Researcher KnowHow session presented by Sarah Roughley & Caroline Myles from the Open Access Team at the University of Liverpool Library.

1. Publishing Open
Access in 5 easy steps
Sarah Roughley & Caroline Myles
Open Access Team: openaccess@liverpool.ac.uk

2. “Open access”
means making
scholarly
research work
freely available
to read and re-
use over the
internet.
- Martin Eve

3. Step 1:
Decide whether to go Gold Open
Access or Green Open Access

4. What is Gold Open Access?
• Gold Open Access refers to research being
published Open Access immediately on the
publisher’s website.
• Usually, though not always, a fee must be paid for
Gold Open Access. The average fee is £2700.
• There are two types of Gold Open Access journals:
hybrid and Fully Open.
• Some funding is available for Liverpool researchers
to cover these costs (more on that later).

5. What is Green Open Access?
• Green Open access refers to research being made
available in a university or subject repository.
• It is often referred to as ‘delayed’ Open Access as
usually the publisher insists on an embargo being
applied, though lots of publishers are no longer doing
this. The embargo period is usually between 6 and 24
months.
• There is no fee associated with Green Open Access.

6. You should consider:-
• What are your funder or institutional requirements?
Details on most Open Access policy requirements
can be found on our webpages:
https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/open-research/open-
access/open-access-policies/
• Who’s your audience, and would they benefit from
knowing about your research NOW?

7. They don’t have an
Open Access policy!

8. • We have paid for some deals with publishers which
enable you to publish Open Access with them with no
additional cost to you or your department.
• Details of available deals and instructions on how to
take advantage can be found on our webpages:
https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/open-research/open-
access/publisher-agreements-and-memberships/
• Publishers include: Springer, Wiley, IOP Publishing,
Cambridge University Press and many more…
Step 2:
If you’re going for Gold, can you publish in
an existing publishing deal?

9. Step 3:
If needed, apply for Open Access
funding
• If you can’t find a suitable journal to publish in with
one of our existing deals, but still want to publish via
Gold Open Access, you may need to apply for Open
Access funding.
• This is easy to do – simply complete the Open Access
Payment Request form on our webpages:
https://liverpool.libwizard.com/f/goldoa

10. Open Access funding
We have five pots of Open Access funding depending
on how the underlying research was funded:
1. UKRI OA block grant
2. Wellcome Trust block grant
3. British Heart Foundation funding
4. Cancer Research UK block grant
5. Institutional fund
Each fund has it’s own criteria which can be found on
our webpages: https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/open-
research/open-access/open-access-funding/

11. Step 4:
Deposit in the university repository
• If you are opting for Green Open Access, we will make a
version of the journal article available in the University
Repository where it will be openly accessible for
everyone.
• To do this, you must deposit the journal article in
Liverpool Elements. Publishers each have their own
policy on which version of a journal article can be
deposited – usually it is the author accepted version.
• You can check journal policies on the Sherpa Romeo
website: https://v2.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo/

12. Step 5: Promote!
Once you’re article is available,
you should promote it if you can.
You could:
• Post it on social media: Twitter,
LinkedIn
• Share it with colleagues
• Link to it on your email
signature
• Contact the University Press
Office
Find out more in our session on
Altmetric and social media on
the 26th November

13. Open
Monographs
• Not many funders require
you to make your book
Open Access but some do -
the Wellcome Trust do.
• Lots of publishers offer Gold
Open Access options but
these are expensive –
usually more than £10,000
per book.
• Some publishers have
Green Open Access
policies, but not many.

14. Help and guidance
Our Open Access webpages should answer any
questions you have:
https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/open-research/open-
access/
For any other questions, please email:
openaccess@liverpool.ac.uk