Findability: Information, Not Location

Session A305 Findability: Information Not Location University Library University of Michigan Mike Creech Web Content Manager [email_address] Ken Varnum Web Systems Manager [email_address]

Introduction/Overview
A Brief History of Our Version of Reality
The current collection of sites for the Library System has grown with no particular plan and each one has its own design and architecture.
The sites correspond with previous library organizational structures but really make no sense to our users or even to some staff members.
Beyond basic information, users need to know which of the libraries holds particular materials and how to use the site of that library.

What We Have Now
About 33 sites served from lib.umich.edu
About 52,000 pages of content
Does not include:
Public Health library
Digital library
Scholarly publishing
Institutional repository
Every month
Average of ~3,000,000 pages viewed
Average of ~500,000 users served

My God, What Have We Done?

You get the picture

"I Can't Find Anything."
This is how the problem was presented
In discussions with management and staff:
Navigation to known objects difficult
Search & findability a challenge
Branding (as we’ve seen) uneven at best
Sense of place totally absent

Phased Approach
A band-aid Consistent navigation and branding
Major surgery Reinventing the entire web presence

Short-Term Goals
Standard global navigation
Extending “MLibrary” branding
More consistency in layout
Brought content into sharper relief
Moved toward unified web site for system

Phase I: MLibrarification
This included most of the library sites.
Goal: Consistent navigation and sense of place
Out of scope defined by
Significant programming overhead
Significant complexity of pages
Volume of usage vs. size of site

More MLibrarification
Reviewed navigation elements each site used
Created a global scheme to incorporate consistency
Extended the MLibrary brand
Preserved local autonomy over look and feel of each site’s content during the transition

Long-Term Goals
Engineer a more effective search solution
Break down the silos that hold our information
Create an ordered and consistent navigation scheme
Provide users an opportunity to build pathways we did not see

Phase II: Information not Location
Eliminating silos
Fostering community
Highlighting context
Improving findability
Syndicating content

Phase II: Process
Focus Groups
Formal Survey
One Question Survey
Server Access Log and Google Analytics Analysis
Initiate on-going conversations with MLibrary stakeholders
Review and assess existing content

What We've Found
Users want importance to be obvious
Users don’t differentiate between silos, tools and services
Users come to the library website with a task, not necessarily a resource in mind

Process So Far
Generated buy-in from administration
Extended the brand across all sites
Established Advisory Groups
Approach
User Interface Design
Information Architecture
Technology
Faculty
Communicating with library staff
Team blog
Staff newsletter

MTagger: Down with Silos!

Collections
Five at present
MLibrary
Mirlyn
Digital Images
Scholarly Publishing
Other
In development
MBooks
Link Resolver

Getting Stuff Out
RSS Feeds
API
JSON
PHP
Styled HTML

Tagging from Tag Cloud

What Gets Tagged

Who Does the Tagging

Next Steps
Select and implement a CMS
Select an open-source search tool
Develop the information architecture and user interface for the unified web presence
Migrate content and applications into the CMS
Production server live by end of year

Questions?

Thank You http://lib.umich.edu Slides http://www.varnum.org/papers/cil2008.ppt Mike Creech Web Content Manager [email_address] Ken Varnum Web Systems Manager [email_address]

Findability: Information, Not Location

by Ken Varnum on Apr 10, 2008

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Findability: Information, Not Location Presentation Transcript