‍Extrica is an inventive and fast-growing open science publisher whose approach is built on trust, quality and innovation. Their Journal Home partnership launched six months ago, covering a range of Extrica’s open access engineering journals. In this interview, Mangirdas Ragulskis, Chief Executive Officer, explains what the partnership with ResearchGate has delivered so far.

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Why did Extrica decide to work with ResearchGate?

Extrica’s mission is to ease the process of publishing. We have the ability to work closely with all stakeholders of research – authors, editors, reviewers – and offer them solutions that support their focus on research. Right now, we are very small compared to other publishers, but we see this as an advantage that allows us to focus on quality over quantity and be innovative in every aspect of publishing.

From the very start of my time as CEO at Extrica, I believed that our values aligned with ResearchGate. When we saw the opportunity for such a partnership, we knew it was the right thing for Extrica journals.. I think it’s important to work with an innovative partner and ResearchGate supports our mission, helping us build visibility, reach, and author satisfaction. 

Right now, we are very small compared to other publishers, but we see this as an advantage that allows us to focus on quality over quantity and be innovative in every aspect of publishing...our values aligned with ResearchGate

What opportunities does Journal Home offer a smaller publisher like Extrica?

As a small publisher, we are always thinking about how to attract attention to our published content, and ways to increase visibility for published papers. I think being on ResearchGate gives us that visibility. That is the number one factor why we began this partnership – to get brand awareness for Extrica’s journals. 

The second most important factor is citations. As a result of more visibility, more researchers will find out about our published content this will lead to citations and eventually those researchers choosing Extrica journals for publishing their research. That is a very important thing we are tracking: how people engage with our content and if they are citing and later submitting their research to Extrica journals. Journal Home helps us to build this ecosystem of researchers, because the connections of our current author’s network will become readers of our journals and potentially new authors.

As a result of more visibility, more researchers will find out about our published content this will lead to citations and eventually those researchers choosing Extrica journals for publishing their research

How else is working with ResearchGate benefitting Extrica’s community?

Working with ResearchGate also gives better value for our authors, as their published articles are automatically shared on ResearchGate immediately after being accepted and published online.

Working with ResearchGate also gives better value for our authors

The simple automatic syndication of published content adds to the value we already provide for our authors – easy submission process, convenient peer-review, production and online publication of accepted articles in a matter of a couple of weeks, and now, articles appearing on ResearchGate right after they are published online. That’s a true benefit for our authors.

What have you learned from the process of working together with ResearchGate?

Getting started with ResearchGate was easy, the process was very smooth.

Right now, we only have three journals included, but I think later on we will consider placing all of our journals on ResearchGate. We are tracking the progress of our journals regularly and can see that more and more researchers globally are engaging with our content. More than 90% of the thousands researchers globally reading our content or interacting with our journals on ResearchGate have not yet published with us – we are really growing awareness and engagement with a new international audience. This gives us even more engagement with the tools that we have developed to support innovative publishing and this is super important for us at this stage for improving and innovating in the industry.

It's not easy to be a small player among such large, well-known brands. Nonetheless, we are always learning, and ResearchGate, as an innovator in the industry, helps us learn about the needs of research stakeholders even faster. 

I feel truly supported by ResearchGate as a publisher, they are really looking for opportunities to help us maximise this potential. I greatly value the collaboration.

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To find out more about Journal Home, visit: https://www.researchgate.net/journal-home

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