The document discusses how academic libraries can understand student needs and market their services effectively. It emphasizes the importance of understanding who your customers are by mapping their journeys and identifying pain points. Libraries should also identify key performance indicators and internal service level agreements to define what excellent service looks like. While customer support is often seen as a cost center, it can boost loyalty if structured properly as an extension of marketing. Ensuring staff are trained, empowered and engaged is critical, as the quality of service depends on the staff experience.

1. Dr Sonya Campbell – Perry
Head of Customer Service,
The Library
Glasgow Caledonian
University
“Marketing academic
libraries and
understanding students
needs"

2. “Do you know what ‘they’
want, and can you actually
give them it?”

3. Higher education (HE) has become
a crowded global marketplace
and, as such, is not immune to
changes affecting 21st century
society–—an increasingly global,
digital, and dynamic environment.
There is a general consensus that
the future of academia is and will
be complicated, challenging, and
uncertain; some authors view this
future with optimism, whereas
others foresee doomsday scenarios
(Pucciarelli & Kaplan, 2016).
THE CURRENT
CLIMATE-
GLOBAL HE

4. Libraries and library
professionals face multiple
challenges in meeting user
needs in the second decade of
the new millennium. This is
particularly true in academic
libraries where students and
faculty demand and expect
fast, easy, and seamless access
to information as well as
flexible, comfortable places to
work alone as well as
collaboratively with colleagues,
friends, classmates, and
instructors (Seal, 2015).
THE CURRENT
CLIMATE –
GLOBAL
LIBRARIES

6. WORKSHOP OUTLINE
Understanding your
‘customer’ needs
and expectations
• Who are they? Are they
just students?
• How do you find out
what they want?
• What do they want
versus what you think
they want?
• Why does it actually
matter?
Telling your customers
(and everyone else)
what you can deliver
• How do you manage
different expectations?
• How do you deliver
great services on a
budget?
• How do you become
consistent and
comfortable enough
about your services to
shout about what you
do?

7. And the importance
of language……..
UNDERSTANDING
YOUR CUSTOMER

8. Research has shown that students
can and do feel they are, at times, a
customer within their student
experience (Dougas & Douglas,
2015; Tomlinson, 2016; Millward,
2016).
Cuthbert (2010) states that HE has a
distorted view of how other sectors
behave toward their customers,
and as a result ‘..generalise
inappropriately from experience as
customer in other settings’
(Cuthbert, 2010, p.12).
IF THEY
THINK THEY
ARE
CUSTOMERS?

9. WHO AM I
TO
DISAGREE?

10. ‘..the goal should be to
understand the unique
and particular status of
the students as a
customer, which is one
that by necessity must
bridge the
public/private nexus.”
(Pitman, 2016, p.357)
STUDENTS
AS
CUSTOMERS

11. Customer Service
Excellence defines in
Criterion 1 that you
provide high levels
of customer insight
and can evidence
how you know who
your customers are.
WHO ARE
YOUR OTHER
CUSTOMERS?

12. CUSTOMER
INSIGHT CRITERION 1.

13. HOW DO WE KNOW
WHAT THEY NEED?
We ask them
Surveys
Focus Groups
Feedback
Working groups
Students Association
Student employability
Mystery shopping
UX
We ask ourselves
Customer Journey
mapping
Horizon scanning
Life through a lens
Peer to peer
Review of KPIs
Library Strategy and
operational plans

14. Take 5 minutes, and in groups
discuss how you identify your
customer needs and
expectations?
HOW DO
YOU
KNOW?

15. Students tell us they want:
The three A’s (and 1 C)-
Access, Attentiveness,
Availability & Communication
(Douglas et. al.,2015)
[Understanding student satisfaction and dissatisfaction: an interpretive
study in the UK HE context].

20. We say they need four C’s
Library professionals have always given
customer service high priority, and through
the information commons (IC) model they
have seen an opportunity not only to meet,
but exceed, the expectations of library
users by fulfilling the IC’s “4 C philosophy”
of connectivity, collaboration, creation of
knowledge, and community” (Seal, 2015)

22. Why
does it
matter ?

23. Bad experiences drive customers
away – fast.
• Globally, consumers would stop
doing business with a company
due to unfriendly service (60%),
unknowledgeable employees
(46%), and lack of company trust
(50%).
• Speed and efficiency (80%);
knowledgeable and helpful
employees (78%); and convenience
(77%) universally matter most.
[pwc.com, 2018]
DELIVERING
EXCELLENT
EXPERIENCES

24. Satisfied students can be more self-confident (Hasan & Subhani,
2016).
Gibbs (2015) suggests that satisfied students are more likely to be
happier students, and as direct a result are more deeply engaged
with their role as a learner, than those being made to feel unhappy
by their student experience. This suggests that in order to increase
student engagement with learning, universities should be paying
attention to satisfying student expectations, in order to support
successful learning outcomes.
There is a need for HEIs to ensure they are well positioned in a
competitive market place and so must deliver quality services to
gain competitive advantage. For this to occur institutions need to
understand the expectations and experiences of their students or
customers, in order that any expectation gaps are identified and
resolved (Giannakis & Bullivant, 2016).

