The document discusses the evolution of subject guides at the University of Bolton library from 2008 to 2017. It describes how the guides have become more comprehensive over time, providing detailed descriptions of databases and links to additional help resources. Usage statistics show the guides are popular with over 31,000 views of 97 guides. The most viewed guides cover subjects like law, health, and business. The number of questions received about electronic resources has decreased as the guides have improved. Future work includes usability testing and expanding guide content for researchers.

1. LibGuiding the way: new directions
at the University of Bolton
Sarah Taylor
Electronic Resources Librarian

2. LibGuiding the way:
today’s session
• The problem
• Back in time
• Understanding our user behaviour by looking at
enquiries
• The project, design process and end result
• Using guides
• Impact of guides
• Future developments

3. LibGuides: ten years of the dynamic
guide
• Holistic approach to access help required to recognise that electronic
resources access has many elements (Erb and Erb, 2014).
• Basic principle of LibGuides is that it takes the paper guide and makes
it electronic, and as the Internet has grown, these paper guides have
been embedded on websites (i.e. the paper versions are digitised) and
are often static as a result (Giullian and Zitser, 2015).
• LibGuides represent “the democratization of the Internet” (Erb and
Erb, 2014) as it allows librarians to create and maintain library web
pages with little or no web authoring expertise and creating an
explosion of online library guides

4. Once upon a time…

5. October 2008: Hadron Collider and Obama
Types of databases
listed first (with no
information), rather
than actual
databases
Linking out, rather
than providing
information
No explanation of
what the databases
contain, or why use
them

6. October 2008
• Linking out rather
than providing
information
• Subject-specific
information is in
the form of a
workbook, but the
purpose of
workbook is
unclear
• Not clear that the
link to electronic
journals is a link to
a list where titles
must be searched
for

7. May 2012: in training
• Information about
what all these
resource types are
• The concept of a
workbook has been
changed to
Database User
Guide
• Linking out: “more
information” is
useful, but it is not
clear how to access
the resources

8. July 2015: a comprehensive approach
• Access
Discover@Bolton
from here
• Detailed
descriptions of
databases with
recommendations
• Links to further
sources of help
(Quick Start Guides
and a video)
• Tabs to separate
resource types

9. July 2015: a comprehensive approach?
26%
1%
32%
13%
2%
12%
0%
14%
Referrals to Subject Librarians 2015/16
Basic search/Discover@Bolton
Print journals
In depth search Discover/databases
E-access issues
Other online information
Study skills
Moodle
Other

10. Implementing LibGuides
• Understand the issues, create the vision and be mindful of the
“mishmash” of thought between creators and users (Gessner et al, 2015)
• Undertaken during the summer of 2016 and branded as Subject Guides
• Sought examples of best practice, but are very much tailored to feedback
already received and what we already knew about how our users wanted
to access resources and information about services in general
• Each course has its own guide; the idea is that students have a directed
focus, rather than having to visit pages related to a broad range of
topics: a new approach
• Consistent yet subject-specific

11. The LibGuide: take 1

12. The LibGuide: take 1
• Linking out to other places
instead of presenting actual
information
• Databases! Journal articles!
• Jargon
• What are Subject Resources?
• Looks like BISSTO is the only
service (“Looks great… what’s
BISSTO?”)

13. Ask no questions
• The more content is added, the greater the need for granularity of
structure: if the question is “Where can I find…?” then there is a lack of
clarity.
• Subject guides should be compact in nature (Dalton and Pan, 2014);
help guides are more significant in content. Using LibGuides allows
these to be presented together, and this is a key principle.
• Our students sometimes think that “electronic resources” are different
to electronic information sources, i.e. journals and articles.
• All academic content is academic content: there is no difference
between electronic and print sources because that is merely the format,
and in no way indicative of the academic suitability of the content.

