[WEB4LIB] Re: What is the value of a library web site? [hits or requests?]

[Mark Ellis]

Joyce,

Do you mean 11 million hits (i.e. files--.html, gif, etc.) or 11 million
requests (i.e. pages)  Hits aren't a  particularly useful measurement.  I
know this is beside your point, but I worry that these terms are often used
interchangeably. 


Mark Ellis
Manager, Reference and Information Services
Richmond Public Library  
Richmond, B.C.                      
(604) 231-6410
www.yourlibrary.ca


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Joyce M. Latham [mailto:latham1 at students.uiuc.edu]
> Sent: Tuesday, August 14, 2001 1:07 PM
> To: Multiple recipients of list
> Subject: [WEB4LIB] Re: What is the value of a library web site?
> 
> 
> You are of course correct.  But for libraries what can we consider a
> return on investment?  For instance, the Chicago Public Library gets
> over 11 million hits a month, but, basically, so what?  The value of
> that web site is not for sale -- i.e., no advertiser is going to get
> access to it.  I don't think, anyway ...
> 
> Now, any vendor who wants to make some kind of contribution to CPL to
> further some programming objective as a corporate partner may 
> get their
> name tied into a logo that promotes the project, but you can't really
> sell that because there is no staying power beyond the exposure of the
> project.
> 
> There may be some political payoff in terms of the municipal 
> government
> -- i.e., we get this much traffic and that's more news about 
> our locale
> getting out there -- simple PR -- but there never has been a way to
> really balance the ROI in libraries, particularly public ones.
> 
> Any thoughts?
> 
> Joyce
> 
> rich at richardwiggins.com wrote:
> > 
> > All of that adds up to the cost of the site -- fixed and 
> recurring costs of building it and maintaining it.  I think 
> Kati is looking for both sides of the equation: the 
> investment, and the return on that investment.  In other 
> words, showing how much benefit is returned to the 
> organization for having spent all that money.
> > 
> > A lot of public libraries gather lots of statistics about 
> usage and about budgets, making it possible to calculate 
> things like books checked out per citizen per annum.  There 
> will always be lots of intangible benefits whose value is 
> hard to quantify.  There might be some useful ideas in the 
> literature on corporate intranets and on CRM or SAP systems.
> > 
> > /rich
> > 
> > On Tue, 14 August 2001, "Joyce M. Latham" wrote:
> > 
> > >
> > > Having managed a fairly large web site myself, I would 
> simply look at
> > > human hours for development and maintenance of the 
> *site*. You would
> > > have to begin with average weekly scheduled time, and then add
> > > high-pressure development hours -- when a site has to be hastily
> > > developed for some key political or economic event.  We 
> never did any
> > > outsourcing of anything so I can't speak to those kinds of costs.
> > >
> > > Question: If you are using any subject specialist 
> development, do you
> > > include them in the cost?  For instance, if the Business, 
> Science and
> > > Technology librarian is helping to maintain the content 
> for the BST
> > > pages on the site, do you include the cost of their 
> contribution?  Or,
> > > if their contribution would not be outsourced, do you 
> leave it off?
> > >
> > > and then there are the hardware costs -- main server, 
> backup server,
> > > development server, development workstations -- and the costs of
> > > maintaining those, along with periodic upgrades ( all 
> servers must be
> > > identical).
> > >
> > > Joyce
> > >
> > > Sunner wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Hi all,
> > > >
> > > > I'm working on a ROI of the Information Centre for 
> management and am trying
> > > > to find out if there is a formula for valuing a web 
> site. I've done return
> > > > on investment evaluations on other aspects of 
> information services before,
> > > > but nothing I have is adaptable to a web site. To date 
> I have failed to turn
> > > > up anything useful.
> > > >
> > > > If anyone has any leads, ideas etc it would be greatly 
> appreciated.
> > > >
> > > > Many thanks.
> > > >
> > > > Kati
> > > >
> > > > "... knowing that to be a librarian was to come as 
> close as any human being
> > > > can to sitting in the peak-seat of eternity's engine."
> > > > - Stephen King
> > > > ___________________________________________
> > > >
> > > > Kati Sunner
> > > >
> > > > Federation of Education Unions Information Centre
> > > > 120 Clarendon St. Southbank Victoria 3006 Australia
> > > > Telephone: +61 3 9254 1800 Fax: +61 3 9254 1805
> > > > Website: http://www.feuic.org.au
> > > > E-mail: katis at feuic.org.au
> > > >
> > > > Alternate e-mail: sunner at bigpond.net.au
> > > > ___________________________________________
> > >
> > > --
> > > Joyce M. Latham
> > > GSLIS -- University of Illinois
> > >
> > >    "Strictly speaking, there are no enlightened people; there is
> > > only     enlightened activity."  Suzuki Roshi
> > 
> > _____________________________________________________
> > 
> > Richard Wiggins
> > Writing, Speaking, and Consulting on the Internet
> > rich at richardwiggins.com  http://richardwiggins.com
> 
> -- 
> Joyce M. Latham
> GSLIS -- University of Illinois
> 
>    "Strictly speaking, there are no enlightened people; there is
> only     enlightened activity."  Suzuki Roshi
>