize our resources more, particularly to faculty. A newly formed Public Relations committee considers ways to raise awareness of all the Libraries' products & services. University Administration This may be one of the most important ways we can use our usage statistics: showing our administration the importance of the Libraries on campus and making a case for continued and increased funding in an age of shrinking budgets. Circulation and gate counts may be in a downward trend, although ours have fluctuated somewhat over the past 6 years. However, just one of our highly used databases more than makes up for our gate count or circ drop in it's largest year. The charts above are a particularly useful tool. Further development
|
