Libraries face difficult decisions when renewing journal subscriptions. Typically, they rely on metrics like usage and price, but this only tells part of the story. Decision Metrics 2.0 provides a more comprehensive view by gathering additional data on journals, including how much the institution's authors publish and cite each journal, and what proportion is already open access. This enriched data is mapped and linked to research output to connect acquisitions to institutional research. It provides pricing, usage, publication, and citation data in one place to enable better analysis of cancellations and alternative subscription scenarios. The aim is to offer libraries improved decision support when evaluating subscriptions.

1. Decision Metrics 2.0
Problem
Every year libraries have to make tough calls
at renewal time – Which journals should be
renewed and which must be cancelled.
Libraries typically resolve to metrics,
to support decisions.
The metrics typically include only usage
data and price. However, how much a
journal is being read, is only one side
of the story.
The impact of a cancellation can be harder
than the usage-stats indicate.
Process
We started by asking the following
questions about the journals:
How much it is being published in?
How much it is being cited by the
institutions authors?
How much of it is already Open Access?
We mapped the answers to these questions
and enriched the article data from a variety of
sources. Next, we linked the research output
to the e-resources to connect the institution’s
acquisitions to its research output.
Result
This resulted in a comprehensive view of each
resource and its development over time:
Pricing, usage, published articles, citations
- all in one place.
Gathering this data enabled consequence
analysis of cancellations of individual titles or
even alternative scenarios to the big
deals, with true impact measurements.
Decision
Our aim is to end up using the insight and
new metrics to offer libraries better decision
support.
Whether evaluating a big deal or a single tit-
le, at the time of decision, this information
should be readily available in a structured way.
This is what we call Decision Metrics 2.0
Price per year (USD)
For a long time we have mainly been focusing on price and usage as the obvious criteria…
Subscriptions mapped against articles published
Deep insights for each title
Deep analysis of an Offsetting agreement Insights before making renewal decisions
Building alternative scenarios based on the insights
Then enriched with for instance license info and APC charges
...but what if you could add even more criterias?
Interested in getting a free analysis of one of your journal packages?
Contact Tejs Grevstad at tg@consortiamanager.com to learn how
Decision
References
OA
License info
Article data
APC cost
Identifier
Impact
Usage
Research
output