NOTE: For help with the new Credo stats reporting, see here.
WHAT IS COUNTER?
COUNTER stands for Counting Online Usage of Networked Electronic Resources. Their website is at https://www.projectcounter.org/.
COUNTER was one of the first, if not the first, standards organization established for the modern
information environment. It has succeeded in bringing together a collaboration of publishers and
librarians to develop and maintain a standard for counting the use of electronic resources. It has
also ensured that most major publishers and vendors are compliant by providing their library customers around the world with COUNTER usage statistics.
COUNTER publishes the Code of Practice, which is the standard for counting the use of electronic
resources, and maintains a register of COUNTER-compliant vendors and publishers.
WHO USES COUNTER REPORTS?
The COUNTER standard was originally developed to provide a service to librarians and others who
purchase subscriptions to publishers’ content. The intention was to allow librarians to easily com-
pare their usage across different publishers’ content, and let them use that information to calculate a cost-per-download for their subscriptions. COUNTER reports were not originally intended to
be used by publishers as a way of measuring usage across their client base, but are increasingly
being used for that purpose.
Academic libraries across the world use COUNTER reports to:
- Help them make renewal decisions or new purchasing decisions based on data about
usage and access denials - Inform faculty about the value of the library and its resources
- Understand user behavior and improve user experiences.
Most major vendors and publishers also use COUNTER reports to:
- Provide reliable and consistent usage data to their customers
- Upsell using COUNTER data about access denials
- Inform editors and authors about the usage of their publications
Where to Access Your COUNTER Report:
You can access your COUNTER reports from two places within the admin portal. For product specific COUNTER reports, you can access it from the product level navigation.
To access your COUNTER report for all products that you subscribe to, click on the COUNTER Reports tab on the left-hand navigation.
COUNTER5 Report Types
Platform Reports
PR (Platform Master Report)
A customizable report summarizing activity across a content provider’s platforms that allows the user to apply filters and select other configuration options.
PR_P1 (Platform Usage)
Platform-level usage summarized by metric type. The report shows total and unique item requests, unique title requests, and platform searches.
Database Reports
DR (Database Master Report)
A customizable report detailing activity by database that allows the user to apply filters and select other configuration options.
DR_D1 (Database Search and Item Usage)
Reports on key searches, investigations and requests metrics needed to evaluate a database. The report shows regular and federated searches, and total item investigations and requests.
Title Reports
TR (Title Master Report)
A customizable report detailing activity at the title level (journal, book, etc.) that allows the user to apply filters and select other configuration options.
TR_B1 (Book Requests (Excluding OA_Gold)
Reports on full-text activity for books, excluding Gold Open Access content, as total item requests and unique title requests. Numbers between sites will vary based on whether the content is delivered as a complete book or by chapter.
Item Reports
IR (Item Master Report)
A granular, customizable report showing activity at the level of the item (article, chapter, media object, etc.) that allows the user to apply filters and select other configuration options.
IR_M1 (Multimedia Item Requests)
Reports on multimedia requests at the item level.
COUNTER5 Metrics
Requests: A category of COUNTER Metric Types that represents a user accessing content (i.e. full text of an article).
Investigations: A category of COUNTER metric types that represent a user accessing information related to a content item (i.e. an abstract or detailed descriptive metadata of an article) or a content item itself (i.e. full text of an article).
Requests are recorded where record views were recorded in COUNTER4, and are also treated as investigations.
‘Total_Item_Requests’ represents the number of times users requested the full content (i.e. full text) of an item.
‘Unique_Item_Requests’ represents the number of unique content items investigated in a user-session. Examples of items are articles, book chapters, and multimedia files.
‘Unique_Title_Requests’ represents the number of unique titles requested in a user session. Examples of titles are journals and books.
‘Total_Item_Investigations’ represents the total number of times a content item or information related to a content item was accessed.
‘Unique_Item_Investigations’ represents the number of unique Content Items investigated in a user-session.
‘Unique_Title_Investigations’ represents the number of unique titles requested in a user session. Examples of titles are journals and books.
Consortia Access and COUNTER5
In COUNTER5, separate consortium reports are not provided. Consortium administrators can access R5 reports for their members using the All Accounts dropdown that is available from the COUNTER reports section of the admin portal. Clicking on the member account name will take the consortium administrator to that account’s COUNTER5 reports without having to sign in for each individual institution.