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Category: Book Marketing

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BISAC subject codes

BISAC Subject Codes

BISAC Categories: Help your reader find your book!

When it comes to self publishing, properly categorizing your book is critical when it comes making sure your reader can find it. To assign specific subject codes to your book you'll use the BISAC (Book Industry Standards and Communications) subject codes. These are codes that the whole book industry, from bookstores to libraries, use to understand where your book fits on their shelves so that readers can easily find it.
These codes are updated periodically and the most recent list was published in December of 2020. According to the BISG.org blog, "This year’s update added 155 codes and modified 123 literals, with two inactivations across more than half of the 54 top-level sections. A total of 23 sections had at least one addition to the code list."
You can assign BISAC subject codes to your book in several places including in your ISBN setup, IngramSpark and KDP. There are literally hundreds of BISAC codes and it's important to get as specific as possible. For example, if you're writing a business book for nonprofits, you have these options for categorizing your book:
  • BUSINESS & ECONOMICS / Nonprofit Organizations & Charities / General
  • BUSINESS & ECONOMICS / Nonprofit Organizations & Charities / Finance & Accounting
  • BUSINESS & ECONOMICS / Nonprofit Organizations & Charities / Fundraising & Grants
  • BUSINESS & ECONOMICS / Nonprofit Organizations & Charities / Management & Leadership
  • BUSINESS & ECONOMICS / Nonprofit Organizations & Charities / Marketing & Communications

Pro Tip: Did you know that BISAC categories are different than Amazon Categories?

When you make your category choices in KDP, those are BISAC categories and Amazon uses those to decide which Amazon category to put your book in. In this initial set up you can only choose two categories, however you can easily request that Amazon increase the number of categories that they place you in by simply contacting them through your Author Central account.

Choosing the right BISAC categories is very important. Your choice factors into everything from appearing in keyword searches to where your book sits on the shelf. Visit the Book Industry Study Group website to view the full list of subject codes.

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Help for Independent Presses

Book Design & Production

Have you written a nonfiction or fiction manuscript? After it has been professionally edited, I can design the interior pages and cover, plus guide you through the maze of book publishing and printing. To get started, contact me to discuss your project and my helpful guide for authors.

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10 Tips for getting your Self Published Book Discovered.

10 Tips to Get Your Book Discovered Online

Choose effective keywords to help people find your book!

Keywords are one very important component of metadata that will help your book be successfully found  by your audience. Use these helpful tips to carefully research and select your keywords.

10 Tips for Selecting Keywords for your Self-Published Book

  1. You're metadata will be used in many places, so keep a master document on your computer so you have it handy when you need it. This method also makes it easy to add to and keep your metadata current.
  2. In KDP you can choose up to 7 keywords and phrases, but have a list of 10-20 strategically chosen high quality keywords and phrases on hand.
  3. Keep them generic words that readers would use when searching.
  4. Don't repeat words in the title & subtitle - they are already taken into account by search engines.
  5. Include synonyms and spelling variations.
  6. Don't include misspellings. Amazon will offer alternate spelling of misspelled words to the searcher.
  7. Make your keywords specific to your book. They should not include other author names or titles.
  8. Do use search words and phrases that readers will use together to find your book and enter them in a logical order.
  9. If your book is about a specific location be sure to include that.
  10. It's also good to know that keywords work together with your chosen BISAC category and may increase your books' discoverability. So get as specific as possible with your BISAC categories because they are used by many companies throughout the supply chain to categorize books based on topical content. We'll explore more about BISAC Subject Codes in a later newsletter.

Pro Tip: If you run out of ideas for keywords, take a look at your reviews! Your readers may use some great words to describe your book.

  • If you don't have any reviews, check out a similar author and see how their readers describe their book.
While it does take some careful research to find great keywords, it is well worth your time and effort to find and compile relevant and specific keywords.
Click here to read more about the metadata required for the success of self-published books.

Want more tips like this? Subscribe to my monthly book design newsletter.

Help for Independent Presses

Book Design & Production

Have you written a nonfiction or fiction manuscript? After it has been professionally edited, I can design the interior pages and cover, plus guide you through the maze of book publishing and printing. To get started, contact me to discuss your project and my helpful guide for authors.

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Metadata for authors

Metadata – The Key to your Book’s Online Discoverability

Increase your book's discoverability with metadata!

Do you find yourself wondering how people will find your book after it is available for sale? A large and critical part of the answer is metadata. Understanding metadata and applying it properly is extremely important in the discoverability of your book.
What is metadata anyway?! It's kind of a mysterious and strange, "techy" sounding word that seems like it might be hard to apply. In short, metadata is data that provides information about other data. (Is that enough "datas" for you?) In the case of your book, it is all of the information that describes your book and includes these categories:
  • Title
  • Subtitle
  • Author Names
  • Description
  • Editorial Reviews
  • Author Bio
  • Keywords
  • Categories
  • Product details
  • Community Reviews
Google, Amazon and other sites have powerful technology that analyses all of this data so that it can show users of their services the most relevant content possible. All of the pieces of metadata that you assign to your book work together to help online sites know to show your reader your book. It then will help that reader determine if they want to read and ultimately purchase your book. So you can see why it is very important that each metadata category be fully and accurately filled out.
 
 

10 Tips for Selecting Keywords

  1. You're metadata will be used in many places, so keep a master document on your computer so you have it handy when you need it. This method also makes it easy to add to and keep your metadata current.
  2. In KDP you can choose up to 7 keywords and phrases, but have a list of 10-20 strategically chosen high quality keywords and phrases on hand.
  3. Keep them generic words that readers would use when searching.
  4. Don't repeat words in the title & subtitle - they are already taken into account by search engines.
  5. Include synonyms and spelling variations.
  6. Don't include misspellings. Amazon will offer alternate spelling of misspelled words to the searcher.
  7. Make your keywords specific to your book. They should not include other author names or titles.
  8. Do use search words and phrases that readers will use together to find your book and enter them in a logical order.
  9. If your book is about a specific location be sure to include that.
  10. It's also good to know that keywords work together with your chosen BISAC category and may increase your books' discoverability. So get as specific as possible with your BISAC categories because they are used by many companies throughout the supply chain to categorize books based on topical content. We'll explore more about BISAC Subject Codes in a later newsletter.

Pro Tip: If you run out of ideas for keywords, take a look at your reviews! Your readers may use some great words to describe your book.

  • If you don't have any reviews, check out a similar author and see how their readers describe their book.
While it does take some careful research to find great keywords, it is well worth your time and effort to find and compile relevant and specific keywords. You can then consider how these keywords may be used to form a high quality book description that further increases the chance that readers will be shown your book when they perform their searches.

For more information you can check out this helpful video from KDP University, and Ingram Spark's Free Online Self-Publishing Course.
 

Want more tips like this? Subscribe to my monthly book design newsletter.

Help for Independent Presses

Book Design & Production

Have you written a nonfiction or fiction manuscript? After it has been professionally edited, I can design the interior pages and cover, plus guide you through the maze of book publishing and printing. To get started, contact me to discuss your project and my helpful guide for authors.

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