Evidence
TrendMD's content recommendation platform has been evaluated through peer-reviewed randomized controlled trials. Three RCTs demonstrate that TrendMD increases citations, Mendeley saves, and readership for scholarly content.
A peer-reviewed RCT block-randomized 3,200 articles across 64 journals in eight subject areas. Half (1,600) were distributed through TrendMD; the other half served as controls. Citations were tracked for 12 months after publication.
Promoted articles received 50% more citations at 12 months compared to controls.
Extended follow-up of the same 3,200-article RCT cohort, re-measuring citations at 36 months post-publication. The study assessed whether the initial citation advantage persisted or attenuated over time.
Promoted articles maintained a 28% citation advantage at 36 months (mean difference 10.52, 95% CI 3.79–17.25, P = .001).
Randomized 400 articles over four weeks, comparing TrendMD-promoted articles to controls on Mendeley saves. Mendeley saves are a recognized early indicator of future citations.
TrendMD-promoted articles received 77% more Mendeley saves (6.2 vs 3.5 mean saves, P < .05).
Independent analyses have compared TrendMD's reader engagement against other scholarly traffic sources. In a study of JMIR traffic data, TrendMD referrals showed twice the engagement of Google Scholar and PubMed, and three times the engagement of Twitter, with 150% more pages per visit and a bounce rate of 13% compared to 26% or higher for other sources.
A separate analysis with Springer Nature found that TrendMD referrals had a 9.25% bounce rate versus 67.59% for Twitter, with average time on site of 2 minutes 52 seconds and 52% more PDF downloads.
A pilot study of 100 JMIR articles (50 distributed through TrendMD, 50 controls) measured an 87% increase in article views over six weeks, with distributed articles averaging 191 views compared to 102 for controls.
A crossover study with BMJ Open tested 1,000 articles from 3,752 published over six weeks. Unpaid TrendMD promotion produced a 10.4% increase in weekly pageviews, while paid campaigns at modest budgets ($250–$500) achieved increases of 16.3% to 28.5%.
See how these research findings translate into real publisher results in our case studies. To explore the full network of publications using TrendMD, visit the publisher network page. Ready to get started? Get in touch.
