Why you should purchase your EBL titles through James Bennett

As the first — and most experienced — EBL provider in Australia, we deliver EBL titles in the shortest and most efficient timeframes for libraries and their patrons. Here are just some of the reasons for choosing to purchase EBL titles through James Bennett:

• One single, familiar acquisitions workflow for both print and electronic materials
• You receive James Bennett invoices in Australian dollars (or your preferred currency)
• We are currently integrating ebooks into our New Title Services
• We deal direct with EBL on your behalf if you have questions about technical matters or licensing
• You can use JBO to see acquisitions information on all your purchases, whether they are print format or ebooks 
• Separate accounts may be set-up to track ordering, invoicing, and selection method (short term loans, demand driven selection, and standard ordering or non-linear lending)

Contact our eResources team today for a brochure on EBL workflows through James Bennett.  We've been partnering with EBL a long time and are still the most experienced of the library vendors in the ANZ marketplace. Go with a vendor you trust.  Contact James Bennett today:

Tel: +61 2 8988 5000
Fax: +61 2 8988 5031
Email: eresources@bennett.com.au

Want to know more about using James Bennett as your print, digital and multimedia library vendor?  Click here for 10 reasons why.  If you want to add to the list, feel free to do so.  We've worked in library supplies since the 1960s and work with public, academic, specialist, government and reference libraries.  There's a reason why we are the leading supplier in the ANZ marketplace.  Use us to find out why!

Read it! Love it? Add Peter James to your Profile

As many of our blog readers know, we have a service called Read it Love it Add it to Your Profile.  Designed for public libraries comfortable with an outsourced model for profiling & selection, it's a way to bring authors to the attention of the libraries and adding them to their existing profile with us.  That way, the next book published by that author will be automatically sent to them and everybody wins - the reader, the library, the author, the publisher, and us as their library vendor of choice.

This month's selection for Read it Love it Add it to Your Profile service is an author already established in the marketplace, particularly in the UK.  Peter James was born in Brighton, England.  He was educated at Charterhouse then at film school. His novels, many of which have been "Sunday Times" top 10 bestsellers, have been translated into thirty languages and, not surprising considering his background, three have been filmed. He actually has a very impressive resume.  We would encourage you to visit his website and read more about him here.

International best-selling crime thriller novelist published in 34 languages doesn't begin to cover it!

Once you realise what an interesting man Peter James is, have a look at his books!  His website presents his titles in a way that filters just the novels featuring Detective Superintendent Roy Grace of the Sussex police force.  Seven books have already been written featuring DS Roy Grace and in an interview with Shots Magazine, Peter James had this to say about his creation:

Roy Grace has indeed been through the grinder, in his private life, both with his beloved Sandy’s disappearance and now Cleo’s perhaps endangered pregnancy… and professionally with a boss who disliked him, largely for his maverick behaviour and tried hard to undermine him.   But he’s a survivor, and above all, he is a good man in a dark world.

We also liked what Lee Child had to say about one of Peter's earlier books - Dead Like You -  "Sinister and riveting, Peter James is one of the best British crime writers". 

 

So with that background information, we'd like to introduce this month's title for Read it Love it Add it to Your Profile - Dead Man's Grip by Peter James.

    “ I want them to suffer, and I want them dead ...   ”

Carly Chase is traumatised ten days after being in a fatal traffic accident which kills a teenage student from Brighton University. Then she receives news that turns her entire world into a living nightmare.The drivers of the other two vehicles involved have been found tortured and murdered. Now Detective Superintendant Roy Grace of the Sussex Police force issues a stark and urgent warning to Carly: She could be next.The student had deadly connections. Connections that stretch across the Atlantic. Someone has sworn revenge and won't rest until the final person involved in that fatal accident is dead.

The police advise Carly her only option is to go into hiding and change identity. The terrified woman disagrees - she knows these people have ways of hunting you down anywhere. If the police are unable to stop them, she has to find a way to do it herself. But already the killer is one step ahead of her, watching, waiting, and ready ...

Is it his most nail-biting thriller yet?  You tell us!  Request a copy at your local library today.

ISBN 9780230747241 | Paperback | 408 pages | published July 2011 by Pan Macmillan Australia

Ebrary, ebooks and libraries

James Bennett will shortly be representing ebrary in the Australasian marketplace.  As many of our libraries would know, ebrary has had a close working relationship with our parent company - Baker & Taylor - for years.  James Bennett has been working with ebrary on integration for the ANZ region for several months now and we're pleased to be adding another market-leading ebook platform to our stable.  Contact us today to discuss James Bennett selecting, profiling and purchasing ebrary titles on your library's behalf.  You can call your nominated Customer Co-ordinator or email our dedicated eResources team.

