Alternative metrics or altmetrics “is the creation and study of new metrics based on the Social Web for analyzing, and informing scholarship.” Altmetrics include article downloads and views, bookmarks, saves, favourites, readers, blog posts, tweets, Wikipedia articles, news stories, likes, shares and ratings. Altmetrics provides impact of just-published work and includes all types of scholarly output.
Altmetrics is a relatively new and emerging field and may have potential in:
Altmetric.com is a service that allows you to see how much attention any article with a DOI (digital object identifier) has received online by using a bookmarklet tool. They also have another subscription product called Altmetric Explorer for Institutions that the University of Limerick has access to.
Impactstory is an open-source website that helps researchers explore and share the the online impact of their research. You can create an Impactstory profile with your ORCID credentials in just a minute.
Plum Analytics is an altmetrics service that tracks more than 20 different types of artifacts, including journal articles, books, videos, presentations, conference proceedings, datasets, source code, cases, and more. Plum Analytics collect impact metrics in 5 major categories: usage, captures, mentions, social media, and citations.
This recorded presentation explains what altmetrics are and how they could be beneficial.
Altmetric Explorer for Institutions is a tool that allows a university to track and evaluate the online dissemination and impact of their authored research. This tutorial shows you how to use some of the key features of Altmetric Explorer for Institutions with further help and information available here.
Further reading on altmetrics can be found below: