Visual of our Questions

TGIF Tips – 11/07/08, Issue 6

One of the wonderful aspects of Ask a Librarian is the collaborative nature of the service, which allows the handful of librarians actively staffing the desk to help patrons from across the state of Florida.  Because of this collaborative nature, patrons sometimes need referrals to their local libraries in order to satisfy a library- or branch-specific question whose answer can’t be culled from the catalog or looking at the patron’s available account information.  One process that may be helpful in such situations is referring that patron’s chat transcript to his or her local library via email so that local staff can follow-up.  

To refer a transcript to email for follow-up by a local library, just follow these steps: 

1.  Present the follow-up option to the patron and confirm contact information.

2.  When the chat is finished, click on “Dismiss” rather than “End”, which allows you to add notes.

3.  Click on the post-it note icon, or double-click in the Customer Details box, to add such details as email address and/or phone number.

4.  Click on the ”Click here to send email” link in the Customer Details form, or click the “Create New Email” option under the ‘Mail Sent’ tab in the upper left corner. 

5.  Under the “KnowledgeBase” tab & sub-tab, look up the library and copy the site coordinator’s email address.  (This is an interim step and will change.)

6.  Add the email address and a subject (subject example - ”Email follow-up for live chat session”) and click OK.

7.  Add message to email and click “Send”.

Voila!  The patron will receive the local, in-depth assistance they need, and you will have provided yet another patron with impeccable service.  (Remember – never underestimate the value of a referral or follow-up in reference.)

Ready, Set, Available!

Don’t forget to set your status to available when you are ready to take patrons in the Agent Console.  Just click on the status box arrow in the lower right corner of the Agent Console.  Keep in mind that this status doesn’t change when you have a patron, so the other librarians staffing will still show “available” even when they’re actively involved in a patron chat.  Feel free to use the Agent Room (for group chat) or the private messaging feature to communicate with your Ask a Libarian coworkers on workflow.

Promotional Materials

Feeling enthusiastic about the Ask a Librarian virtual reference service?  You can order free promotional materials such as posters, bookmarks, and even cool lanyards to hold those name badges – a great way to get staff and patrons “in the know” on Ask a Librarian.  Just log in to the Ask a Librarian toolbox at http://info.askalibrarian.org/toolbox/login.asp and click on the “Promotional Materials” link on the left.

New Ask a Librarian Workshops 

New full-day Ask a Librarian have been added to the training schedule.  The areas currently scheduled are:  Tampa, Fort Pierce, and West Palm Beach.  Although the full-day training is only required for those new to Ask a Librarian, it is also great for those who haven’t staffed in a while, don’t staff often, or just want more in-depth, in-person training on the new software.  Also, don’t forget our new feature-specific workshops as well – we’re offering classes on such individual features as screensharing, email within the agent console, and viewing & retrieving statistics in the InstantService software.  Register at http://www.tblc.org/ws_classes.php to reserve your seat(s) today.

Ask a Librarian Marketing Plan

We are working on the Ask a Librarian Marketing Plan for 2008-2009 and I would like your help.

To bring you up to speed on recent AaL marketing efforts, here is what we have been up to:

- The Director’s Chair YouTube Contest
- We mailed info packets containing information about AaL, posters, bookmarks, lanyards and The Director’s Chair flyers to every high school in Florida
- Posters, bookmarks, lanyards, The Director’s Chair flyers, post-it pads available for libraries in the toolbox at http://info.askalibrarian.org
- Movie theater ad is playing before every movie in two Gainesville theaters through Nov. 20 (check out the ad here: http://www.tblc.org/theaterad)
- MySpace (www.myspace.com/askalibrarianfl) and Facebook pages
- Business flyers (promoting to business community)
- Speaking at various statewide events
- In the process of developing next year’s brand new and FRESH back-to-school campaign geared toward high school and college students

What would you like to see AaL do to promote Ask a Librarian to your users?

Please send me your suggestions at sachsd at tblc.org or add a comment to the blog.

October Statistics

What a great month! We survived and are thriving after the migration.

We answered 5,039 questions last month.  This breaks down to:
Local Desks = 959
Collaborative Live Chat Sessions = 2,554
Academic Live Chat Sessions= 406
E-mail Sessions = 1,120

A pdf summary of October is available here:  aal-stat-report-oct-08
A report of usage by zip code is available here:  zip-code-report-oct-08
A report of usage by entry point is available here:  chatsbyentrypoint-all-desks0