Five Reasons to Try Esearch Teaching/Learning Workshops Eastern Michigan University August 26, 2011 Sara Memmott Emerging Technologies Librarian

What is Esearch? Esearch is the EMU library’s branded version of Summon, one of a few “discovery products” for libraries Discovery products provide – What searchers want: a simple, Google-like search – What searchers need: lots of quality content

1. Search many types of sources printed books e-books articles (scholarly and popular) dissertations music video and more… Compared to Google Scholar: more comprehensive, and more targeted to the library’s subscriptions Not all library subscriptions are included

2. Cross-disciplinary searching Large collection allows for interdisciplinary searching Use subject databases instead of Esearch for: – Special search features – Tighter focus

3. Sort results with facets Focus or expand the results of a search using the facets on the left side of the results. Advanced search also offers search limiters.

4. Online indicator It’s easy to spot what’s immediately available online. Connects to FindText+ to direct you to the library’s subscriptions.

5. Easy for students to use Studies show that most students think Esearch is easy to use. Search is similar to Google – full text searching with relevance ranking. Students can spend more time evaluating sources, rather than searching for them. Significant increases in use of library’s online subscriptions at other institutions with Esearch