For those of you wanting to know what took us so long - well, it's been a challenge integrating ebrary into the James Bennett system.  This is not due to our close and long-standing relationship with our other ebook vendor, EBL, but due to the use of the ISBN as the primary identifier in the James Bennett database. Publishers generally use one e-ISBN across multiple ebook systems and platforms.  Our database links one ISBN to a vendor and our IT team has spent years working their way through all the e-ISBN issues including pricing, markets, special prices, loans/rentals, and more.  We won't go into details today but you can probably imagine our relief this project is nearly finished and we can represent many more digital products in future.

That said, we have represented ebrary's subscription product for public libraries for over 12 months.  That was easy to manage in the database and through our Standing Orders area. Contact your account representative for a demo or contact the eResources team to set up a trial for you.

So, want to know more about ebrary?  Here's just a snapshot!

Key features and benefits

• Works on multiple devices
• Contextual linking across multiple online resources with InfoTools™
• Unique ability to upload and integrate a library’s own digital content with DASH! and Software as a Service (SaaS) Shareable bookshelves that automatically store links
• Notes and highlights
• Multiple options for searching and navigating
• Automatic citations when text is printed or copied and pasted into Word or any text applications. Citations include an automatic URL hyperlink back to the source
• Ability to transform text into a hyperlink to a URL of the end-user’s choice
• Text-to-speech and other keyboard shortcuts to assist end-users with special accessibility needs

Platform Overview

• Available in multiple languages including English, Arabic, Chinese (simplified), French, Japanese, Portuguese, Spanish, German, Swedish, and Turkish, with additional languages in the works
• Compatibility with a range of discoverability and technology services including the ProQuest platform, SerialsSolutions Summon™, Ex Libris SFX, Doody’s Core Titles, Eduserv OpenAthens, Shibboleth®, Blackboard, RefWorks, EndNote, Moodle, and moreFree on-demand MARC records
• COUNTER-compliant usage statics

Request a soft copy of the ebrary Pocket Guide for Academic Libraries and the Pocket Guide for Public Libraries, contact Marketing today! 

And of course, order your library's ebrary titles through your trusted library supplier, James Bennett.  We aim to provide you with the best from the digital world with our renowned - and superior - local service.

A formal media release will follow in due course.

An Update on the Course eTextbook Trial

We've recently sent out an update on the Course eTextbook Trial we are conducting with our ebook partners, EBL.  For those not subscribing to the service or participating in the trial, we thought we'd share some news with you here.

Firstly, we are hopeful we can get the trial off the ground in time for 1st Semester 2012.  We know it's ambitious, but we like a challenge!  Subscribers have been told who is on the Steering Committee, which as you know, is being co-ordinated by our Publisher Relations & Marketing Communications Manager, Rachael McDiarmid together with colleagues at EBL.

We have representatives from 20 academic libraries on board for the trial and half a dozen publishers willing to explore eTextbooks in libraries.  Those publishers participating in the trial have asked to review core textbooks that are adopted at the participating institutions.  The Steering Committee has suggested focusing on business & economic titles, nursing, health sciences and law but will consider other subjects.  Local textbooks are the primary interest - afterall, we are working with Australian based publishers on this trial!  Their content is the most relevant to students and we hope there won't be too many hurdles ahead for them with regards to contracts and content management.

Each publisher will be looking at business model (access/loans) and other considerations like chapters, rentals, purchase (print/electronic version), supplementary materials, downloads.  There is much work to be done.  Much to think about but we will endeavour to keep you informed on the more important decisions and models as they develop.

We all need to consider what it is we are testing with this Course eTextbook Trial - what books, what criteria, and how we are going to measure the impact.  As a pilot, we also need to look at how the information regarding the eTextbook is actually conveyed to the student, how is it promoted to library patrons, how do we engage them in the electronic version so we can measure their behaviour?

Do you have any thoughts on these issues?  If so share them here!  Remember, this is an industry trial and something we all have an interest in.  What is it we are testing? How are we going to do that so the results are meaningful to all?

In the meantime, these are the keywords cropping up in our teleconferences.  No doubt they will ring true for everyone:

academics, access models, Adobe Digital Editions, awareness, booking time with the textbook, books on reserve, booksellers, bookshops, budgets, business case, campus booksellers, chapter level, chapter purchase, communication, compatible devices, course book, downloads, EBL, ebook purchase, ebooks, eTextbook, James Bennett, libraries, limit of concurrent users, limited loans, loan restrictions, loans per hour, measurement of turnaways, minimum number of concurrent users, no limits on overall use, patrons, print book purchase, print sales, project, promotion, rental, sales impact, shorter access, stakeholders, students, supplementary materials, testing, testing competing textbooks, testing supplementary materials, textbooks, unique loans, universities, unlimited access.

