Library Out Loud

Congratulations, you’ve published! Now what? If you want your publication to have some impact, you now need to tell people about it.

See how dissemination fits in with your publishing and profile strategies in this short webinar Maximising your citations.

Choose a few dissemination methods that work for you from the many out there. Here are a few to think about…

• Massey channels: Take the help on offer from your unit and Massey, such as media training, Massey News, etc.
• Email signature: even something as simple as including links to your work in your email signature can help.
• The Conversation: a sort of scholarly news website, which allows you to write a newsworthy story on your research in your own words; your story may be picked up by mainstream media if it is topical.
• Wikipedia: this potentially gives the best return on effort vs impact; it’s usually top of Google results; it gets thousands of hits; it’s easy to edit; you can link to your work which may dramatically increase readership if it’s open access. See more on how Wikipedia boosts visibility and readership of your research and Help: Wikipedia editing for researchers, scholars and academics.
• Blogs: can explain research in plain language; gives a preview when not yet at publication stage; counts as “published” for references in Wikipedia. Massey provides an easy to set up blog platform.
• Scholarly social networks: e.g. ResearchGate, Academia, Mendeley. Use these if they suit you, but take care around copyright.
• Social media: e.g. Twitter, YouTube, etc. These are increasingly being measured with altmetrics; they can take a bit of interest, time and skills to do well and build up a good number of followers.

Do what suits you – but do something. Talk to your colleagues or others in your field about what works for them. Perhaps see if they’re interested in sharing the load with a Twitter account or blog. Keep an eye out for other dissemination methods that appeal to you. Experiment – if you’re struggling with one, try another.

Good luck and have fun!