Widgets

Ask a Librarian widgets embedded on a web page allow your patrons to contact you by chat, SMS, or email without leaving your website. Chat widgets are created to match the look and feel of your library website. It’s best to place widgets in header or footer sections so they appear on each page of your site for ease of access to your reference support. Contact the Ask a Librarian Helpdesk to add or modify a widget for your library.

Chat can be configured as button, embedded, floating, or slide-out. Here are some samples of widgets currently being used by member libraries.

A floating widget is a small icon button that sits at the bottom of a web page – found at the bottom right corner of this page.

Floating widgets open a proactive dialog window, to ask patrons whether they need assistance based on a set number of seconds.

A slide-out is our best-used chat widget, reaching the most users to provide support.

And example of the slide-out widget is located at the top-right corner of this page. Slide-out widgets open a proactive dialog window, to ask patrons whether they need assistance based on a set number of seconds.