25. MARKETING YOUR
EXCELLENT
SERVICES
“In a connected world,
customers are no longer
willing to wait to get
answers. They want to be
able to reach out in an
ever-increasing number of
methods, including phone,
email and social media
channels. You need to
monitor all of them, and
constantly be on the
lookout for what
customers are saying
about you” (Forbes.com,
2018).

26. ENCOURAGE A DIFFERENT
VIEW
Inward looking Outward looking

27. • They deliver the
experience
• They identify the
problems & barriers to
excellence
• They identify the future
developments and
innovations to
continuously improve
• They are your service
experience
BE
CAREFUL
WHICH
LENS YOU
PROVIDE
YOUR
STAFF

28. “The way you treat your employees is the
way they treat your customers” Richard
Branson.
“Brands won’t be able to solve
their CX problems with
technology alone – it’s just an
enabler... Instead, they must
find a way to create an
experience that blends
consumer demand for tech
with their strong desire for
authentic, personal interaction.
They don’t need to look far,
though – employees hold the
key to creating and sustaining
great interactions with
consumers” Forbes.com (2018).
“You’ve got to start with the customer experience and work
backwards to the technology, Steve Jobs”
International 2018 survey
Sixty four percent of consumers
feel companies have lost touch
with the human element of CX
75% of Consumers Around the
World Desire More Human
Interaction;
65% of U.S. Consumers Find a
Positive CX to be More Influential
than Advertising
(Pwc.com (2018).

29. Staff provide the story for
your customers to talk
about. They are ‘the
organisation’ from your
customers viewpoint.
STAFF ARE THE KEY TO A
SUCCESSFUL MARKETING
CAMPAIGN

30. In his book Descartes Error, Damasio (2018),
argues that emotion is a necessary ingredient
to almost all decisions. When we are
confronted with a decision, emotions from
previous, related experiences affix values to
the options we are considering. These
emotions create preferences, which lead to our
decisions, and how we feel about our choices.
An important foundation to build an
organisations emotional link to its customers
can be found in its ‘narrative’— the story that
communicates ‘who’ it is, what it means to the
consumer, and why the consumer should care.
This story is the basis for brand marketing and
promotion (Forbes.com, 2018).
STUDENTS
READ AND
EXPERIENCE
THE STORY

31. STUDENTS THEN
TELL THE WORLD!
(QUICKLY)

32. 1. Understand who are your
customers. Spend time on their
journeys by using Journey
Mapping. Make the time to map
out the important/main customer
journeys, and identify where your
customer may need some
assistance. What are your touch
points, are there any PAIN points?
All of these events trigger unique
opportunities to provide an
excellence service and tell a
fabulous story about your excellent
services which can then be retold
by your customers!
IN
SUMMARY:
SOME
ACTIONS

33. 2. Identify Target KPIs And Internal SLAs. What
does excellent service look like? Set up your targets
and metrics to deliver what you understand to be
your customers expectations. By defining these
internal metrics, you show staff what an excellent
service looks like. A word of caution, ensure staff
are equipped and able to deliver the processes and
tasks you will hold them accountable for delivering,
otherwise metrics will not achieved, staff will
become demotivated and ultimately your service
delivery will suffer and customer expectations will
not be met.

34. 3. Budget: Many organisations treat customer
support as a cost centre. However, if you
structure your team and your messaging
properly, you can boost your customer loyalty,
and have customer support be a marketing
function rather than an afterthought.
Culturally all members of your team should be
viewed as customer facing and therefore
responsible for the marketing of your service.

35. 4. Understand your Staff: Your
service and the resulting satisfaction
from your service is only as good as
your staff allow it to be. Your focus
needs to be on your staff journey
first. Do they know what excellent
service looks like? Do they find it easy
to deliver excellent service? Are they
trained? Are they empowered? Are
they motivated and engaged?

36. SIMPLES!