Alma supports a comprehensive and sophisticated Trial workflow for e-resource material. The option to run a trial or evaluation prior to purchase significantly assists staff in the decision making process. Trials and evaluations can be limited to a select group of participants, or can be made open to the public.

The trial record includes a survey form with questions that can be defined for the e-resource package, or chosen from a pool of questions. Participants are notified of the trial and are requested to fill in the form. Further instructions, annotations or comments can be added as needed (at the top for a general note and for each question of the survey form):

Apart from a pool of questions, you can easily add questions, with the following answering modes:

Scale of satisfied (for example, 1-5)

• Yes/No
• Free text
• Multi choice
• Single choice

You can also define if an answer is mandatory, if it allows to be commented and give notes (the "Label" field can be used to put a note in front of the comment field):

Before sending the survey form to trial participants you can also preview the form from the trial record:

For each response, the trial manager or operator has the option viewing graphic display of the response results. This can assist in formulating a decision about whether or not to subscribe to the package.