T
his quarter Ken Winter represented the library and VDOT at an advisory meeting held by ASTM International at their headquarters in Pennsylvania, discussed in this quarter's Spotlight.
It was a routine and somewhat unremarkable quarter for the library and we spent significant amounts of time in staff training with Springshare's LibGuides and LibAnswers, with slightly above average activity on the library's live chat service. Most patron transactions still come via e-mail, but that is shifting as more patrons use online submission forms or live chat.
The library's Website is increasingly the umbrella under which all library services and communications are offered. Site traffic continues to rise: This quarter the library's home page had 371 views, while the A-Z resources page had 482 views and library guides had 7,400 views. The most popular guide was HBR Top 25 Articles (1,310 views), followed by the Guide to Transportation Planning Data (1,177 views) and the Skillsoft Books Quick Start guide (177 views).
System data indicates patrons are migrating from the agency's Internet Explorer browser (which used to account for more than 90% of accesses) to Chrome, which was used for 45% of accesses his quarter.
Library Web Site Searches: The administrative side of our site allows us to "spy" on search queries submitted to our site search, including search terms and searcher behavior (such as what search results they click on). It is interesting to note that top search terms included: "Inside VDOT" followed by "maps" and both "VDOT u" and "VDOT University." This reminds us that VDOT employees don't always differentiate between one VDOT site and other (and are probably mistaking the library's site for the VDOT University site managed by the learning center or InsideVDOT managed through Central Office). In the future we should be sure to develop FAQs, guides or other information that helps direct busy VDOT employees to Web sites managed by other divisions of the agency.
Library Tracks TRB Changes With Newsletter Posts
This quarter there were an unusual number of announcements by the Transportation Research Board (TRB) related to information, and the library utilized both LinkedIn social media posts and Connections, the library E-newsletter to inform researchers about changes. Our articles included:
At this time the library has about 50 subscribers to Connections but we are hoping continued promotion will help push that to more than 100 soon.
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