Librarygame
Evaluating gamification as a means of increasing
customer engagement
Dr Kay Munro
College Librarian
University of Glasgow
Ciaran Talbot
Library Systems
University of Manchester
The University of Manchester
The University of Glasgow
Phillip Capper: http://www.flickr.com/people/42033648@N00
Librarygame
• Librarygame?
• Why we’re interested
• Project so far
• What next
Librarygame
Joint project with University of Manchester Library
Running In The Halls
working with software developers - Running in the Halls
Librarygame means points, badges and awards!
The Librarygame software aims to
provide a user interface that gives
students a more social, enjoyable,
motivating, and engaging
experiencing.
Users will get points, badges and awards
for entering the library, borrowing and
returning books and using e-resources as
well as additional social learning rewards,
such as leaving reviews on items borrowed.
what is gamification?
It’s about adding elements of games to non-game activities & situations
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points
badges, achievements, rewards
challenges, leaderboards, competition
Makes the task more fun and more social because you
can share all this information with friends & classmates
why gamification – what does the research tell us?
Gamification programs can lead to the increase in the use of a service and
change behaviour (Zichermann & Cunningham, 2011).
Gamification in the library sector specifically, suggests that if users have a
positive and meaningful game-based experience that is closely connected to
the underlying non-game setting (the library) then it will result in longer-term
& deeper engagement between participants, non-game activities & supporting
organizations (Nicholson, 2012).
why are we interested?
Data from the JISC funded Library Impact Data Project at the University of
Huddersfield seems to have established a correlation between library usage
and student attainment.
Data captured from our LMS shows that there are a small, but significant
number of students, who appear to have no / very little engagement with
the Library.
Our aim for Librarygame is to use as a tool to encourage new students to
become (and remain) actively engaged with the Library.
We also wish to investigate the potential of Librarygame or particular
elements of Librarygame as a tool for existing students.
why are we interested?
• Feedback from Eureka! Student Innovation Challenge
• Providing a sharing platform, tapping into the ‘Learning Black Market’
• Serendipitous resource discovery and increased breadth of reading
project aims
To manage the implementation of Librarygame as a full service,
including desktop and mobile versions, at the University of
Glasgow Library (and Manchester!) from 2014/15 academic
session.
To evaluate the effectiveness of Librarygame - to measure its
impact as a tool to encourage students to become active users of
the Library by engaging them in the activities we know are linked
to academic achievement.
project aims
Critical Success Factors
• Effective engagement with stakeholders to ensure the
project meets the needs of all key stakeholders.
• The key success factor will be the full implementation of
Librarygame as a service (both desktop and mobile versions)
from the beginning of the 2014-15 academic session
• To evaluate the effectiveness of Librarygame software
from wireframes to product: getting initial user feedback
In October 2013 we ran focus groups to get feedback
on the concept & on specifics of look, feel and
terminology used in the product. Three focus groups
of UG students from three distinct groups:
1. Level 1 students (Freshers)
2. Level 3/4 students who use Library regularly
3. Level 3/4 students who don’t use the Library
regularly
initial feedback – what did we learn?
Freshers loved it!
Loved the concept
Loved the look
Understood the terminology
Loved the challenges & badges
Would use it
Levels 3 / 4 students
Not quite so enthusiastic
Not so sure about the badges & points
Liked & would use the sharing elements
: Book Review / Rating etc.
initial feedback – what did we learn?
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It’s all in the name
Librarygame
BookedIn
Positive towards sharing
Careful about privacy
getting started with Librarygame
signing up
privacy settings
what does Librarygame track?
bookshelf
Librarytree also provides a visual record of the items you
borrow / view – this is a screenshot of my bookshelf
rewards - reviewing, rating and recommending
challenges & badges
test, test & test again
Since the software was installed on
our servers and linked to our
systems we have run two tests to
check stability & reliability of the
services & run one focus group
with gaming students
The two tests highlighted issues
with platform stability and recurrent errors which had to be
addressed before being able to
launch the beta version to our
whole user community
next steps?
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beta version now live & we are
beginning to gather information and
feedback from real students about the
service
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e-resource integration using RAPTOR
data – summer 2014
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launch of the mobile app – summer
2014
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launch a full service in Sept 2014…
Manchester student feedback
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“I can see the library that I've been to-amazing!”
“Found the article I was looking for,
downloaded it, went back to see the result on
BookedIn but nothing shows.”
how does it work?
Access control system
Polling
Library Management System
API
Integration server
Librarygame server
Shibboleth/EZProxy server
the e-resource capture challenge
If you use EZProxy/Shibboleth:
E-resource provider
Shibboleth authentication
Librarygame server
the e-resource capture challenge
But if you don’t…:
University of Manchester IP
range = 130.88.xx.xx
Therefore no authentication
required
E-resource provider
User IP 130.88.123.456
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Librarygame server
launch & evaluation of service
Launch a full service in Sept 2014
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Main focus on new 1st year undergraduates
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Marketing campaign during freshers week to recruit
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Marketing campaign aimed at continuing students with a
focus on specific features of the service.
let the World know?
decision by committee
decision by committee
launch & evaluation of service
Monitor the use of Librarygame and evaluate the impact
of Librarygame on user behaviour
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Work to a set of agreed measurements with the University
of Manchester Library & RiTH
Collect regular data from Librarygame and from our LMS
and other available datasets to compare Libarygame users
and non-users
Gather regular user opinion
launch & evaluation of service
?
Lingering gold
Thanks
Kay Munro
University of Glasgow Library
kay.munro@glasgow.ac.uk
@kayjmunro
Ciaran Talbot
University of Manchester
ciaran.talbot@manchester.ac.uk
@ciaran_talbot