Staff Focus - Profiling & Selection Executive

Focus On......

This month's Bennett Blurb focuses on Profiling & Selection.  Whether you are a public, academic, specialist or government library, James Bennett can assist with all your collection development needs.  Need support with subject profiles? Opening Day Collections? Spending funds?  In a nutshell, we have the service - and the experience - you need.

One of our most experienced staff is Julie Buckroyd, Profiling & Selection Executive.  She answered some general questions in the Bennett Blurb but she also allowed us to do our own profile of her, here in The Bennett Blog.  How did she get to where she is now? What makes her tick?  Read on and discover for yourself.

Name: Julie Buckroyd
Position: Profiling & Selection Executive

When did you start at James Bennett? 6/6/1994.  D-Day.  (I don't know if that was significant!)

What roles have you had in your 17 years with James Bennett? I started in the Kit area and moved to the Allocation area.  Now all the New Title areas have combined under me!

Describe your job: My role is extremely busy, but very rewarding. Overseeing a team of people and ensuring we have the best coverage of New Titles in all areas and in a timely manner. Making sure that our customer’s profiles are offering them the most appropriate titles. Always looking at the best workflows within the team to make sure that we are covering all the titles that we can and should be.
What do you enjoy most about your job? It is always changing!
Describe James Bennett (as an organisation) in a few words: Dynamic, Local, Knowledgeable 
What would you like customers to know about the work you do? We work hard to ensure full coverage on your profile. We have a great system now that has enabled us to have a better matching and non subject coverage. But the real work happens when the team “find” the first available, or be the first to let you know about a forthcoming best seller. 
What are the challenges you are facing? Local offices of international publishers. Bringing out titles here in Australia months after the US or UK release, and inflating the prices. There have been improvements but we spot every title that doesn't meet our customer's requirements.  And we have to review each and make the best buying decision for our library.
What gets you excited about your day? Waking up! Seriously you can’t make plans about how your day will go, as it will always change.   
What books do you like to read? True crime, crime fiction, and biographies 
Do you have a favourite author?  It changes with every book I read but Jodi Picoult stays there at the top. 
Last book you read? Violent Exposure by Katherine Howell 
Currently reading? The Little Coffee Shop of Kabul by Deborah Rodriguez. 
On the reading wishlist? Probably Cloudstreet so I can make more sense out of the mini series!

If Customers are considering Profiling & Selection Services what are the things they need to consider?  What they will do with their spare time!  (laughs)  No the main things are: what sort of areas they are interested in. Should I just start with an author profile and build up to a full profile? How much money should I commit to Profiling? Do I need to know expenditure in certain areas ie: Adult Non Fiction, Adult Fiction or just overall expenditure?  There's lots of questions but we can assist them along the way.

And if they have any further questions?  Contact me or their sales representative.  


What staff member would you like to see a Focus On here on the Bennett Blog or in our newsletter service?  Contact Marketing on jbmarketing@bennett.com.au and we'll see what we can do!

Read it! Love it? Add Andrew Nicoll to your James Bennett Profile

Before we tell you about this month's selection for the Read it, Love it, Add it to your Profile service, we'd like to congratulate the publisher.  Quercus (UK) was recently awarded Publisher of the Year at The Bookseller Industry Awards.   The company was co-founded in 2005 by CEO Mark Smith and Wayne Davies and they beat seven other nominated finalists, including industry giant Penguin, to win the prestigious award. Past winners have included Little Brown and Faber & Faber, so they are in great company. 

Now that is out the way, we'd like to introduce you to this month's featured author on the Read it, Love it, Add it to your Profile service - Andrew Nicoll.  His second book, The Love and Death of Caterina has us spellbound. Sebastian Barry calls Nicoll "a life-enhancing storyteller, of stellar wit and intriguing depth...pure gold' and we can see why.  We're hooked!

The protagonist is Chano Valdez, a celebrated writer in his South American country.  He pens not just novels, but works of such astounding quality that he is known as the finest of his generation.Unfortunately he's suffering from writer's block and his latest great work comprises the words ‘The scrawny yellow cat crossed the road’. He’s tried all his usual tricks to get back on track - he’s had a few debates with his trusty colleagues at the university, he’s had an affair with the banker’s wife, nothing will work. Until he meets Caterina. Beautiful, young and one of his biggest fans, she has idolised him since she was a child and he has inspired her to write. Convinced that falling in love with her, spending every minute he can alongside her, moulding her to his world, will unlock something and enable him to write, he pursues her and soon enough, he falls headlong into her arms. But it’s only a matter of time before he murders her.  

