Why Work With an Agent for Your Subscriptions?

Chapter 1: Library Investment in Subscriptions

With increasing pressure on librarians to streamline library expenditures and maximise the use of library budgets, decision makers could consider various strategies to reduce costs and optimise return on investment for library resources. Not all these approaches will be in the best interest of the library and its patrons. We discuss some tactics for managing budget constraints, particularly in terms of subscription products, with Matthew Rice , Regional Sales Manager for the Subscription Services Division at EBSCO Information Services Sub-Saharan Africa .

Consider library investment in subscription products

One obvious strategy to minimise expenditure is to reduce the number of items in your basket. While this might seem like the simplest solution, it will impact the library’s ability to fulfil its primary purpose – the provision of information and supporting student success. There are some additional downfalls with following this course of action. Firstly, once a package or individual title has been removed from the budget wish list, it is usually very difficult to motivate to have it included for the following financial year. Furthermore, unless your library has access to accurate usage statistics across all subscribed resources, making the correct decision on which journals to remove can be problematic.

It is also important to remember that EBSCO’s customer management policy operates on a basis of economies of scale, meaning that EBSCO can offer advantageous pricing across its other product lines, considering the library’s subscription business investment.? This cost advantage to your institution is not replicated amongst all other subscription agents or even on a publisher-direct basis.

If you have any questions about this first topic in our series on the benefits of working with an agent for subscription management, please reach out to your EBSCO Regional Sales Manager or contact our office on +27 11?380 1800 or [email protected]. Look out for the next instalments in this series where we cover vendor selection considerations and strategies for effective budget management.