Whether you’re chomping at the bit or dragging your feet, sooner or later Duplication on Demand service will be coming to all NLS network libraries. As we get deeper into implementation processes at more and more libraries, we want to make sure we’re sharing what we learn with the rest of you, to help things go as smoothly as possible.
A big thing that we hope you’re hearing is that the time to work on your cataloging is now.
As you switch your patrons to Duplication service, they will very suddenly have access to your entire catalog of DB titles. That includes:
- Almost a decade of Retrospective titles, which you may not have done any cataloging for since no copies were ordered or expected.
- Anything and everything from Copy Allotment that you requested only 1 copy of, because it wasn’t a subject your patrons had much interest in.
- All of those titles you returned all of your copies of through the XESS process.
This can and will be a huge benefit to your patrons, as they will be able to receive their requests and reserves faster than ever, read series in order, and have access to all the classics and old favorites they may have had trouble getting before.
It can also have its pitfalls, especially if your catalog hasn’t been kept up. But don’t panic! You still have time to fix things.
Take a look at your catalog, and come up with a plan. If you have questions or need help strategizing, we’re here to help!
Some things to check on or try out:
Is this subject set up in your catalog and applied to titles that you don’t want circulating except on request?
- No Local Subjects
Make sure your back catalog can circulate (or be excluded!) appropriately. Run a “PDQ – Missing MARC Tags” to find titles with few or no 690s.
- Missing Exclusion Subjects
The Merge Queries feature in version 7.7 enables you to query for information that isn’t on a record, and this is a good time to use it! Run a query for books with “Strong Language” in the annotation, and select any result to get the search into your “recent queries list. Then, run a query for books with your strong language subject code or codes (likely SL). Use merge queries to subtract the second search from the first, and you’ve got a handy list of books that need their exclusion added! (Then, you can do the same for violence and sexual content.)
This version 7.7 feature will help you apply exclusion headings from the Rating Unrated Books project, or add new Local Subjects to appropriate titles quickly and easily.
- Series Info
As you add new books to those long, sprawling series... take that as a reminder to do a book search for the series and see if those older titles are cataloged as part of the series, or if its missing some of its lower numbers. Also take a look at the Link Titles screen: titles listed there will count as HasHads for the listed title.
- High Demand Requests
The “HD Titles – Requests” report can help you find titles with many outstanding requests. The listed titles (especially those with a high requests-to-copies ratio) are likely to see a big spike in circulation; make sure the cataloging is good so they can keep going even to patrons who didn’t think to ask for them.
- Outdated Requests
Do your patrons remember what they requested 3 years ago? 10 years ago? Think about how far back you want to serve request lists, and let us know if you want to clear out some of those ancient requests.
