Pacifichem 2015 talk about ways researchers can optimize the discoverability of their published manuscripts.

1. REACHING YOUR TARGET
AUDIENCE AFTER PUBLICATION
Laura Stemmle, PhD
Product Manager
Research Square

2. EFFECTIVE RESEARCH COMMUNICATION IS
IMPORTANT
Developing a strong reputation among international peers
• Citations
• Invitations to present
• Tenure and promotion
Forging new collaborations across fields
Communicating impact to funders
Sharing findings with the public and policy makers
Attracting students and postdocs

3. *The STM Report, 4th Edition, March 2015
LITERATURE VOLUME IS HUGE
29,000 peer reviewed, English language
journals
2.5 Million articles per year
Growing annually by 3%

4. BROWSE HAS BECOME SEARCH

5. RESEARCHERS ARE USING GOOGLE TO FIND
LITERATURE
0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
Article databases
Search Engines
Direct emails
eTable of contents
Social media
Lab webpages or blogs
Press release sites
Other
*August 2015 researcher survey, 1555 responses (collaboration between NPG and Research Square)

6. OPTIMIZING DISCOVERABILITY

7. STRUCTURE YOUR PAPER FOR SEARCH
Use keywords effectively
• Select keywords based on who you want to find your work
• Use these keywords throughout the abstract
• Use key phrases (think in search terms)
• Avoid repetition – use synonyms

8. STRUCTURE YOUR PAPER FOR SEARCH
Optimize the title
• Lead with keywords (first 65 characters)
• Include acronyms
• Explicitly express the finding
Example:
Instead of: “The influence of dietary status on the cognitive performance of children”
Try: “Cognitive performance and diet in children: evidence that low glycaemic loads are
beneficial”

9. STRUCTURE YOUR PAPER FOR SEARCH
Use headers throughout the paper
Create vector-based images, tables, and graphs
AFTER PUBLICATION:
Add links to your article (especially from .edu sites)

10. SELECT THE BEST JOURNAL
(BEYOND IMPACT FACTOR)
Open access or non-restrictive licensing
Indexed widely
Supports authors in promoting articles
Has a mobile-responsive site

11. CREATE NEW CONTENT
Short descriptive title
Written summary for a general audience
Short video explaining the key findings
Blogs
• Add your article DOI to any new content
• Reference the funding information (funder and amount)

12. CREATE NEW CONTENT
Short descriptive title
Written summary for a general audience
Short video explaining the key findings
Blogs
• Add your article DOI to any new content
• Reference the funding information (funder and amount)

13. VIDEOS
Michael Dickey Lab
Chemical and Biomedical
Engineering
NC State University
>800,000 views

14. VIDEOS
Other formats
• Author on camera, giving a short talk about the paper
• Interview
• Slide show captured on video software (Camtasia)
• Video footage and/or animation with narration

15. VIDEOS: RESEARCH SQUARE
Trial with Nature Publishing Group (NPG)
• 30 articles from 8 NPG journals
• ~3 minute video summaries of the articles for a general audience
• Posted on YouTube and linked to article
• Tagged with keywords in YouTube
• Shared with authors for further dissemination

16. VIDEOS: RESEARCH SQUARE
Goals:
• To develop the video summary service and get feedback
• To understand the operational processes and cost
• To determine the effect of video content on article metrics

17. VIDEOS (NATURE TRIAL EXAMPLE)

18. NATURE TRIAL RESULTS
On average, articles with videos
had:
• 67% more article views
• 531% higher Altmetric
scores
than matched papers without
videos*
*papers from the same journal and issue
treated similarly by NPG press site

19. DISSEMINATION OF ARTICLE-
RELATED CONTENT

20. PROFESSIONAL NETWORK SITES

21. HOW DO RESEARCHERS SHARE THEIR
WORK?
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60%
Research Gate
E-mail
Google Scholar
Linkedin
ORCID
Facebook
None of above
Twitter
Mendeley
Wikipedia
YouTube
Loop
F1000 Posters
Wikiversity
*August 2015 researcher survey, 1555 responses (collaboration between NPG and Research Square)

22. LAB OR INSTITUTIONAL WEBSITE
Consider designing your
own page
Keep content updated
• Recent publications
• Upcoming talks
• News
Link to your publications
and other resources

23. PRESS
Sources of Press Releases:
• Your university or research institute (Press Information Officer or PIO)
• Wants to highlight work being done at the institution
• Works with the author to write an accurate press release
• Has personal contacts at media outlets and knows where to send
the story
• The journal (or publisher) that will be publishing your paper
• Your funder
Important: a press release requires the press officer to know about the
finding before it is published.

24. Explain
Share
Measure
Downloads were 19% higher for articles explained
and shared using the Kudos toolkit*
*From a 2013 pilot

25. Scholarly content discovery and
promotion platform
• “We recommend” list of related
papers on journal article pages
• Reaches over 8 million unique
scholarly readers per month
• 87% increase in median article views
at 6 weeks
• Guarantees at least 100 additional
article views in 1 month or less

26. SUMMARY
You can be proactive about getting your published articles discovered:
• Structure your article for search optimization
• Create new content related to the article
• Look for ways beyond the journal to share your story
• With your professional network
• On your lab and institutional websites
• In collaboration with the press
• Consider third party services that help promote your work
• GrowKudos
• TrendMD

27. THANK YOU
Contact:
laura.stemmle@researchsquare.com
Research Square Booth is #226
www.aje.com
www.researchsquare.com
Video summaries: https://www.youtube.com/researchsquare