Benchmarking the RAE Returns of Marketing Professors' Journal Publications

Abstract

Publishing in refereed journals is an acknowledged requirement for successful academics. In the UK, a rise in benchmarking activities, such as the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE), has brought concerns about the relative quality of different journals to the fore. This paper reviews publication data from the RAE (2001) for full professors in marketing. Four ranking schemes are used to benchmark the quality of the journals included in the RAE. The findings highlight the difficulties which UK academics, including the established leading names, continue to face in publishing in the top North American marketing journals. The reasons for these difficulties are explored and future publication strategies are considered. The paper is intended to put into perspective the apparent requirement to publish in the top few US journals. The paper presents some suggestions for achieving this, but also raises the spectre of whether this really is either the right focus or a feasible one.