"Publishers developing or refining their open-access (OA) strategies will need to explore what they can do to differentiate themselves in the academic market by aiding authors, librarians and researchers. As authors and their institutions become increasingly astute in their decisions about where to publish in OA form there are some important things that publishers should consider in order to navigate and succeed in the academic market.
The first is to develop a clear pricing strategy. We are still a long way from realising a truly mature market for OA publishing. However there is a growing focus on the cost and management of article processing charges (APCs). Attempts are already underway to map APC costs to article influence, as exemplified by the OA cost effectiveness tool at www.eigenfactor.org/openaccess, and such formulations are likely to become increasingly sophisticated over time. Meanwhile, authors, academic institutions and research funders are increasingly likely to seek evidence that the APCs they pay represent fair value for the money.
Publishers need to have a clear pricing strategy and must effectively articulate the correlation between their APCs and their business model or models. In addition to setting their APC list price, many publishers are actively considering the potential role of differential pricing based on existing subscription relationships, memberships, geographical regions, and the licence used for the OA content. Publishers must be able to communicate clearly what reuse rights are available to authors and users. For example, a customer should be able to identify easily whether an article is covered by a Creative Commons CC BY, CC BY-NC or CC BY-ND licence.
The second thing that publishers should consider is the need to adapt their systems and reporting to meet the needs of authors and institutions. Many institutions have limited funds available to cover APCs and so expect to increase access to their research through a mixture of APC payments (‘gold OA’) and deposit in repositories (‘green OA’). To be able to manage this effectively they would like the option to pre-approve APC expenditure by their authors. And authors themselves would prefer to confirm that funds are available from their institution or research funder before accepting liability for payment of an APC ...
Publishers should also streamline OA payment arrangements. As transaction volumes rise, the administration costs of OA can increase substantially, both for publishers and academic institutions. Several payment models can simplify transaction flows and facilitate payment of APCs.Many publishers offer membership schemes, under which payment of an annual fee entitles member institutions to preferential APC pricing. Membership schemes can also be linked to existing subscription arrangements, with the level of discount varying according to the subscription package held. Another approach is article credits. Publishers may choose to offer a limited number of 'article credits' to subscribing institutions, for use by the institution's authors to publish articles in OA form at no extra charge. This can be an effective way to encourage initial uptake of gold OA in disciplinary areas where there is scepticism about its value or where funds are limited. There is also the model of deposit/prepayment schemes, where institutions make an upfront payment to the publisher, and APCs are charged against this balance as they’re incurred. This simplifies the transaction flows for the publisher and institution, while eliminating the risk of bad debt and improving cash flow for the publisher. However, implementation requires a formal agreement with the institution, separate accounting for client funds, and the ability to report to institutions on their account balances and activity. A fourth model is fixed price agreements. This is where publishers contract with funding agencies (or individual institutions in receipt of agency funds) to publish all articles arising from the funder’s research for a stipulated fee. Additional parameters may be agreed upon; one example is limiting the arrangement to articles for which the funding agency is the primary research funder or has funded the lead author. This model can be attractive to funders and institutions as it gives them control over compliance, but requires careful financial modelling by the publisher to determine an appropriate price ..."