tri-university group primo usability study

TUG Primo Central Usability Study

Randy Oldham

Web Development Librarian

University of Guelph

Who we are…

Tri-University Group (TUG) Consortium of three university libraries in

Ontario, Canada: University of Waterloo Wilfrid Laurier University University of Guelph

ExLibris Products we share:

• Voyager• Primo• Primo Central

• bX Recommender• SFX• Verde

About our institutions

U Waterloo U of Guelph Laurier

# of Undergrad Students

28,200 18,296 14,536

University employee FTE

1901 2340 -------

Library employee FTE

118.5 95.4 61

ACQ Budget 6.9 Million 6.8 Million 3.1 Million

Primo Implementation Team

Primo Implementation Team: 7 members total from all three

institutions: 1 systems guy 2 programmers 2 cataloguers 2 web developers

The cataloguers and the web developers were responsible for the trial and final implementation of PC

Initial Trial Launch

Based on several other Primo implementations U of Utah

U of Auckland

U of Iowa

Initial Decisions

Primo Implementation team initially decided on three tabs

Web and Information Architecture cross functional team at Guelph Recommended having no tabs Single search box for Guelph 3 tabs for Waterloo and Laurier Compare user feedback with our consortial

partners

The Design – Waterloo / Laurier

Waterloo and Laurier 3 tabs: Blended, Primo only, Primo Central

only Tabs have quick limits that can be applied

The Design – U of G

U of Guelph Single search box No tabs, no quick limits

The Trial Launch

Waterloo & Laurier launched as separate trial, parallel to existing non-Primo Central primo view

Guelph replaced access to it’s Primo-only view, essentially forcing patrons into the PC view.

Feedback links on the Guelph PC view shunted patrons to a quick three-question survey…Random PRIZE: one of five $10 gift cards for campus food services/textbooks/gifts

The Survey Responses

88 responses

Generally +ve staff vs users

Number 1 +ve: Easy to use

Number 1 –ve: How do I find a known item?

Immediate tweak

Changed facet order

Before: After:

Usability Studies – UW

@ U of Waterloo Purpose: to discover how uWaterloo

students, faculty and staff use PC, what they like, and what they dislike.

Came up with specific scenarios: “Please search for the journal article title

Strategic decision-making. Could you tell me if you find the search results easy to understand? Why, or why not?”

“I’d like to draw your attention to the facet ‘Expand beyond library collections’. Before I ask you to click on it, could you tell me what it means to you?”

Usability Studies - UW

UW Participants: Undergraduates: 38 Graduates: 32 Faculty: 2 Staff: 4 Alumni: 1

UW Incentive Prize: iPad 2 Lots of feedback to help with labels and to

get direction. Lots of non-PC related comments.

Usability Studies - UG @ U of Guelph (True usability) Participants completed 4 real-life tasks.

Before the tasks were assigned, users were asked pre-test questions and after the test a number of follow-up questions were asked. Use PC to find information on

something that interests you, or that you expect to be researching in the near future.

Take some time to look at the results of your search. What have you found?

Usability Testing - UG

UG Participants: 3 Undergraduates 4 Graduates

Incentive: $10 Dollar gift card for campus food/gifts/textbooks

Learned a lot about GENERAL principles of discovery vs. search and user expectations…less about the actual PC labels etc.

Usability Testing - UG Also did group interview with Library staff

from Learning &Curriculum Support team and Research Help Team How do you use facets/with students? When do you use Adv search/with

students? How effective is PC to find what

you/students need? What has PC been good/lousy for What do you wish PC could/not do? Has the availability of PC changed your

search habits?

The Final Launch Decisions:

Primo Implementation Team (PIT) Review all input:

Staff survey results Patron feedback Usability feedback Staff group interview feedback WIA feedback

Mock-up new labels and do some final testing…

Guerilla Testing

Guerilla Testing

Guerilla Usability Testing

Other Decisions:

Removed “CITED ARTICLES” facet Removed “EXPAND BEYOND

LIBRARY COLLECTIONS” facet Changed search scope names to

match tab names

Modified availability labels (for consistency

Launch Date:

FULL launch date with all new changes is MAY 1 2012

Wish us luck!

IMAGE: hellojenuine

Randy Oldhamroldham@uoguelph.ca

References:

List of Primo Sites

Guelph Primo Central View Waterloo Primo Central View Laurier Primo Central View