Product: Lean Library Access
Accessing resources from home and a 45% increase in online journal usage
The Challenge
The library puts in a considerable amount of time and effort to develop its collections and provide support for users. But are patrons always gaining easy access to these resources?
- "We are a tiny team of 4 people in an organisation of over 7,000 staff. Spread over 100 sites, we are extremely stretched and communication with our existing and potential users is very difficult. Within healthcare, many clinical staff such as nurses, doctors and nursing assistants will not have access to a computer during their working day and much research or study is done from home so off-campus access is therefore essential.
- Within the NHS, we use OpenAthens to authenticate our users but navigating the user to the correct resource or search function has always been tricky and when at home the user will often default to “natural” searching through Google, Google Scholar, or Pubmed."
"The installation and ongoing dialogue with Lean Library were exemplary; always consistently helpful and very responsive. I am not necessarily very technically minded but Daniel - our Lean Library contact - guided me through all the necessary steps at our end."
The Solution
Lean Library, a powerful browser plug-in, solves access issues and provides patrons with content as and when they need it, all while protecting their privacy and promoting your library’s brand.
- "Lean Library helps us in several ways - firstly whether at work or home, the user is allowed to search naturally - using the internet in a normal fashion, searching in a manner they feel comfortable with.With Lean Library installed on every PC in the Trust our small team of four people has massively expanded its reach and our potential users are more aware of our presence in the organisation. By using the assist messages within Lean Library, we are also able to inform users of known issues with suppliers or websites, saving the user and library team time in answering questions before they are raised."
Matching Expectations
Lean Library strives to deliver a product that continually brings value to the library. Does it match your expectations?
"The product has exceeded our expectations in terms of increased user satisfaction and increases in OpenAthens sessions across the Trust."
Promoting Lean Library
Lean Library requires users to download the plug-in. So, how do you get patrons to download it?
"Initially we directly emailed all registered OpenAthens users within the Trust about Lean Library - about a fifth of our user base - and we continue to do this with new software developments such as Highlight and Search. Beyond that, we ran a poster campaign across the organisation informing them of Lean Library and the arrival of the Chrome browser.
Lean Library also promotes itself and our service in an ambient manner as potential users in remote locations are now made aware of our service and the availability of online resources through our Lean Library popups. In our organization, our users wouldn’t necessarily identify as students - as they will have existing OpenAthens account registered under their professional group."
"The implementation of Lean Library in Mersey Care has contributed towards a 45% increase in online journal usage."
User Feedback
At the end of the day, users need to see the value, and their feedback is important.
"The feedback is uniformly positive - and it is reassuring to know that if for any reason the user did not want to see the popups anymore, we can give them instructions on how to easily disable it."
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Find out more about Lean Library.
If you’d like to hear more or receive a product demo, get in touch.
