BookNet Canada teamed up with the The 49th Shelf to bring you Increase Sales and Lower Costs With Better Metadata: A Step-By-Step Guide for Publishers [pdf].
More and more digital platforms are sourcing their content from ONIX files, which makes it easy for publishers to take part without increasing their workload. The catch, though, is that the information needs to be in the ONIX files to be shared, and currently most publishers are not including enough information in the files they’re creating.
The types of gaps we’re seeing are often related to marketing information: is the contributor Canadian? Has the title won any awards? Is the subject matter related to a specific region? Did you include a description and an author bio? What about reviews, endorsements, tour information…?
The point is that this is all information you already have, and it should be added to your ONIX file by everyone who touches the book throughout the life cycle. If you include this information in your ONIX feed then it will be visible (and, more importantly, discoverable ) in places such as a publisher’s website, online bookstores, library catalogues and systems, electronic catalogues like BNC CataList, and search and discovery platforms like the The 49th Shelf, a project of the Association of Canadian Publishers in collaboration with the Canadian Publishers Council.
To help you get started, we joined forces with the The 49th Shelf team to create this guide that we hope will help you do more with the information you already have. Take a look and let us know what you think—it’s a living document, so it can be updated and re-exported on the fly to ensure you’re always getting accurate, up-to-date information (but more on that, later!).
Read the guide: Increase Sales and Lower Costs With Better Metadata: A Step-By-Step Guide for Publishers [PDF]
