Business and Data Services Librarian
Best Bets for Ranking Top Journals
Journal Ranking
One of the most difficult things is deciding where to publish. Examination of journal rankings and the metrics behind them helps to define which journals are considered highly revered in a particular field (often most-cited). Google Scholar maintains a journal ranking page, but there are certainly better methods for measuring impact.
Journal Impact
If you are a scholar planning to publish a journal article, you will no doubt be looking for a reputable journal to provide the best exposure for your work. Be mindful: Making comparisons across different subject areas is difficult; rates of citation are not necessarily stable over time; journal rankings can be affected by self-citations and copious review articles.
Metrics
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CiteScoreElsevier's CiteScore metric calculates the average number of citations received in a calendar year by the number of items published by the journal in the previous three years. CiteScore metrics for conference proceedings, book series and trade journals are also listed.
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SCImago (SJR)Using Scopus data, SCImago Journal Rank (SJR) offers metrics that are the average number of weighted citations received in a year over the number of documents published in the previous three years. Citations are weighted--worth more or less--depending on the source that they come from (subject field, quality and reputation of the journal, etc.)
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Journal Impact Factor (JIF)Clarivate's Journal Impact Factor (JIF) is calculated by dividing the number of citations in the JCR year by the total number of articles published in the previous two or five years. For business publications, the 5-yr JIF is best.
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SNIPCWTS source normalized impact per paper (SNIP) indicators measure the average citation impact of the publications of a journal. Unlike the well-known journal impact factor, SNIP corrects for differences in citation practices between scientific fields, thereby allowing for more accurate between-field comparisons of citation impact. CWTS Journal Indicators also provide stability intervals that indicate the reliability of the SNIP value of a journal.