ZB MED publishes results of market and target group analysis
The main findings of the published study include key information on ZB MED's target groups. This data suggests ZB MED should be placing a key focus on researchers and students in the subject areas of medicine, health, nutritional, environmental and agricultural sciences, as well as on key disseminators and multipliers. This latter group primarily comprises libraries and other information institutions. "Our job now is to ensure that our products genuinely cater to these validated target groups, " says Ulrich Korwitz, Director of ZB MED.
The results of the study also yielded four activities which are of key strategic importance in the library's portfolio of services, namely "Search & find", "Process & prepare", "Publish & disseminate" and "Research & development".
These priority activities are reflected in a number of new products announced by ZB MED. One of its first tasks will be to combine the MEDPILOT and GREENPILOT search portals into an interdisciplinary search portal for life sciences known as LIVIVO (key theme: "Search & find"). This new portal is due to be up and running sometime this spring. ZB MED will also be expanding its "Publish & disseminate" services. For example, it has already set up a comprehensive publishing advice service focused on the "open access" scheme which promotes free public access to research results. ZB MED will also be expanding its publishing platform with innovative projects such as "Living Handbooks". The goal of this project is to provide access to up-to-date scientific information by drawing on the worldwide cooperation of experts in each specific life sciences discipline. The contributions to the platform, which can be submitted and updated by the authors themselves, are subjected to a peer review process to maintain a high level of quality. They are also provided with a Digital Object Identifier (DOI), a persistent identifier which ensures items remain permanently citable and traceable.
