Good PDA or Good PR? - assessing PDA activity in the academic Good PDA or Good PR? - assessing PDA activity in the academic library Briony Heyhoe-Pullar – University of Huddersfield Steve Sharp – University of Leeds
Jan 01, 2016
Good PDA or Good PR? - assessing PDA activity in the academic
Good PDA or Good PR? - assessing PDA activity in the
academic library
Briony Heyhoe-Pullar – University of Huddersfield
Steve Sharp – University of Leeds
Background to PDA at Huddersfield
Between April 2010 to April 2014, various PDA suppliers have been used
Supplier No. of titles bought No. of titles imported Dawson 2010 111 Dawson 2011 45 Dawson 2012 131 4921Coutts 454 2559Ebrary 57 53,738EBL 637 132,914Total 1279
61,218
Why EBL?
PDA with EBL ran from 7th February to 13th April 2014
Advantages of EBL include:• Existing Proquest customer so activation of MARC records is easier and
quicker• Like EBL model which includes a free of charge 5min browse period with
unlimited page turns• Library decides on the number of STLs to trigger a purchase• Library can access spend reports and see which titles have been purchased
through LibCentral• Flexible content parameters for each subject • EBL gathers data on who is using the titles
Questionnaire
The 5 questions we asked were:
• Subject area• School• Readership level• Do you have a preference for reading electronic or print books?
(with an option for them to say either p, e, or no preference)• Will you be accessing this book on a mobile device- if yes, what
type?
The set up
• All subjects were included, but only titles published after 01/01/10• Law and computing titles were to be published after 01/01/13• Maximum list price was set at £120• Readership levels were undergraduates and postgraduates• We opted for 2 short term loans before a purchase is triggered• We set the short term loan length at 1 day• We marketed this round of PDA, which we have never done in the past
What we achieved
• Spent the money in 9 weeks• Money spent equated to 20% of the book fund• 6071 titles were accessed• 637 of these were purchases, the remainder were short
term loans
Data analysis
2442
1
268
1312
209
41
16
9
Dewey range
001-099
100-199
200-299
300-399
400-499
500-599
600-699
700-799
800-899
900-999
Data analysis
300-309
310-319
320-329
330-339
340-349
350-359
360-369
370-379
380-389
390-399
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
300s
600-609
610-619
620-629
630-639
640-649
650-659
660-669
670-679
680-689
690-699
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
600s
Data analysis
8%
4%
21%
4%
18%
32%
14%
Percentage by School
Applied Sciences
Art Design and Architecture
Business
Computing and Engineering
Education and Professional Development
Human and Health Sciences
Music Humanities and Media
Data analysis
Applie
d Scie
nces
Art, D
esign
and
Arc
hitec
ture
Busine
ss
Compu
ting
and
Engine
ering
Educa
tion
Human
and
Hea
lth
Mus
ic, H
uman
ities
and
med
ia0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
30%
35%
Average FTE
PDA use
Data analysis
Applie
d Scie
nces
Art Des
ign a
nd A
rchit
ectu
re
Busine
ss
Compu
ting
and
Engine
ering
Educa
tion
and
Profe
ssion
al Dev
elopm
ent
Human
and
Hea
lth S
cienc
es
Mus
ic Hum
anitie
s an
d M
edia
0
20
40
60
80
100
Purchases by School and patron type
Staff
Post Graduate Research
Taught Post Graduate
Undergraduate Year 1
Undergraduate Year 2
Undergraduate Year 3
Data analysis
No preference Print Ebook Both0
20
40
60
80
100
120
140
160
180
200
Format preference
Yes No0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
400
450
500
Mobile device use
Data analysis
Android iPhone Blackberry Phone iPad Kindle Tablet0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
Use by device
Data analysis
Applied Sciences
Art Design and Architecture
Business
Computing and Engineering
Education and Professional Development
Human and Health Sciences
Music Humanities and Media
- 20.00
40.00
60.00
80.00
100.00
120.00
Average book price (£)
Data analysis
1999 2000 2002 2005 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 20140
50
100
150
200
250
300
Year of publication
Recommendations for PDA 2014/15
• PDA to be added to the suite of services that the library offers
• To top slice 25% of the book fund for PDA
• To reduce the years available in the selection pool to increase the longevity of PDA over the year and to leave the subject selection as broad as possible
• To review the number of rentals that trigger a purchase
• To keep EBL as our PDA supplier for 2014/15