14. Using guides: the numbers game
• Subject Guides were made available in September 2016; a small
number of Help Guides have been made live since
• Since then, there have been over 12,700 views of the Subject Guides
homepage (i.e. the complete list of guides linked to from the Library
website)
• 97 live guides have been viewed a total of 31,456 times as of 1st
August 2017
• The most popular (i.e. most viewed) guide has been viewed over 8,500
times since it was made available in September 2016

15. Use of Subject Guides: top 10 guides
Data correct as of 1st August 2017
Guide Views Top page after Starting Point
Law 4010 Databases, journals and articles*
Health and Social Care 1041 Databases, journals and articles
Business Management 997 Databases, journals and articles
Nursing 824 Databases, journals and articles
Psychology 798 Databases, journals and articles
Civil Engineering 796 Databases, journals and articles
Education 760 Databases, journals and articles
District Nursing 748 Databases, journals and articles*
Art and Design 558 Databases, journals and articles
Accountancy 528 Databases, journals and articles

16. How do we know what we don’t know?: email
enquiries
2016/15 2016/17
Total email queries: 81 Total email queries: 62
Electronic resource-related emails: 51
(63%)
Electronic resource-related emails: 41
(66%)
“How do I…” “I can’t do…”
“What can I…” “I have a problem with…”
“I need help with…” “This isn’t working…”
“Where do I find…” “I’m not sure about this feature…”

17. How do we know what we don’t know?: enquiries
22%
5%
20%
16%
8%
9%
1%
19%
Referrals to Subject Librarians 2016/17
Basic search/Discover@Bolton
Print journals
In depth search
Discover/databases
E-access issues
Other online information
Study skills
Moodle
Other
E-resource related queries:
15/16: 71 per cent of total
16/17: 58 per cent of total
Change:
55 per cent decrease
Study skills queries:
15/16: 12 per cent of total
16/17: 9 per cent of total
Change:
25 per cent decrease

18. Reaching further with guides: Research
Support• One of eight live Help Guides to date
• Completely new content: includes a Guide for Researchers (downloadable
leaflet), but also covers open access and REF compliancy, institutional
repository, Research Data Management, sharing research and measuring
impact.
• Linked directly the from Library homepage: no navigation required.
• Over 2,200 views this academic year making this one of the most popular
guides overall
• Most popular sections are Research at the University of Bolton and
Referencing and Managing Research.

19. Reaching further with guides: next steps
• Consider usability across a range of student types and survey users (via
LibGuides!)
• Use this work to improve visual presentation of content, for example,
consider students’ experiences of social media and how this might translate
into expectations for how a guide might look (Conerton and Goldenstein,
2017).
• Create a comprehensive range of Help Guides and Resource Guides that
acknowledge variations in learning styles.
• Create Staff Guide to provide detail on resources and resource acquisition,
usage of resources and user education, for example.

20. Bibliography
Conerton, K. and Goldenstein, C. (2017) Making LibGuides works: student interviews and usability tests.
Internet Reference Services Quarterly, 22(1), pp. 43-54
Dalton, M. and Pan, R. (2014) Snakes or Ladders? Evaluating a LibGuides pilot at UCD Library. Journal of
Academic Librarianship, 40(5), pp. 515-520
Erb, R. and Erb, B. (2014) Leveraging the LibGuides platform for electronic resources access assistance.
Journal of Electronic Resources Librarianship, 26(3), pp. 170-189
Gessner, G. et all (2015) Are you reaching your audience? The intersection between LibGuide authors and
LibGuide users. Reference Services Review, 43(3), pp. 491-508
Giullian, J. and Zitser, E. (2015) Beyond LibGuides: the past, present and future of online research guides.
Slavic and East European Information Resources, 16(4), pp. 170-180
Ream, T. and Parker-Kelley, D. (2016) Expanding library services and instruction through LibGuides. Medical
and Reference Services Quarterly, 35(3), pp. 342-349
Sontesby, A. and DeJonge, J. (2013) Usability testing, user-centred design, and LibGuides Subject Guides: a
case study. Journal of Web Librarianship, 7(1), pp. 83-94