​​Publishers: The risks of poor metadata
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For publishers, high quality metadata are the building blocks to any commercial arrangement and business modelling. The consequences of not addressing metadata issues are significant: alongside the well documented impact on discovery, usage, and impact, publishing values will be undermined, reputations damaged, and business opportunities jeopardized. In summary the risks of poor metadata practices are (in alphabetical order):
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Harder contract negotiations and customer dissatisfaction
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Loss of control in the open data ecosystem
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Misattribution of scholarly work
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Non-compliance with industry standards
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Operational burden and higher cost
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Reduced discoverability, usage, impact and submissions
Go here for more insights.
The benefits of getting it right
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We have talked about the risks, but now the good news for publishers of investing in improving metadata quality:
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Business Insights: Enhanced management information and better opportunities for portfolio management
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Customer Insights: Greater insights into your customers and authors
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Stakeholder and Customer Support: Improved services for research funders, institutions, and consortia
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System Integration: Full integration into the scholarly communications ecosystem, resulting in greater potential impact
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Research Integrity: Support for upstream editorial and research integrity objectives and thus better support for your authors
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Discoverability: Enhanced visibility to improve readership and citation
Best Practices
Accurate and efficient “each stage: first time right”
The Data Quality Challenge invites you to lead the change
Real-world successes in upstream metadata
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Complete and correct metadata for author affiliations and research funding are essential. The most effective approach? Fix it upstream.
Integrate metadata creation - collection, quality control and updating - in your systems and workflows before publication, and relay it throughout the editorial, production, and publication processes.
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Below, we've gathered real-life examples of publishers putting this into practice. Use these best practices as inspiration for strengthening your own approach. ​Get inspired!
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Lead the way by committing to continuous data improvements
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Demonstrate support for this collaborative, cross industry initiative and create positive brand associations
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Invest in your future by committing to continuous data improvements
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Increase efficiencies – get it right first-time round, cheaper and more efficient than fixing it later
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Improve internal management information
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Develop more effective integration with the complex OA ecosystem.
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Improve customer relations by supporting their data needs