Authorship and Contributorship Policy
Scholarly Contribution • Transparency • Accountability
Authorship and Contributorship Policy
Mercatura : Journal of Marketing requires authorship to accurately reflect substantial scholarly contributions to research in marketing management, consumer behavior, digital marketing, branding, marketing strategy, services marketing, retailing, social media marketing, customer relationship management, market analytics, sustainable marketing, and related fields.
SUBSTANTIAL CONTRIBUTION CRediT TAXONOMY FULL ACCOUNTABILITY
Authorship represents both academic credit and responsibility. A person should be listed as an author only when they have made a meaningful intellectual contribution to the research and accept responsibility for the integrity, accuracy, transparency, ethical conduct, and scholarly quality of the published work.
1. Criteria for Authorship
All listed authors must demonstrate substantial scholarly involvement in the study. Authorship should normally include all of the following:
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Substantial Research Contribution Significant contribution to the marketing research problem, conceptual framework, consumer-behavior model, branding or marketing-strategy framework, research design, customer or market-data collection, survey or experiment design, digital-platform analysis, market analytics, segmentation, methodology, statistical analysis, qualitative analysis, or interpretation of findings. |
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Intellectual Contribution to the Manuscript Active participation in drafting the manuscript or critically revising its marketing theory, strategic argument, consumer interpretation, methodology, analytical approach, digital-marketing implications, discussion, or scholarly contribution. |
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Final Approval Review and approval of the final manuscript, including the accuracy of author names, affiliations, customer or market data, campaign information, analytical findings, managerial implications, declarations, and references. |
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Accountability Agreement to take responsibility for the author's contribution and to cooperate in resolving questions concerning consumer data, market datasets, survey or experimental procedures, digital analytics, marketing models, research ethics, privacy, research integrity, authorship, or other aspects of the published work. |
Activities That Do Not Alone Qualify for Authorship
The following activities, when performed alone, are generally insufficient to justify authorship:
| • Providing research funding only | • Providing access to customers, companies, campaign data, sales records, social-media accounts, or market datasets only |
| • General academic, marketing, or administrative supervision | • Holding a marketing, executive, managerial, institutional, agency, or professional position |
| • Routine survey distribution, customer recruitment, data entry, transcription, or clerical work | • Language editing, proofreading, translation, or formatting only |
| • Providing advertising materials, analytics platforms, software, customer lists, or facilities only | • General encouragement, networking, or mentorship without scholarly contribution |
Individuals providing these forms of assistance may be recognized in the Acknowledgments section, subject to their permission where appropriate.
2. Author Contribution Statement – CRediT
Every accepted manuscript must include an Author Contribution Statement. Authors are encouraged to use the CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy) to identify each author's contribution transparently.
| Conceptualization Development of marketing research ideas, consumer-behavior questions, branding hypotheses, customer-value models, marketing-strategy concepts, or market-related frameworks. |
Methodology Development or design of surveys, experiments, qualitative studies, mixed methods, market research, digital analytics, consumer studies, longitudinal designs, or marketing-modeling approaches. |
| Formal Analysis Statistical, econometric, consumer, market, segmentation, pricing, branding, digital-marketing, customer, qualitative, or other analytical work. |
Investigation Conducting consumer surveys, interviews, focus groups, marketing experiments, customer observations, market audits, social-media studies, campaign evaluations, or empirical data collection. |
| Data Curation Collecting, cleaning, coding, anonymizing, organizing, documenting, or maintaining consumer, customer, campaign, sales, social-media, retail, CRM, or market datasets. |
Software Statistical coding, market analytics, social-media analytics, customer modeling, CRM analysis, dashboard development, web analytics, or development of analytical tools. |
| Validation Verification of analytical results, marketing scales, consumer measures, segmentation models, campaign metrics, predictive models, coding, or research outputs. |
Visualization Preparation of research tables, figures, customer-journey maps, marketing models, positioning maps, dashboards, campaign charts, or data visualizations. |
| Writing – Original Draft Preparation of the initial scholarly manuscript. |
Writing – Review & Editing Critical intellectual review and substantive manuscript revision. |
| Resources Provision of essential market datasets, customer records, advertising materials, analytics platforms, survey instruments, company access, or other resources combined with scholarly contribution. |
Supervision Intellectual oversight and scholarly guidance of the research process. |
| Project Administration Coordination and management of research activities. |
Funding Acquisition Acquisition of financial support for the research project. |
Note: Assignment of a CRediT role does not automatically qualify an individual for authorship. The individual must also satisfy the journal's authorship requirements and accept accountability.
