How to Fix Missing or Incorrect Book Metadata in ISBN Databases

Each ISBN agency has its own process for issuing ISBNs to book publishers in their respective countries.. In the United States, Bowker is the ISBN agency, and when you obtain an ISBN from Bowker, they issue the ISBN without any information about the book. Later, the publisher can assign an ISBN to a book format by entering book information. The book information entered on the assignment page helps with book metadata. But the problem is that this ISBN-assigned book information is not publicly available.

Bowker offers a paid service that allows companies to get the book information of assigned ISBNs. Google Books indexes book information from multiple sources, and based on my experience, Bowker is one of Google Books’ data sources. It depends on Google to index the book information from Bowker quickly.

By just assigning your ISBN, your book information can get added into book databases such as Google Books even before your book is published or becomes available for purchase. But Google Books takes a lot of time to index book information.

In case your book is published but not available in the Google Books database or the metadata is inaccurate, this article will help you with fixing or adding your book metadata into publicly known ISBN databases such as Google Books. It’s worth noting that not all ISBN agencies feed data to Google Books. For example, the ISBN agency in India has a publicly available ISBN database, but only the book title, author name, and publisher name are available in their database

How to Fix Your Book Metadata

ISBNs are assigned to book information before the book is published. Basic book information such as book title and author name is not changeable after the ISBN is assigned successfully. In case you have entered wrong book information, this doesn’t mean your ISBN becomes useless. Assigning an ISBN in the ISBN agency system is more of a formality than a required validation.

You can still use the same ISBN to publish your book even if it doesn’t match the ISBN-assigned basic book information. Book databases such as Google Books prioritize book metadata from retailer websites because retailer data reflects the actual published book that customers can purchase, making it more reliable and up-to-date than pre-publication assignment data.

For example, if an ISBN is assigned to book ABC but published with book XYZ, then Google Books will only list XYZ book information in their database because that’s what appears on retail platforms. You really don’t have to worry about metadata inaccuracy as long as the published book metadata is accurate.

Even after this, if your book is not found in Google Books and ISBN lookup databases, then follow the steps below to add or correct your book metadata.

Step 1: Create a free account at OpenLibrary.org. Open Library is similar to Google Books, but anyone can add or change book information in the Open Library database, unlike Google Books.

Step 2: Search for your book’s ISBN. If no result is found, then create a new book listing and add your book information.

These simple steps complete the process. You have added book information to a popular book information database. There are several book retailers, libraries, and software that use Open Library’s free API and database for book metadata. Once you have added your book information to Open Library, ISBN lookup tools can find your book information.