Toolkit for institutions and repository managers

Advocacy and engagement

A successful advocacy campaign is critical to the success of a repository. Although academics are starting to become more aware of repositories and the open access movement, it is still the case that many of them are unfamiliar with the concepts. An institutional advocacy campaign will need to address different groups of stakeholders: University management, academics and perhaps also Library and/or computing staff. The key selling points for each of these groups may be slightly different. This section should be read in conjunction with Introducing change at your institution: Mandates.

The message

University management: As the development of a repository is likely to involve the commitment of resources, university managers need to be convinced of the case. It is therefore necessary to demonstrate the benefits a repository will bring. This is covered in more detail in Why develop an institutional repository?.
Academics: Engaging academics is critical, as they are the providers of the content for the repository. The key messages likely to engage academics are similar to that for management, but differ in some ways. Academics are most likely to be engaged if they think that there will be benefits to them of their work being freely available, e.g. it will be read and cited more.
Library/Computing staff: This may appear to be the least critical group of stakeholders, but if the repository is to be a success it is important that staff members in the area of the University responsible for the repository are informed and enthusiastic. In many institutions repositories are developed by project teams, and this can sometimes mean that other members of staff do not feel the need to get involved in repository matters. It is a good idea to keep members of staff involved through regular updates and presentations so that they are able to answer basic enquiries about the repository.

Getting the message across

Possible methods include:

Presentations
Events: seminars, workshops
Articles, e.g. in the institutional newsletter
E-mails: ideally targeted to individuals, research groups or departments
Publicity material: posters, bookmarks, leaflets
Awareness raising wherever the opportunity arises

See Useful resources for links to e.g. sample presentations, publicity material.

Key advocacy issues raised by academics

A number of common issues are likely to be raised by academics, so it is useful to be prepared with answers:

Why should they bother depositing?
The potential for copyright infringement and a lack of knowledge about what is permitted by publishers.
Confusion between open access journals and repositories, and a misconception that they are being asked to publish in repositories rather than deposit material that had already been published.
Concern about the possible collapse of the current publishing system and the possible impacts, especially on small society publishers.
Uncertainty as to how people will find material in repositories.

Getting some content in

It is always easier to demonstrate the potential of a repository when it contains some content. A range of strategies can be employed to source initial content for a repository. It is useful if this content originates from departments other than the library.

Seek out keen "early adopters" and make available as much of their content as possible.
Look for journals that permit the publisher PDF version of articles to be deposit, and target local authors of papers in these journals. This can be checked using the SHERPA-RoMEO database.
Survey personal web sites for academics already making their papers available – they are more likely to be willing to get involved.

Mandating deposit

This is covered in detail in Introducing change at your institution: Mandates. Those institutions that have mandated deposit have found that it has a major impact on the amount of content deposited.

Key factors for success

Deposit must be a simple as possible, and must not involve more than a few minutes of an academic's time. This may mean offering a mediated service of some sort.
Advice on copyright issues needs to be available from the repository staff. Academics are generally unwilling to get involved in this area, and are very concerned at the prospect of copyright infringement.
Academics need to be convinced that there is a good reason for depositing and that it will be worth while.
Meeting existing needs, e.g. a department may wish to make its publications available online but does not know how to go about it.

The power of usage statistics

One of the key factors that persuades authors to deposit their papers is evidence that material in the depository is being accessed and used. The quote below is from an actual depositor in one of the IRIScotland partner's institutional repositories:

"Thanks for the statistics - I find them very useful and I wish we could get more of it. When authors see a measured impact of their work, the motivation increases and content will grow even further."

It is very useful to start generating repository usage statistics as soon as possible. The data collected can then be used in a number of possible ways:

Information on downloads to individual authors
Publicity about downloads on the repository web site (e.g. the top 10 downloads)
Statistics can be used in presentation to persuade academics to deposit
University management can also be informed of usage statistics

Ongoing advocacy strategies

Even once a repository is up and running it is important to continue an advocacy campaign. It may be necessary to revisit departments and talk to them, and an ongoing publicity campaign will help the continued flow of content. This is particularly the case where no mandate has been put in place.