The University of the Western Cape (UWC) Library supports researchers to establish their individual online visibility through professional networking sites and social media platforms. Researchers are introduced to the benefits of establishing an online footprint, research dissemination, discoverability and impact using the following platforms:

ORCID

ORCID (Open Researcher and Contributor Identifier) is a unique six-teen digit permanent identifier that distinguishes a researcher from every other researcher. For many publishers, it is a requirement for authors to have an ORCID number, to be accepted for publication. The UWC Institutional ORCID account allows individuals to affiliate and authenticate UWC as a Trusted Party to allow the university to keep track of all research publications.

Author Profiles and H-Index

Publishers such as Scopus, Web of Science generate specific author IDs. These can be integrated with an ORCID profile. The support offered by this service to the author includes guidance on creating and maintaining a Google Scholar profile. Each of these platforms offer an h-index score which is an author-level metric that measures citation impact.

Alternative Metrics

The increased use of social media and other online platforms widens the dissemination of scholarship. Traditional citation metrics do not capture the discussion, mentions, tweets and shares occurring on the various platforms. UWC Library promotes publication metrics such as PlumAnalytics, Altmetrics and Twitter, @UWCLibResearch, to supplement traditional citation metrics.