Ask-WA Statistics – August, 2009

Ask-WA maintained a busy service during the month of August, with email again outpacing chat service. In numbers:

• Email questions received: 3821
• Chat sessions requested: 3067
• Chat sessions accepted: 2599
• Qwidget requests (% of total): 789 (25.7%)

As a cooperative we maintained an answering percentage of 84.7% for the month, which is lower than in July but remains well over the goal rate of 75%. Keep up the good work! The email aspect of the service remains robust, and outpaced chat for the month. Qwidget traffic remains around 1/4th of the total chat traffic, with the main users continuing to be Seattle Public and UW Libraries.

Kudos – Academic Cooperative

There were only two comments that really stood out in the academic cooperative this month (August is quite slow), so both of them get kudos.

Alex Harding at the University of Washington did an excellent job helping a student at Spokane Falls Community College figure out how to access her library’s electronic resources. These sorts of technical questions are never easy to navigate (ask IT guys why they’re so cranky all the time), but Alex did a fine job and successfully helped the student access the resources she needed. In her survey, the student indicated she was a first-time user and that she would “very likely” use the service again. She left this comment: “Alex was very helpful an patient, although my computer knowledge is limited he was able to guide me through to correct the problem and allow me to get my research data. Thank you.” Great job, Alex!

Our second kudos goes to Jon McConnel at Whatcom Community College. This is Jon’s second mention here in as many months (which should serve as a challenge to the rest of you). Jon helped a student in California with search strategies for an archival course catalog. Though they were not able to find the actual catalog online, Jon did very well in suggesting both search strategies within the library catalog as well as physical locations at which the student could inquire. In her survey, the student indicated that she was a first-time user and that she would use the service again. She left this comment: “Librarian Newton was smart, savvy, and very helpful!” Way to go, Jon!

Kudos – Public Cooperative

For the public cooperative, there were numerous comments that stood out this month. All the same, I’d like to highlight one librarian who did a fantastic job, and also a team of librarians who are consistently providing excellent service.

Jennifer Ashby at the Asotin County Library may not have had the cleanest answer or most perfect session, but her customer service skills were exemplary, and her tone was pleasant and friendly throughout the session. Evidently the patron she was helping really took notice, because she left this glowing comment: “All I can say is that even though I cannot see or hear the person, I could tell they were genuine, friendly and VERY helpful! I am often self conscious when asking questions over the net because half of the time I do even know what I am asking! I get so jumbled in my own thoughts and well I am grateful that someone is taking the actual time to try and figure out what I am trying to communicate! Thank you for asking. Have a great weekend!” In the end, of course, Jennifer did help the patron find exactly the information she was looking for, and she was very kind along the way. Great job, Jennifer!

The BST Department at the Seattle Public Library (Business, Social Sciences, Science and Technology) provided consistently superior service this month, and deserve to be recognized. It is evident that the team works very well together in answering questions, and that each individual is dedicated to providing excellent service to their patrons. The comments for the team highlight the value they are providing in their community:

• I use this service only occasionally, when other resources fail, and it always come through with high satisfaction and fairly quickly.
• I have been using internet almost daily since 1995 and I consider myself to be adept at finding info. I asked a question through this service that I expected not to have an obviously Googleable answer, and still I got an excellent response quickly. I am always impressed by the quality of this service.
• I appreciate the timely and very thorough answers to my questions!

Way to go, team, and keep up the good work!

Some of my other favorite comments in the public cooperative include (parentheses include name and location of librarian):

• Wow! This was very helpful. Thank you for providing this service! I will most certainly use this again. I have seen my children use it but had never taken advantage of the chat line – great! (Jaclyn @ SPL)
• This was so easy, a high school student could do it. It’s nice to get information from REAL people once in a while. (Ellen @ Spokane CLD)
• I had been looking for this book through the internet and it took me so long and I didn’t find it. I should of known I could chat with someone and have them as a professional find it for me! It took them about 1 to 2 minutes! That was awesome! Thanks! (Corrine @ Mid-Columbia LS)
• Fantastic! Help at 9pm on a Friday. I love it! THANK YOU. (John D @ SPL)
• What an amazing service! I am so excited. I love the library and ordering books on line and now this. It is great. (TS @ SPL)
• What a great service! The librarian, Mamie at Sno-Isle, was very helpful and got me exactly what I wanted. (Mamie @ Sno-Isle)
• The person who helped me was very friendly and helpful and I really appreciated the extra efforts she made in order to find what I was looking for. Even though I was not able to see her face, I was still very much able to envision a bright, happy smile from her as she was helping me. Thank you. (Nancy F @ SPL)
• The Librarian was very helpful and provided me the information I needed – thanks for providing this great service! (Rhonda @ Tacoma PL)
• We are so fortunate to have this service available. Incredible! (Joanne @ Sno-Isle)
• David the librarian who helped me was excellent and I loved how he was able to link things that he was talking about directly on to my computer. Fantastic service – thanks for having it! (David C @ SPL)
• All of the librarians I have talked to have been EXTREMELY helpful … I think this is a great idea and you have wonderful people working with costumers! 🙂 (John T @ KCLS)
• Just a huge thank you to the library!!! This transaction took roughly 3 minutes, and the speed of assistance and friendliness was awesome. :B (Bob J @ KCLS)
• This service is the best kept secret in the county! I first used it a few weeks ago when I was frantically trying to recall the name of an author/book series. I had such a positive experience that I decided to use it again with a project I’m working on. What a find! I feel great about how my tax dollars are being spent! (Claudia R @ KCLS)

Kudos – Back-up Librarians

We like to help our own patrons, but we can’t always be there for them. For the most part, the QP back-up staff do a fantastic job. One backup librarian, in particular, did a bang-up job in the month of August. A big thanks to Sarah H, back-up librarian extraordinaire, for providing excellent service to our Washington patrons. This comment exemplifies the quality service that Sarah provides:

“The reason I stated that this is difficult to use is that it is difficult to get a good librarian at times and often the links won’t show up when the librarian is trying to show you something. For example, XXX, one of the librarians I have met through the service added a link, then said hope it helps and goodnight. No “is this showing up?”, “is this what you were looking for?”. I was extremely disappointed. Sarah, who just helped me, on the other hand, was very helpful and asked if things were coming through and gave me great sources.”

Thanks, Sarah!

Great job, everyone, and thanks for making Ask-WA such a valuable service to library users in Washington State. Keep up the good work!