1. Libraries, Licenses, Institutional
Budgets, and Consortia:
What’s a Publisher to Do?
Confessions of a Subscription Agent
Dan Tonkery
EBSCO Information Services
November 19, 2003

2. Putting it all together:
Marketing to Libraries
• Students and faculty have adopted e-journals
with great enthusiasm
• Publishers and subscription agents work to
support new workflow
• Major issues now facing libraries are access and
management of the e-resource
• Order set-up and access completed in the same
day

3. Agent’s advice for publishers
marketing to libraries
• Establish an open market without artificial
controls
• Work to simplify the pricing models now in
operation
• Adopt standardized license agreements
• Let the agent do what we do best in terms of
service and support
• Learn to work in Internet time

4. Obstacles to achieving
our vision
• Publishers that limit our access to material
• Complex pricing models that change frequently
• Customer Service or support operations that are
still tied to the print model
• Late announcement of pricing and programs
• Lack of automated processing for e-resources

5. What can publishers do better
at marketing to libraries?
• Marketing has been successful at all levels with
libraries
• Libraries are looking for less work in gaining
access, better customer service, and better
pricing models
• Let the library select individual titles that they
need and avoid the package deals
• Understand the dynamics in scholarly publishing
and be in a position to be innovative