What societies want from a publishing partner

Societies, whose publishing programmes are primarily mission‐driven, play a unique role in funding and disseminating research. But by their nature – often small and with limited resources – they are particularly prone to the turbulence currently affecting scholarly publishing. BMJ Journals is itself a society publisher but also publishes under contract for other societies. During 2008, we carried out research to assess societies' evolving needs from their publishing partnerships. The changing expectations and behaviours of the next generation of researchers are considered to be as much of a threat as declining revenues. Societies are planning to expand professional development activities and to maximise their use of emerging technologies to help maintain and grow membership. Although surplus is a low priority for societies and, accordingly, for their publishing programmes, a high financial return is nonetheless a key criterion when choosing publishing partners – as are reputation, technological innovation, and individual title development.