This book is a great library read.  Andrew Nicoll's first book - A Good Mayor - sold close to 15,000 copies in Australia and won the the Saltire First Book Award.  It has been translated into 20 languages. 

Naturally we're expecting great things from this second book.  With promotion on the Macquarie Radio Network, reviews and promotion in Woman's Day, Sun Herald, Courier Mail, Hobart Mercury and West Australian, as well as some radio interviews with the author - it will be a popular request in your library.

Make sure you have plenty of copies available for your patrons!  

Of course, to ensure you automatically get his third book, add him to your adult fiction profile today!  You can email jbmarketing@bennett.com.au or contact your local sales representative to set this up.  We'd highly recommend it.

ISBN 9781849164719 | Paperback | 358 pages | RRP $32.99

Bibliographic data: helping customers make informed decisions

Bibliographic data.  It is something so important to our organisation and to our customer base.  We source product information from bibliographic agencies, we process thousands of files from publishers and even our parent company in the US keeps us well informed of what is being published in their part of the world.  And of course, there is book-in-hand. 

Good, solid, and reliable bibliographic data makes our business run smoothly - from order placement to receipt to cataloguing, processing and despatch to our customers.  As Australia's leading library supplier, we expect to receive accurate, timely information on both new releases and backlist titles for our customer base.  It is an important part of our trading relationship and the request should not be a surprise for our many publishing partners.

James Bennett has a database approaching some 10 million titles thanks to the growth in ebooks, formats, and the important role of Print on Demand (POD) in the supply chain (which has resulted in a growth of scanned documents and facsimile editions of varying degrees of quality).  More ISBNs make their way to our database every day and some days there is no stopping it.  We are reliant on this information yet trying to set "protection rules" and "exclusions" can be a headache for all involved.   Our customers for example don't want to know about a "dump bin" or "spinner" that has been given an ISBN to help distribution centres get the right POS materials to the right customer.  We don't want colouring-in books and similar materials.  We work on getting the mix right, but sometimes those ISBNs pass right by us no matter how hard we try to implement solid business rules for data.  

But there is a way our customers can make informed decisions when looking at JBO.  

For some time now we have a simple icon next to the data.   That icon tells our customers the edition listed is the one we are promoting, it's the one we are ordering, that we are selling. The JB icon identifies the product that has been selected for New Titles Services and promoted in the Sales Kits.  Our talented and experienced Profiling & Selection staff work with our publishing partners on the "right" editions to promote. And of course, they also make business decisions based on other factors in the supply chain - availability etc - which would also come with a icon and this brings us back to bibliographic data....

Dirty data is the bane of our lives yet there are still too many people in the book supply chain simply don't "get" how important bibliographic data is. Catalogues are still printed with wrong ISBN, price, binding, and publication date information.  You can almost forgive a printed catalogue or Advanced Information Sheet - they are prepared in advance and changes to the publication process cannot be accommodated in time.  But Electronic files, that's another story.  We have the ability to keep up-to-date with these changes - as long as publishers provide the latest information, even if it's reliant on manual data entry.

We have to interpret book information in a way that produces the best outcome for the customer. That includes websites and ecommerce sites from our many publishers and distributors - where correct title information is essential.  Display the correct information and more than likely you will get the order.  Display the wrong information and you will have additional costs for your business while you work out how to best handle the non-conformances.  Thanks to the internet and ecommerce developments, we believe that what we read on screen is correct and we get disappointed when our expectations are not met.

Whether we are talking bibliographic files or information sourced over the internet, James Bennett staff have to select the most appropriate title so the library gets the correct book (with the correct binding, price and release date) that they ordered for their patrons.  It isn't rocket science, but no matter how the industry tries to improve their service and information sent, there are roadblocks, exclusions, and errors that we have to work with.  But trust those "in the know".  Let our experience guide your selection.

Our library customers should trust the icon.  It provides peace of mind and a degree of certainty with their purchase.  If in doubt, always contact your James Bennett Customer Co-ordinator on their direct email or phone, or send us an email at info@bennett.com.au   We want to help you make the most informed purchasing decision.  

The icon is just one of the ways we do that.

_______________________________________________

And if you are a publisher reading this, wondering if you are giving us good data - just ask us!  For specific data enquiries please email and we will do our best to answer your questions.  We also have Guidelines we can send you that covers our requirements for AI title information, images, and electronic bibliographic files.   Email our Publisher Relations & Marketing Communications Manager for your copy.