Publication strategy

• Publish where you best reach your intended audience.
• Publish in a high-quality and well-renowned journal. Read more below.
• Ensure that the journal or publication series typically includes the subject you are writing about, especially if your research is interdisciplinary.
• When choosing a book publisher, examine the quality of the publisher’s previous releases of similar titles.
• If possible, publish with open access to increase dissemination and accessibility, and to retain the copyright to your work.
• Investigate which databases and search services index the journal or publisher, so that your text can be found by others.

• Evaluate previously published material. Is this a context where you want yourself and your research to be visible?
• It should be clear who publishes the publication, and there should be clear contact information on the website.
• If the journal/publisher uses a payment model with publication fees, the cost of publishing should be clearly stated and easy to find.
• The journal or publisher should have clear information on how they handle ethical issues and conflicts of interest, for example, by adhering to COPE’s guidelines.
• Clear information should be available about the peer review process. Check that it aligns with the standard in your specific field.
• If the publisher is a member of relevant professional organizations, such as COPE or OASPA, it is a quality indicator.
• That journals are indexed in relevant and quality-controlled bibliographic databases is a quality indicator. This may include subject-specific databases and the journal evaluation tools listed below under Tools.
• It should be clearly stated who is part of a journal’s or publication series’ editorial board. The editorial board should consist of experts in the field represented by the journal.

In the scholarly publishing market, there are a number of less reputable actors who are more interested in financial gain than in scientific quality. In addition to assessing a journal's quality according to the criteria above, you should watch out for the following signs, which may indicate a less serious operation:

• The publisher has launched an unreasonably large number of journals in a short period of time.
• Few articles per issue, sometimes with the same author appearing in several of them.
• No or unclear information regarding publication fees.
• Unrealistically fast peer review process.
• Fake bibliometric figures such as Journal Impact Factor, or questionable metrics like Universal Impact Factor or Global Impact Factor.
• Editorial board members who lack academic competence in the subject. In the worst cases, the individuals are either fictitious or unaware that they are listed as editors.
• Aggressive email marketing. They often request submissions with reference to something they claim to have read or seen at a conference.
• The publisher and/or journal has names, logos, and/or websites that closely resemble those of established and reputable journals/publishers.
• There are examples of journal hijacking, where an exact copy of a well-known journal’s website has been set up online with the aim of deceiving authors into paying publication fees. Stay alert!

The library is happy to help you assess the credibility of journals or publishers if you are unsure.

Web of Science

A database that maps citations in journals selected according to strict quality criteria. In the sub-database Journal Citation Reports, you can find various metrics on journals’ impact.

Journal Citation Reports

Scopus

Scopus functions similarly to Web of Science but has a partly different selection and different metrics for measuring journal impact.

Scopus

Google Scholar Metrics

In Google Scholar Metrics, journals’ h-index is presented, calculated from Google Scholar data. Since there is no quality control of the journals in Google Scholar, the data is of lower quality than in Web of Science and Scopus.

Google Scholar Metrics

Norwegian Register for Scientific Journals, Series and Publishers ("Norwegian list")

Journals and publishers classified by level of scholarly quality.

Norwegian list

Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ)

A database of peer-reviewed open access journals.

DOAJ

Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB)

A database of open access books published by quality-assured publishers.

DOAB