How Ingenta's subscription agent program benefits our publisher partners
Many of you will know that, since 1998, Ingenta has been working closely with the major subscription agents to simplify online subscription activation for your library customers. Our work in this area is unique amongst scholarly hosting services, and was pioneering in its use of institutional identifiers to facilitate smooth online access configuration. We recently added a 10th agent to the program, US-based Wolper Subscription Services. Following questions from publishers about how the program works, and how it benefits you, we here present an overview of the service.
How did it start?
The subscription activation program commenced in 1998, when EBSCO began submitting files, on behalf of a subset of our publisher customers, that pre-activated customer access. The program was designed in response to some of the issues we encountered in our early work with agents - for example, much back-and-forth to obtain the right information to enable set-up, and a collection of haphazard communication methods (requests arrived by mail, email and fax, often with follow-up by phone). Back then, publishers had not approved automatic activation by agents, so all requests had to wait in our system for the publisher's approval. This engendered much work for both us and our agent and publisher partners - and it meant longer than necessary delays for library customers. So, we set about developing a system that would enable agents to tell us what should be set up, and asked all publisher customers whether they would allow us to automatically enable access within our system, without further approval being required. Since subscription agents were (and are!) an established and trusted party in the supply chain, most of our publishers agreed to allow agent files to be accepted on their behalf - and the program went live.
How does it work?
We provide our agent partners with a customised web form, which allows them to ascertain the institutional identifier (CID) for each customer. These IDs can then be used to populate a subscription file for each customer, containing - amongst other details - CID, journal title, coverage (i.e. publications year(s)/volume(s) to which the customer is entitled to online access), and publisher reference number. Only titles for which the customer (a) has paid and (b) wishes to access the content via IngentaConnect are included. The files are collated and supplied to Ingenta, where the data within is loaded into our authorisation system to enable online access.
Libraries opt into the program by contacting their agent; IngentaConnect Premium customers can have us take care of this communication for them.
Who's involved?
The following agents already participate in the program (and we are in discussions with several more):
- Brockhaus / German Books
- Celdes
- EBSCO Information Services
- Globe Publication Pvt. Ltd
- licosa
- Maruzen
- OTTO HARRASSOWITZ KG
- Swets Information Services
- USACO Corporation
- Wolper Subscription Services
We also work with a number of others in an offshoot of the main program, whereby agents use a centralised web service to request activation on behalf of their customers. This program does not pre-activate access but does nonetheless reduce the burden of subscription activation for library customers.
What are the benefits?
The primary benefit to publishers is, of course, a happier librarian customer - 73% of our librarian customers cited our agent program as one of the most beneficial features of IngentaConnect. The program saves library administrators time and effort, for although Ingenta's activation process has been praised for its simplicity, use of any such system can be protracted and wearisome if considerable numbers of titles are involved. Nicholas Lewis, Head of Library Collections at the University of East Anglia, says "We find the subscription activation arrangement is a major time saver and it's very reassuring not to have to do all the work twice over."
The program also reduces the number of steps in the authorisation process, which further speeds up activation. It eliminates the need for publishers to act as the middleman, required to pass on to Ingenta information received from agents. And by utilising our institutional identifiers, the program bypasses many of the traditional problems surrounding accurate identification of institutions - an area which is receiving much airtime in the industry of late, and which continues to pose problems for other e-journal providers.
"Our loading of batch files via Ingenta's subscription agent program greatly expedites the activation of online subscriptions for our customers." says Dr Knut Dorn, Partner and Managing Director of participating agent HARRASSOWITZ. "It means we are able to configure several customers' access in one swift transaction, and thus it helps us to meet our customers' expectations of quick and efficient service."
For further information?
Do get in touch with your client manager if you have any questions about the subscription agent program.