Banner Pages for Promoting Library Resources and Services

[Gerry Mckiernan]

                       _Banner Pages for Promoting Library Resources and Services_

         Earlier this week I had the pleasure of attending the WiLSWorld 2000 Conference 
[  http://www.wils.wisc.edu/wworld.html   ] in  Madison, Wisconsin and had the opportunity to hear a number of *excellent* presentations. Among these was a presentation by Eric Lease Morgan about his MyLibrary at NCState
project [http://my.lib.ncsu.edu/about/paper/index.html ] , "A Model for Implementing  User-centered, Customizable Interface to a Library's Collection of Information Resources ".

    In thinking about the trend in "personalization" and "customization" it occurred to me that libraries  (and universities) might benefit from technologies and displays that are employed in commercial sites , notably user tracking and personalized/customized  banner ads for products/services.

   In the library environment, I can envision top/side/bottom banner 'ads' that promote various library services/databases/exhibit, etc. At the individual level, I can envision that banner 'ads' being customized to display general and specific services/databases/exhibits that would high relevance to the research interest of the individual.

   At a most basic level, the user profile could be derived from their e-mail profile that at the least would include their general research interest(s), e.g. Anthropology, Economics, Aerospace Engineering, Computer Science, etc. At a more advanced level I can envision an enhancement to the MyLibrary at NCState model such that the expressed disciplines of interest are used as the basis of an interest profile. In either case, upon accessing the library's homepage [either through log-in or recognized IP], the page would display a series of banner 'ads' for appropriate databases, workshops, new books, new journals, etc. that would be of interest to the individual based on his/her user profile.

   I'd very much appreciate learning what MyWebColleagues think about the use of banner 'ads' for promoting library services in general as well as the potential and pitfalls of 'personalized' banner pages. I'd be particularly interested in knowing if there are currently  libraries that make use of banner 'ad's as I envision.
 
   As Always, Any and All comments, suggestions, insights, critiques, criticisms, comments, contributions, etc are Most Welcome.

/Gerry McKiernan
Theoretical Librarian 
Iowa State University
Ames IA 50011

gerrymck at iastate.edu  

BTW: There are plans to link to the Power Point presentations from the  WiLSWorld 2000 Conference site. [ http://www.wils.wisc.edu/wworld.html  ]