2024 Year in Review
In 2024, BiblioCommons focused on helping libraries enhance their online experience to match modern users’ expectations and boost patron engagement through improved discovery, personalization, research, and analytics. The BiblioCommons community continued to collaborate, grow, thrive, and stay connected through webinars, virtual meetups, and BiblioCon ’24.
Increasing Patron Engagement through Research and Analytics
Powerful Patron-Focused Analytics
In 2024, BiblioCommons provided a summary dashboard using the BiblioCommons AnalyticsPlatform. This summary dashboard is available as part of any BiblioCommons subscription and helps each library identify trends in key user events or actions across BiblioCommons products. It is a multi-page report built in Looker Studio (formerly Google Data Studio).
As the BiblioCommons Analytics Platform continues to evolve, libraries are leveraging its powerful patron-focused analytics to gain insights into online patron behavior. The BiblioCommons team is also using the new analytics capabilities to run a series of A/B tests to research effective online content strategies for public libraries and their audiences. These tests are all documented and shared with Partner Libraries to improve the effectiveness of the online library experience and to increase patron engagement across all public library websites.
To further support library staff with metrics and analytics, BiblioCommons expanded its consulting services to provide GA4 and BiblioCommons AnalyticsPlatform support, training, and custom reports—all of which have been highly appreciated and utilized by public libraries of all sizes.
Gaining New Insights from Email Marketing
In the past year, BiblioEmail’s functionality was expanded to A/B testing, giving library staff the power to experiment, learn, and ultimately increase patron email engagement. Library staff are now able to run tests on subject lines and email content to see what resonates best with their email recipients. Plus, BiblioEmail has introduced heatmaps for emails, offering a clear visual representation of which areas of an email have received the most clicks. These heatmaps make it easier to evaluate patron interest and level of engagement with the library’s email marketing efforts.
Evolving Online Patron Experiences through Discovery and Personalization
Browse and Discover Transforms the Online Patron Experience
The BiblioCore discovery layer is taking search and discovery to the next level with Browse and Discover, an all-new, library-curated browsing experience. Designed to increase catalog user activity and adoption, Browse and Discover combines powerful library customization with the personalized, intuitive user experiences patrons enjoy from modern streaming services and eCommerce websites and apps. Unlike commercial websites and apps, Browse and Discover is built with library values at its core and prioritizes user privacy.
The Browse and Discover experience starts with a custom BiblioCore homepage and will expand through additional pages and personalized features for logged-in patrons to encourage deep exploration of the catalog. Staff will have the flexibility to showcase everything from seasonal reading lists to Libraries of Things to archival collections, as well as create evergreen pathways like browsing by age group or genre, new and on order, best sellers, and much more. If a library is a consortium member, each consortium library will be able to customize its own Browse and Discover experience. If a library subscribes to non-English languages, a homepage can be created for each language to feature content relevant to that audience.
Every feature of the Browse and Discover experience, starting with the library-curated homepage, will be rigorously tested and improved using the BiblioCommons Analytics Platform. Libraries will be able to use the BiblioCommons Analytics Platform to view their own data and make informed decisions about their curation of Browse and Discover.
Columbus Metropolitan Library was the first Partner Library to implement the new Browse and Discover homepage in April 2024. Additional testing and development continued throughout 2024, and additional libraries will preview the new Browse and Discover experience as it continues to develop in 2025.
New and Improved Curated Lists
Curated staff and patron lists of recommended books, movies, music and more have been a long-standing and beloved feature of the BiblioCore discovery layer. In 2024, they were completely redesigned with an all-new layout and exciting new features. Many libraries have already started using the redesigned lists and all remaining libraries will follow suit in 2025 as they become the modernized default for everyone. The new layout was the result of extensive patron and library staff research, and introduces a clean visual design, enhanced accessibility, and an improved print view. The new lists display all formats per title (one of the most desired enhancement requests by Partner Libraries), and has full instrumentation for the BiblioCommons Analytics Platform to track and enhance patron engagement via lists.
New BiblioCore Consortium Functionality
BiblioCommons has developed and tested new BiblioCore functionality to better support libraries within consortia. With this update, member libraries will be able to highlight and showcase their local collections first while still providing easy access to the full consortium’s collections. This new functionality has successfully completed testing and will be live with libraries in early 2025.