3. Example of Author Contribution Statement
Example – Quantitative Consumer / Marketing Research
Author Contributions: A.B.: Conceptualization, Methodology, Formal Analysis, Writing – Original Draft. C.D.: Investigation, Data Curation, Validation, Visualization. E.F.: Supervision, Writing – Review & Editing. All authors approved the final manuscript and agreed to be accountable for their contributions.
Example – Digital Marketing / Branding Case Study
Author Contributions: A.B.: Conceptualization, Investigation, Methodology, Writing – Original Draft. C.D.: Data Curation, Formal Analysis, Visualization. E.F.: Validation, Supervision, Writing – Review & Editing. All authors reviewed and approved the final manuscript.
4. Author Order
Author order must be determined and agreed upon collectively by the author group before manuscript submission. The journal does not assign or determine author order.
The authorship list and order must be consistent across the submitted manuscript, OJS metadata, Author Contribution Statement, declarations, data documentation where applicable, and final published article.
5. Corresponding Author
One author must be identified as the corresponding author and serve as the primary contact between the journal and all co-authors.
| ✓ Ensures all authors approve manuscript submission | ✓ Verifies author names, affiliations, email, and ORCID information |
| ✓ Coordinates responses to reviewers | ✓ Ensures all authors approve substantive revisions |
| ✓ Verifies funding, ethics, privacy, and Conflict of Interest Statements | ✓ Coordinates Data Availability, consumer-data, or supplementary-material statements where applicable |
| ✓ Coordinates final proof approval | ✓ Responds to post-publication methodological or research-integrity inquiries when necessary |
6. Unacceptable Authorship Practices
| ✕ Guest / Honorary Authorship Adding senior academics, marketing executives, brand managers, agency leaders, institutional heads, or respected individuals who did not make sufficient scholarly contributions. |
✕ Ghost Authorship Excluding individuals who made substantial contributions to research design, consumer analysis, digital analytics, market modeling, qualitative investigation, or manuscript preparation that qualify for authorship. |
| ✕ Gift / Reciprocal Authorship Exchanging or granting authorship without genuine scholarly contribution. |
✕ Purchased Authorship Buying, selling, or transferring authorship positions. |
| ✕ Coercive Authorship Requiring inclusion because of supervisory, executive, corporate, agency, institutional, managerial, or professional authority. |
✕ Unauthorized Authorship Listing a person without their knowledge and approval. |
7. Changes to Authorship
Addition, removal, or rearrangement of authors after submission must be exceptional and supported by a clear explanation and written consent from all affected authors.
| BEFORE ACCEPTANCE May be considered with full written agreement |
AFTER ACCEPTANCE Exceptional and subject to editorial approval |
AFTER PUBLICATION May require a formal Correction Notice |
8. Authorship Disputes
The Editorial Team may request explanations and documentation when an authorship dispute arises. However, the journal does not normally adjudicate disputes concerning who should or should not qualify as an author. Unresolved disputes may be referred to the authors' institution, research-integrity office, employer, or another appropriate authority. Editorial processing may be suspended until the dispute is resolved.
9. Artificial Intelligence and Authorship
Artificial intelligence tools, large language models, generative AI systems, and AI-based marketing or consumer-analytics platforms must not be listed as authors or co-authors. AI cannot accept accountability, approve a manuscript, declare conflicts of interest, or take responsibility for research integrity. Relevant AI-assisted activities, including AI-supported writing, coding, customer segmentation, sentiment analysis, campaign analytics, social-media analysis, predictive modeling, data processing, or analytical interpretation, must instead be disclosed according to the journal's Artificial Intelligence (AI) Usage Policy.
Authorship Checklist Before Submission
| ✓ Every listed author has made a genuine scholarly contribution | ✓ No eligible contributor has been omitted |
| ✓ Author order has been approved by all authors | ✓ All authors approved the submitted manuscript |
| ✓ Author Contribution Statement is complete | ✓ Corresponding author has been identified |
| ✓ OJS metadata matches the manuscript | ✓ Ethics, informed consent, privacy, consumer-data, company-data, and supplementary-material statements are accurate where applicable |
| ✓ AI-assisted activities have been disclosed where required | ✓ All authors accept responsibility for the published work |
Authorship Principle
In Mercatura : Journal of Marketing, authorship is based on substantive intellectual contribution and accountability. Academic rank, executive or marketing authority, institutional position, access to customers, companies, campaign records, sales data, CRM systems, social-media accounts, analytics platforms, funding alone, routine marketing assistance, supervisory status, or professional seniority does not by itself justify authorship.
