For the Danish National Library
Authority it was very interesting to see
how this new service would be received
by the libraries and not least by the
actual user (the end user). It was therefore
decided to carry out a user sur vey
of bibliotek.dk in the autumn 2001
almost one year after the opening.
Conclusions
The user survey was conducted by the
firm SITICOM – Fischer & Lorenz and
is based on 1,040 respondents.
It showed that generally speaking the
users are very satisfied with bibliotek.
dk, including both search and order
facilities and they also consider it to be
a user-friendly system.
The survey also shows that any future
development of bibliotek.dk must concentrate
on core services, which means
that focus should still be on sear ching
and ordering materials from Danish
libraries. The main points are improvements
in search and order facilities and
display formats,as well as access to
external databases and reference works.
How many use bibliotek.dk?
Since the opening of bibliotek.dk in
October 2000, there have been 35,000
requests to the research libraries and
225,000 to the public libraries. The tendency
shows an increase in the use of
bibliotek.dk and in September 2001
bibliotek.dk had 50,000 unique users.
63% of the respondents use bibliotek.
dk as a minimum once every fortnight,
of these 9% use bibliotek.dk
daily and 31% use bibliotek.dk once or
twice a week. 68% visit bibliotek.dk
from their own home.
bibliotek.dk has changed the ‘library
pattern’ for a majority of the respondents.
66% have changed their
borrowing habits, which is particularly
manifested in the way they use more
libraries and borrow more books.
Evaluation of bibliotek.dk
The survey shows that 90% are very
satisfied or satisfied with bibliotek.dk.
96% said that they always or as a rule
find what they are looking for, and
89% find the presentation of the search
result easy to g rasp or fairly easy to
grasp.
The respondents answer that they
generally find it easy to o rientate thembibliotek.
selves and navigate in bibliotek.dk.
93% say that it is “very easy” or “quite
easy” to manoeuvre in bibliotek.dk.
The future
The survey unearthed a number of
questions which prompted some
further thoughts on the development
of bibliotek.dk and how bibliotek.dk is
constructed. The importance of the
core services has been stressed and
with this firmly in mind, the course is
set for future improvements.
The user survey is available on the
Danish National Library Authority’s
homepage at:
www.bs.dk... (in Danish).
Translated by Vibeke Cranfield
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