Weeding is an important part of the collection development process. This is the technique you use to remove titles from your collection that are no longer relevant or up to date.
Just like you would remove weeds in your garden to make space for sunlight and water for your plants to thrive.
You're likely already weeding your print collection to preserve space on your shelves and hide worn titles, but weeding also has many benefits for your digital collection.
This video is for public library Advantage accounts.
In June 2022, OverDrive made updates to how weeding works in OverDrive Marketplace.
The process of how to weed is unchanged, but it is now available to Advantage libraries.
So what does this mean for you? It means you can weed titles at the Advantage level where you could not previously.
Existing Advantage library user accounts were given weeding permissions if they had all of the following Marketplace permissions already: purchasing, shopping, curate, and reports.
So what titles can an Advantage account weed?
You can weed any titles that are in your Advantage account.
This includes titles owned by your library that are shared through Advantage Plus.
Titles are weeded at the title level not the copy level. So as an example, if you have three copies of The Woman in the Window, and you want to weed it, you would be weeding all three copies.
What titles will you see in the weeding tool for Advantage libraries?
To access the weeding tool, login to OverDrive Marketplace and click the admin tab then navigate to the weeding tool.
Marketplace Advantage users will only see titles in the weeding tool that are owned by their specific account.
Meaning in the weeding tool an Advantage user cannot see consortium only owned titles and conversely a consortium cannot see Advantage only owned titles. It will, however, display Advantage/Consortium ownership numbers when it is a mutually owned title.
Here are some scenarios that may require you to weed.
You should weed when your Advantage account has zero holds and zero copies left on a title that you do not plan to repurchase.
You can weed titles when your Advantage account has a title that is no longer available for sale.
Weeding keeps your collection fresh and up to date for your users.
Weeding allows for an accurate reflection of your digital collection that library users can access. If you don't weed, your users may become frustrated by the lack of availability to borrow titles that are expired and not repurchased.
Some best practices for your Advantage account: We suggest setting up an automatic weeding plan.
Automatic weeding plans will
Weed copies at the advantage account level
When they meet the plan's criteria.
The consortium and Advantage accounts can set up independent automatic weeding plans.
Here are some automated weeding ideas and options. Consider these for your plan.
You can weed titles that are no longer for sale and have no holds.
You could weed all expired titles with no holds.
All titles that are no longer available for sale or all expired titles.
The options are vast.
Check your weeded titles report often for the most up to date information.
Reach out to your territory team if you have any questions or feedback.