I want to publish my scientific work – how? Here we give you the necessary know-how to find a suitable journal and promote your work successfully.

Introduction

Congratulations! You have reached the stage of publishing in your academic career! 

Some scholars say that publishing is the most difficult part of the process, as it is not based on your ability. However, though nobody can guarantee that your paper will get published, you can increase your chances by following some rules.

Keep in mind that what counts in science is clarity, not creativity or personal innovativeness. Therefore following the rules is vital to your research and publishing.

Steps of Publishing

  1. Find an adequate journal/publisher for your paper. It is important to find a journal that addresses your field of study. Elsevier provides a website where you can do just that: Find journals | Elsevier® JournalFinder. At this point, you need to decide if you want to publish with an open access journal, or a subscription journal (pros and cons of both will be listed as a paragraph for itself). Furthermore, make yourself familiar with the indicators shown and what they mean, e.g., cite score (how many citings does an article in this journal receive?) or acceptance rate (what are the average chances of publishing?), as you will be able to decide which journal will be more likely to publish your individual paper.
  2. As soon as you have found the journal (and experts suggest you should only apply for one at a time), you need to adjust your paper to its formal requirements. Usually, this means formatting. Read through all the authors guidelines carefully. Many papers get rejected before peer-review simply because of bad formatting or language. Try to fulfil every requirement, including the formatting of tables, dates etc. Proofread your paper many times and ask your peers to proofread it. Try to neutralise your language and make it as precise as possible. Avoid every unnecessary word or circumscription. 
  3. Now you can submit your work including the paper itself, an abstract, the title, and a letter to the editor where you can justify the importance of your paper. Here are some helpful tips from a professional about the submission: 7 steps to publishing in a scientific journal (elsevier.com).
  4. After submitting, you can track your paper via the website you submitted it and see when it gets reviewed or accepted. If it got peer reviewed, it will be sent back to you with remarks from the editor. Address all remarks. If you agree with a change suggested, change the paper, if you do not agree, you have to justify your opinion thoroughly. Resubmit the paper before the deadline. Before publishing there are some formalities regarding copyright etc. that your journal will inform you about in more detail. Here a helpful link: The Scientific Publishing Process | Elsevier Author Services Blog.

open access vs. subscription journals

The difference between open access and subscription journals is where the money comes from. As the name implies, people have to pay for subscription journals , whereas open access journals are for free. Chances are, you will be cited more often in an open access journal. However, somebody has to pay and in open access journals it is the author. Therefore, it requires more work to publish in open access journals, since you will need to also look for sponsors. 

Of course this is the biggest difference and the matter is more complicated. For further information, these websites gives good insight:

Why do journals ‘flip’ from a subscription model to an open access model? | Editage Insights

Open access vs. subscription journals | ResearchGate

promoting your work

Citings are the currency in which the quality of your paper will be measured. The more citings you have, the more impact you gain and the better your paper will be seen. However, less citings do not mean that your paper per se is bad. Especially if you have published in a subscription journal, the information flow will be more hesitant. Therefore, authors have found ways to promote their work online. Here an article on that:Nine free resources to promote your research (elsevier.com). Additionally, as the VGU library, we promote our own students in the student repository. Please contact library staff in case you need further assistance regarding the repository or other things during research, writing or publishing. We are there to help.

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