Meet Unifier

Unifier is dedicated to connecting public libraries closer to the lives of their patrons.
Article originally posted on Unifier Blog.

Hi, I'm Timothy Tavarez – I'm the founder of the Unifier project and its Lead Maintainer. I will be telling you why Unifier exists and what we are doing.

History

A brief recapitulation of why we do what we do.

Public libraries are of immense importance to me. I remember vividly the many late evenings spent at the Allentown Public Library until close ... where I used access to the Internet I otherwise could not have, relaxed in a safe environment and read all the Sci-fi and Fantasy genre books I could consume.

I have very little doubt that without the shelter and resources Allentown Public Library offered me; my formative years would have turned out very differently. I joined the United States Air Force after high school (and racked up a rather significant late fee on a book). Note: I did end up returning years later to pay my $22 late fee.

Later in life, as I completed my enlistment with the United States Air Force, I realized there was much I could do for public libraries with the skills I had attained: every digital interaction with my local libraries left me underwhelmed. The systems I had to use were clunky, unfriendly and unstimulating. I envisioned Unifier as the solution that I could bring to libraries.

Enter Unifier

Unifier is a mobile and web application that can be deployed for a public library with innovative and engaging features to connect patrons to their public library and each other. Unifier provides all the functionality that patrons need, and want, in an obsessively user-focused experience. We support deployment to Android, iOS and mobile web.

Half of public library website traffic is mobile, and mobile web/application experiences commonly suck [not all, of course].^[1]

There really isn't an easier way to put this. An average of 50% of the traffic coming to public libraries is through mobile devices. If the experience of accessing a mobile website isn't friendly, intuitive or speedy, your online visitors will not enjoy it or simply leave. It isn't acceptable to have non-mobile optimized websites, and it isn't sufficient to meet the bare minimum of a mobile user's expectations.

Solution: Mobile visitors as first-class visitors.

Unifier is specifically designed and built with mobile accessibility, user experience and speed in mind. The mobile web is rapidly changing, and user's expectations of websites and applications along with it. Unifier makes the experience of visiting a public library both memorable and enjoyable by capitalizing on recent technological innovations.

Public libraries are missing opportunities to capitalize on their existing traffic, and overall website traffic is trending downward (-3% in 2016).^[1:1]

Almost 30% of Americans visit public library websites, and yet it is really hard to compete with the likes of Facebook, reddit and Instagram for your patrons' attention. There is a perfectly good explanation for this: your patrons are off sharing and generating interesting content there, and not on your website. A patron visiting your website will generally have a specific task/intention in mind: browse resources, check hours, etc.

This is a missed opportunity to engage patrons, but mostly because public libraries lack the technological resources, tools and professionals to capitalize on their traffic with dynamic content (hint: a news article alone is not dynamic content).

Solution: Offer a sandbox to your patrons.

Unifier provides innovative and powerful features out of the box to create a sandbox environment for you and your patrons. You can provide your patrons with User Groups, Notifications, Social Feeds and Media Sharing, Reviews, Event Creation and Registration and a variety of other ways that change the dynamic of how your patrons interact with both your library and each other. Your library controls and can moderate the content and capabilities of your system.

Up to 47% of public library patrons don't know what resources or services their library has available.^[1:2]

It shouldn't be a surprise based on the previous two problems that patrons aren't particularly well informed on what their libraries have available for them. Patrons are missing out on potentially life-changing counseling, career assistance, language classes, tax help, or any number of the wide variety of resources or services that their public libraries make freely available.

Solution: Make it easier than ever to discover.

The key to any successful engagement strategy is empowering your users to both find and share interesting content amongst themselves. Unifier bakes in best practice design patterns to make your collections, services, events and a variety of other things really easy to find. Even better, we enable your patrons to discuss those things, share them with their friends and see historical data on it.

Interested in trying Unifier out? Beta test with us (or contact us at contact@getunifier.com)!

Unifier's mission is to innovate on behalf of public libraries; constantly pushing the boundaries of technology and zealously focusing on creating memorable and positive experiences for patrons.