FEATURE Subscription agents


From provider to partner: subscription agent roles evolve


Siân Harris asks four subscription agents about how libraries purchase content and the implications of this for the agent’s role


T


he move from print to electronic journals had a dramatic impact on the creators, disseminators and users of this information. But it also affects another group: the intermediaries –


subscription agents in particular.


‘Agents used to be order takers and care takers but we are not seeing annual calendars for renewal anymore. People purchase all through the year and in a different way,’ observed Zahra Touil, chief operations officer at LM Information Delivery. ‘As an agent our role has shifted heavily.’ ‘When online came along it changed the nature and role of the agents,’ agreed Paul Harwood, general manager of EBSCO in the UK. ‘Online brought consolidation of content and the many-to-many landscape changed dramatically quite quickly. This presented a big challenge to subscription agents.’ He


noted that the market has seen


consolidation in subscription agents with really only three global traditional subscription agents


Language support


Sweden-based Zahra Touil of LM Information Delivery is particularly conscious of the demands of libraries for content in local languages. She noted that with e-books and other electronic resources there has been a trend to publish in English in order to reach a wider market. ‘It’s very English-dominant today. It’s not bad, but we would like the publishing world to remain as diverse as it has been. Librarians ask for local languages, but it’s slow on the


20 Research Information FEBRUARY/MARCH 2014


publisher side because there has not been a good model for this,’ she observed. She noted that libraries with predominantly electronic collections often still need to opt for print books in order to provide their users with local-language resources. ‘Sometimes they have to drop certain subscriptions to get local language materials,’ she said. ‘In the scientific world English is dominant but it’s also really important to keep local languages for heritage.’


remaining. ‘A lot of traditional roles were called into question. Libraries took the opportunity of online to change their own role, to negotiate price and terms of use with publishers. Tendering came into journal supply. The traditional service of supplying journals became a commodity. This made things very competitive and drove the handling charges to almost nothing. There is also the challenge of customers going directly to publishers,’ he continued. ‘Agents have had to get used to a smaller share.’


Big deals and consortia


He went on to explain that there are some deals now that have no agent involvement. ‘There are a certain number of deals that agents are locked out of, for example the NESLi2 deals in the UK,’ he said.


So-called “big deals” where subscriptions to packages of journals are sold together, although sometimes grumbled about, have also remained a big part of library purchases in the online world. As Harwood noted, ‘when libraries have been able to negotiate with the content of big deals they have often found that it is not worth it. The big deal just about suits both parties.’ But, of course, not all publishers offer their journals and other content as big deals – anymore than every library purchases content as part of a consortium – and this is where agents see their role as important. Touil of LM noted: ‘For all agents these are a lot of deals that used to be with subscription agents but we have also seen customers who big deals


didn’t work so well for coming to us. It’s given us the possibility to reevaluate ourselves.’ Finbar Galligan, marketing specialist for online and content at Swets, agreed: ‘Big deals have meant that libraries will go directly to big publishers but the smaller publishers value intermediaries. If you have, for example, five journals you might struggle to get exposure on your own.’


E-books


Another trend that has happened more recently than the rise of online journals is the emergence of e-books. These present a more complicated purchasing picture than e-journals and opportunities for agents to help navigate the market. ‘We try to harvest as many licensing and purchasing options as possible,’ said Galligan. ‘There is a huge buzz about patron-driven


‘Online brought


consolidation of content


and the many-to-many landscape changed dramatically quite quickly. This presented a big challenge to subscription agents’ Paul Harwood, EBSCO


acquisition (PDA) [a range of approaches that essentially mean that libraries purchase e-books based on patron requests or usage]. We partner with big suppliers like MyiLibrary and ebrary to offer their PDA to our customers and we have seen more and more PDA, especially in the last year.’


However, he said that this is usually a percentage of the library budget. ‘I don’t know of a library that’s gone 100 per cent to PDA,’ he said. He added that libraries face a challenge in communicating about PDA: whether to make a


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