Publications are an integral part of an academic career and have to be adhered to along with core research activities. Many times good academicians struggle to get journal publications. No matter how hard a scholarly author works to conduct research that is compelling and sound and write about it inaccurate and sophisticated ways, often the desired result in terms of successful publication eludes them. There is often a frustrating period when a series of rejections often leave authors disgruntled and demoralized. A successful publication is more than just good research; it requires a targeted strategy that needs to be developed with time and effort.
Key to good publication strategy:
Analyze the rejections: If your submissions are being periodically rejected, it is time to objectively analyze the shortcoming being highlighted by the rejection letters. Every journal cites the reasons why they are unable to accommodate your article in their own way. It is up to you to find a commonality or the core problem and then work to address it.
Re-orient your approach: The key to a successful publication is the relevance of your article and at times one needs to rejig one’s paper to suit the more immediate trends or requirements. Perhaps it is time to rework your topic or methodology. Depending on the reasons for rejection, you could either broaden your perspective by introducing new data or theories into your research or narrow your focus to more precise outcomes and discussions.
Engage with peers: Deciding who your key audiences are will help you to select the channels and mode for dissemination. Engage with peers and stakeholders via conferences, seminars, letters to editors, or personal correspondence to understand the pulse and what the sector is expecting from publications in this field.
Get others to collaborate: Often as a researcher one develops a narrowed focus that creates a challenge to connect with a wider audience. One way to address this challenge is to work in collaboration with other researchers. The second point of view helps widen one’s perspective, working with colleagues from associated fields help create inter-disciplinary research work that often has a wider appeal.
Work on your basics: There is no alternative to strengthening one’s basic writing skills. Often good researchers do not make good writers. Writing is a skill that needs to be nurtured. Work hard on writing in crisp definite language free of grammatical errors. Learn how to communicate in writing diverse thoughts, how to build up an argument, how to develop sections in a paper. Work hard on the basics as journals prefer well-formatted articles that are properly structured. Pay special attention to the author’s guidelines of each journal and make sure you adhere to each and every instruction for submission.
Take professional help: there exist today specialized services that help authors get their works published. These services offer the best of class support and guidance to authors that help them to develop publication-worthy articles. They also help by taking off the added responsibilities of writing and allow researchers to focus on their core activity.