BiblioApps Integrations, Consortium Support, and Enhanced Discovery
The BiblioApps team expanded the app’s functionality by enabling Browse and Discover to give users additional ways to explore a library’s collection. The team also integrated BiblioWeb content, making it easy for libraries to feature their news, online resources, and blogs directly in the app. Additionally, BiblioApps now has new consortium-friendly functionality that allows member libraries to use unique branding and library-specific settings.
In addition to big development projects with the BiblioCore catalog, a number of library-staff-requested enhancements were developed and released into production. These included support for Syndetics Unbound, new formats to support Libraries of Things and archival collections, improved library staff tagging, and enhanced consortium functionality.
Personalized Library Experience and Patron Customization Options
To create a more personalized and engaging experience for library patrons,BiblioCommons continues to develop tools and options for patrons to customize their library experience.
‘MyEvents’ is now live for all libraries that subscribe to BiblioEvents. This new feature allows users to easily track and manage the events they plan to attend, or have attended, right from their library account. With seamless integration between BiblioEvents and the patron’s account, users can organize their events alongside their checkouts, holds, and other library activities, making their experience more convenient than ever.
Another commonly requested feature, custom calendars for BiblioEvents, was launched in2024. ‘Create PDF’ within BiblioEvents allows users to generate a printable PDF document that displays a customized, library-branded event calendar based on the patron’s interests, such as preferred branch, and more.
BiblioApps now has more personalization features. Patrons can customize their home screen to create a bespoke experience that features the content that is most relevant and interesting to them.
Offering the online library experience in the patron’s preferred language was also a focus across BiblioCommons products in 2024 to expand personalized features. For example, BiblioEmail provides the option for patrons to indicate their language preferences, allowing library staff to create targeted email segments indifferent languages. BiblioWeb also supports multilingual content, so libraries can now leverage the Language Taxonomy to identify content by its primary language. Applying the appropriate language term ensures that screen readers can use the Language & Region sub-tag to deliver the correct pronunciation and accent, so a Spanish-language page, for example, is read with authentic Spanish pronunciation instead of English.
A Vibrant and Connected Community of Libraries
Learning, Sharing, and Thriving Through BiblioCon, Webinars, Virtual Meetups, and Library Visits
BiblioCommons hosted several community-building opportunities throughout 2024. Webinar topics included everything from marketing and advocacy to the details of using theBiblioCommons Analytics Platform to gain insights into the patron online experience. BiblioCommons also hosted quarterly virtual meetups for BiblioWeb libraries and for Readers’ Advisory discussions.
BiblioCon ’24 marked the fifth year of the online patron experience conference. With 400 total registrations, BiblioCon ’24 was online and featured 25 sessions over 2 days, with 33 speakers from across public libraries, and an additional day of Office Hours sessions with the BiblioCommons product managers. In the post-conference survey, 92% of participants said they were likely or very likely to attend BiblioCon again or encourage others at their organization to attend. The BiblioCommons team is busy planning BiblioCon ’25, which will take place in person, in Toronto from October 8-10, 2025. More information about the upcoming conference will be shared soon!
Welcoming New Libraries to the BiblioCommons Community
BiblioCommons welcomed many new libraries in 2024, including Sonoma County Library (CA), Plymouth District Library (MI), and Coquitlam Public Library (BC), who subscribed to the BiblioCore discovery layer. Burlington County Library System (NJ) andEvanston Public Library (IL) subscribed to the complete digital experience platform that includes a completely integrated experience between BiblioWeb, BiblioCore, and BiblioEvents. The list of 2024 libraries joining BiblioCommons is not all-inclusive, and additional names will be shared as their agreements allow.
Additionally, several Partner Libraries expanded their BiblioCommons subscriptions by adopting BiblioWeb to benefit from the complete digital experience platform. These Partner Libraries include Johnson County Library (KS), Ocean Free Library (NJ), and Muskegon Area District Library (MI).
As more libraries joined the BiblioCommons community, long-term Library Partners collaborated with the BiblioCommons team in sponsored development and research designed to further support the online library experience. The BiblioCommons team looks forward to 2025 and deepening patron engagement through personalization, transformative discovery, research and analytics, and leveraging new technologies.