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Yesterday the L-net Quality Team announced that Steph Miller of Multnomah County Library was awarded a Notable Transcript for her chat, Sherwood OR, is that close by?

Steph is the one with the flowers. Also pictured are Emily Papagni, Caleb Tucker-Raymond (both of L-net and Multnomah County Library) and Stephanie Debner (Portland Community College).

The quality team wrote,

This transcript begins as a simple telephone directory lookup; it is the kind of ready reference question that people supposedly don't ask libraries anymore, because, "everything is on the internet". An out-of-state patron asks for the phone number of a Sherwood resident. Steph quickly finds the phone number and confirms that it is the correct number using a second, authoritative source. What really impressed the Quality Team is the nature of the conversation that took place. The patron told Steph that he was trying to reach the son of a Vietnam War Prisoner-of-War. The patron had the father's POW bracelet and wanted to be sure a family member received it. While still chatting online with Steph, the patron called the number. In tears, he spoke with a family member while Steph remained online in support.
 
In the early 1970s over 5 million POW/MIA metal bracelets were made and worn as a symbol of hope. The bracelets transcended politics and were worn by Americans both opposed to and supportive of the Vietnam War.
 
The Quality Team always emphasizes the importance of a friendly, welcoming tone in virtual reference. It was the conversation between Steph and the patron that made what could have just been just another lookup into a meaningful connection with the library. Librarians often talk about how libraries change lives. With Steph's blend of reference skill and compassion, she proves it.

We're not exactly sure how the patron found our service from across the country, but it is possible they searched the internet and found us, or found the Sherwood Public Library's website and then us, but we are glad we are on the internet.

I wanted to make a quick note for anyone who is interested, there used to be a box when you logged into this website for "remember me". I think it was causing problems for some people and making them log in over and over so I disabled it. If the problems don't go away, I'll bring it back.

For now, your login lasts only until you close your browser.

Welcome back to that same old place that we laughed about. The L-net naming team has finally come to a decision, and we've picked a new name, and it is our old name:

Answerland

No name is perfect, but in the end, what is great about the name Answerland is that it champions reference service. It emphasizes the tangible benefit that patrons receive when they ask questions at the library.

It does not emphasize the library itself, though neither does the name L-net. Instead, the library is the context in which people experience the service: most patrons who visit the L-net website got there by clicking on a link from their local library's site.

It will take some time to work up a new logo, a new website and new marketing materials, so we'll keep calling it "L-net" until sometime next summer.

This wasn't an easy decision to make, and we appreciate all of the feedback you have given us recently. I especially appreciate all of the careful planning and thought that the L-net naming team put into this process.

And just what was that process?

1. Ask Librarians

A librarian survey in May revealed that what was most important about a name was that it be memorable for patrons and that it describe what the service does.

2. Ask Patrons

Patrons said that what matters to them the most about our service was "getting help" and "getting answers". They described our service with the words "helpful", "librarian" and "chat".

OCLC and Rutgers' University's report about virtual reference, Seeking Synchronicity, says library patrons like chat for its convenience, authoritative answers and for the friendly people behind it.

3. Come up  with potential names

We contracted a crowdsourcing website, crowdSPRING, offered the best bounty we could, and received over 1,400 entries. The winning entry would earn some cash for the creative person who submitted it.

I encouraged people to submit names that demonstrated that people from the library were online to give you authoritative answers, right now. This is a challenging thing to say in one to three words.

I was active in rating and giving feedback on entries, but he whole naming team helped choose the finalists. They were:

Answer Cafe
AnswerWell
AnswersOnCall
Ask the Librarians
Hello Library
InstaHelp
Just Ask
Mybrarian
My Library Live
Pop A Question

Answerland was not among the submissions, but we were always going to consider it.

4. Ask library staff for feedback online

I reported on the results of our survey to librarians a few weeks ago. The most popular name was "Ask the Librarians", at a whopping 40%. It became clear that whatever name we picked was going to be unpopular with most people, and oddly enough, that gave us confidence to go forward with the name we thought was right.

We used the librarian survey to narrow down what we would get feedback from patrons on. My thought was that it was okay to annoy 60% of Oregon library staff, but annoying 80% was over the line. This left:

Answerland
Ask the Librarians
Hello Library
Just Ask
Mybrarian
My Library Live

5. Ask patrons for feedback online

An online survey of people visiting the L-net website showed that patrons preferred "Ask the Librarians", "Just Ask" and "Mybrarian". I checked the results by hand to make sure they weren't skewed.

6. Ask patrons and potential patrons for feedback in person

We made flashcards of these names, one name per sheet, and asked our friends, friends of friends, families, and people on the street. Patrons we spoke with in person clearly preferred "Mybrarian" and "Answerland".

