Librarians statewide to celebrate Ask a Librarian Day – Press Release

Are you having trouble finding out, who invented the stethoscope? Do you want to know, who owns the apartment building on 49th street? Are you sitting at your computer frustrated trying to figure out where to start on your big research project? Live expert help is just a click away with Ask a Librarian. Ask a Librarian (www.askalibrarian.org) is FREE online service for all Floridians.

With Ask a Librarian, you are connected to a librarian who will answer your question right when you need assistance most. It’s easy to use, just go to www.askalibrarian.org and ask your question, a Florida librarian will assist you. Ask a Librarian is a collaborative program by libraries throughout Florida and will provide you with accurate answers utilizing your state and local resources.

“Ask a Librarian is a tremendous resource for students and anyone with a research need. It makes expert librarians available to any Florida resident. Ask a question and within minutes an actual person is helping you. It’s a great feeling to connect with a skilled supportive person and know you are not lost amid a million search results” according to Ask a Librarian Manager, Diana Silveira.

Librarians all over Florida will celebrate Ask a Librarian Day on Feb. 23 to bring awareness to the free online reference service that connects Floridians with librarians for help with homework or general questions.

Librarians at over 106 libraries around Florida will don “Askalibrarian.org” t-shirts and pins and will talk about the valuable service with library customers. They hope to inform people about Ask a Librarian’s benefits so that everyone can take full advantage of this user-friendly service.

Ask a Librarian is available live from 10 a.m. to midnight Sunday through Thursday and 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday and Saturday and 24/7 for email assistance. Visit www.askalibrarian.org for more information or to ask a librarian a question.

Pictures from last year’s event and more information about the service are available at: https://info.askalibrarian.org/aal_day.asp

Ask a Librarian is managed by the Tampa Bay Library Consortium (TBLC), and is funded as part of the Florida Electronic Library (www.flelibrary.org) by a Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) grant.

Participate in VR Research via Phone Interview!

Participate in VR Research via Phone Interview
Dear Virtual Reference Librarian:
Greetings! We are looking for people interested in taking part in an important study of virtual reference services (VRS). We are willing to pay you for your time.
We hope you will be interested in sharing your opinions and insights about live chat VRS in our grant-funded research project titled, “Cyber Synergy: Seeking Sustainability through Collaboration between Virtual Reference and Social Q&A Sites.” We need librarians willing to participate in a phone interview. Please access the following link to sign up for the survey:
The phone interview will take approximately 45 minutes and participants will receive $30 in compensation. All responses will be kept strictly confidential.
Prior to the interview, we will need a signed consent form. When you respond to this email by responding to the above URL and stating that you are willing to participate, we will send you a one page consent form for you to download, sign, and fax back to us. More instructions about this will follow to confirm your participation.
Cyber Synergy will evaluate sustainability of VRS and explore collaborative models for subject expertise among librarians and other experts systems, such as Social Q&A sites. This study is funded by a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services, Rutgers University, and OCLC Online Computer Library Center, Inc.
We, the principal investigators of Cyber Synergy, thank you for your interest in the study.
Marie L. Radford, Ph.D., Associate Professor
Rutgers University
Lynn Silipigni Connaway, Ph.D., Senior Research Scientist
OCLC, Inc.
Chirag Shah, Ph.D.
Rutgers University, Assistant Professor
More information can be obtained at the project website: http://www.oclc.org/research/activities/synergy/default.htm
Questions?
Contact Alyssa Darden at dardena@oclc.org

May 2015 Statistics

On May 1st Ask a Librarian migrated from Oracle Live Chat to Springshare’s LibAnswers.

May 2015 Ask a Librarian Statistics
SourceSessions
Chat3067
SMS847
Email2046
Total5960
Session Sources

Session Sources

LibChat Statistics

Browsers Used
Operating Systems Used
Daily Distribution
Hourly Distribution
Chat Sources

AMP: Ask a Librarian Accelerated Mobile Page

AMP: Ask a Librarian Accelerated Mobile Page

When you search google for “Ask a Librarian” on a phone, the first result is Ask a Librarian’s AMP page. Google shows that this is a valid AMP page by placing the AMP logo and name before the Search Result Snippet.

AMP Specification and page caching by Google result in very fast page loads

AMP logo

AMP logo

Ask a Librarian created an AMP page for statewide chat in August 2016. Chats from this chat widget began the next month.

Conversion Rate of 70.9%

While only 31 patrons viewed this page, it resulted in 22 chats offered. This is an extremely high conversion rate of 70.9%

What kind of questions are answered?

  • Lake County librarian helping Orange County patron place a hold on a book at OCLS
  • Patron wanting an ebook
  • 5th grader needing help with a book
  • Patron having Kindle trouble
  • Patron directed to FLE for databases
  • St. Petersburg Library System librarian helping a Leon Country patron find a book at the Main Library

Who else publishes AMP pages?

Many sites now publish AMP pages. Here are some screenshots from the Google mobile news carousel, which are all AMP pages. img_5379 img_5380 img_5381 img_5382 img_5383 img_5384 img_5385

Page Size 98KB, Load time 0.7s, 4 requests

The AMP specification and Google caching result in a fast-loading page.

Ask a Librarian AMP page search results

AMP page search results

AMP page search results

Ask a Librarian AMP page screenshot

AMP page

Chats from AMP page by Operating System

AMP page chat by OS

Chats from AMP page by Browser

AMP chats by browser

Chats answered and missed

AMP chats offered and answered

AMP chats offered and answered