SAGE Publishing today announces the launch of a new platform for the SAGE Research Methods suite of products. The design of the new site was developed alongside student, academic and librarian user communities to improve discovery and user experiences and to allow users to get to the content they need quicker. Now live, the platform features both text and video content, improved discovery and internal search functionality, and a responsive design to optimize use across devices.
SAGE Research Methods is a comprehensive methods library with more than 1,000 books, reference works, and journal articles; 570 case studies of research projects written by researchers in the field; 120 datasets that allow users to practice analytical techniques hands-on; and, coming soon, an extensive collection of streaming video dedicated to research methods, statistics, and evaluation.
“When we launched SAGE Research Methods in 2011, our aim was to build a destination site for researchers, faculty, librarians, students, and beyond,” commented Katie Metzler, Publisher for SAGE Research Methods. “In the last five years, we have expanded the range of resources available to ensure that the needs of our 500 library customers, who provide access to an estimated 7 million researchers worldwide, are being met. Now we are thrilled to launch this new, redesigned platform which makes it even easier for our users to find all of the resources they need to answer their research methods and statistics questions.”
Changes to the SAGE Research Methods platform include:
- A responsive design for ease of use on desktops, laptops, tablets, and mobile devices
- Improved content tagging for better browsing and more accurate search results, which are customizable based on resources available in each library
- A fresh design and modern layout, developed around users’ key behaviors for a better overall user experience
- The addition of “SAGE Recommends,” a semantically-driven feature that links to relevant SAGE content within the context of each user’s journey
- An improved Methods Map that visualizes how methods terms and concepts are related (pictured)
New usage reports and library discovery tools are also provided with the new SAGE Research Methods platform so that institutions can build a better picture of how their patrons engage with the site. In addition, SAGE Research Methods Video, now in beta, will launch with over 120 hours of video on the platform on September 30. Produced in collaboration with an international editorial board of methods experts, the collection includes videos covering the entire research methods and statistics curriculum.
“As the world’s leading social science research methods publisher, SAGE is committed to continuing to expand and improve the SAGE Research Methods suite of products to support high-quality research and scholarship.” continued Metzler. “The new platform gives us the flexibility to experiment with new, innovative forms of digital publishing in the future.”
The new SAGE Research Methods platform marks an additional investment in SAGE’s digital resources to improve discovery and user experience; the announcement follows the 2015 migration of the SAGE Knowledge to a new platform in November 2015 and will be followed by the SAGE Journals migration to Atypon’s Literatum online publishing platform in early 2017.