7. Get professional help

I asked Jeremy Graybill, Multnomah County's Marketing and Communications Director, for help. Which names had the most potential for marketing and promotion? His feedback was that with one exception, "My Library Live", they would all be easy to work with, but he particularly liked "Mybrarian" and "Answerland" - they were most unique in the online space.

We found the same thing in our own research, and also that "Just Ask" related to ask.com, "Hello Library" was used a few times already to good effect, "Ask the Librarians" and its variations would make our service hard to distinguish from similar ones.

8. Debate

Now the hard part: we had to choose a name.

The easy one to drop was "My Library Live". No one loved it, though it did convey what we did, if you already knew about reference service, in a boring sort of way. "Ask the Librarians" eventually fell into the same category.

"Just Ask" was catchy but also a little off-putting. It reminded some people of a local company's famous slogan, which was positive, but for most people, it has a kind of condescending tone. It was out.

My personal absolute favorite was "Hello Library", and I found a few kindred librarian spirits who felt the same way, but patrons did not respond to it either online or in person.

Near the end, we discussed "Mybrarian" and "Answerland" at length.

Mybrarian conveys a personal service provided by a person who works at the library. It is awkward to read and say the first time you see it - it is jarring, and it gets your attention. One patron told us "I can't help but see the word 'brain' here, and I love that".

Answerland emphasizes a place for answers.

Almost everyone in the group was happy with either name. I characterize the difference between them like this:

Answers ... from the library!
The library ... has answers!

But it is easier to make up for the lack of "library" in a name than it is to make up for the lack of description of what the service does. Patrons get to our site by starting at a library website. The library brand is built-in, and that is why we've been able to survive so long with a name that means nothing to anyone.

We thought also about what name we wanted to have in ten years. We don't know that we'll be around, or in what form, but if we are, you'll know where to find us.

The team

Erin Golub, Eugene Public Library
Stuart Levy, Wood Middle School in Wilsonville
Emily Papagni, Multnomah County Library
Kim Read, Clark College
Caleb Tucker-Raymond, Multnomah County Library

One sign that we are doing a better and better job is that the average wait time for a chat is dropping.

In 2010, patrons waited an average of 3 minutes and 16 seconds before being connected to an Oregon librarian. In 2011, with a little more than a week to go, the average is 2 minutes 8 seconds.

Those are just the raw, ugly, averages of course. It includes many patrons that were connected to a librarian in under 20 seconds, and many who waited 10 minutes before the system who timed them out. So it is hard to say exactly what either of the above figures means, but I know that by comparing them, we are seeing a 35% improvement, and that is definitely good.

Here is a graph. The y axis is the average number of seconds a patron waits.

And some raw numbers - this data is for the 'oregon' workgroup, the general L-net service.

If you compare a month's total chats and average wait time to the previous year's, in most cases, there is an improvement in wait time with the same or slightly increased traffic.

Why are we improving? It is hard to say for sure but I have some ideas:

1. More volunteers. We began ramping up our volunteer program in January 2010 and we currently have 46 individuals contributing their personal time to answering questions on L-net.

2. More L-net Local. As more libraries shift to providing local virtual reference instead of sending patrons to L-net, fewer patrons overall are going to the statewide reference service and we are able to serve them better.

3. Lack of promotion. The number of people answering questions has grown faster than but the overall number of people using L-net. The result is better service for everyone.

Here is the data for patrons being connected to AfterDark:

AfterDark's time has increased slightly, and I think that reflects some overall cuts to AfterDark that Ohio's KnowItNow and we agreed on. See also how one very busy day in July 2010 can skew the numbers. The upside is that patrons still tend not to wait as long for them as they do for us.

A few weeks ago, I asked L-net to participate in a survey about our scheduling system, and the results were very consistent. All 7 people said the availability of unfilled shifts and frequency of being notified about them was just right.

But only 7 people? I take it is a good sign that L-net staff have better things to think about than scheduling software, or maybe it works well enough that you just don't have to.

Everyone also said the schedule was hard to find, and most people agreed that it would be just fine if we let someone drop a shift even if they were the last person scheduled.

I made two changes:

1 - You can now drop any shift even if you are the last one scheduled. Previously, the site would stop you from dropping the shift if you were the last one scheduled. Now, if that shift is 48 hours away or less, a message will go out to the list inviting others to pick up the shift. If the shift is between two days and a week away, the message will go out the next morning.

2 - You can now find a schedule tab when you log in to the L-net website, or from the 'Preferences' link underneath your name. Yes, the whole site needs overhauling, but this should help until we get a new name and new site.