The volume of full‐text coverage of top‐tier marketing journals in the ABI/INFORM and Business Source Premier databases – key indicators for database licensing

Purpose – The purpose of this research is to analyze the volume of full‐text coverage for 50 marketing‐focused and marketing‐related serial sources in the Ebsco Business Source Premier (BSP) and ProQuest ABI/INFORM Global (ABI) databases, focusing on the significant differences in the full‐text availability of 21 journals which are common in the two databases. Design/methodology/approach – The target serials were the ones rated –in response to a large scale, very well‐designed and implemented research project (Hult et al. )– by more than 600 marketing specialists, working at the marketing departments of universities around the world (the Hult050 set). Findings – The test searches found that BSP had full‐text coverage for 29, and ABI for 34 sources. BSP had 70,740 and ABI had 63,405 full‐text items. However, the detailed analysis at the individual source level of the Hult‐50 set revealed anomalies in the reported volume of full‐text coverage for several top tier marketing journals in ABI, such as single year and even decade‐long gaps and inflated hit counts. Originality/value – The paper provides empirical evidence for anomalies, which should be considered in comparing the real volume and value of full‐text availability when making licensing decisions.