BIC Brunch, May 2020 Keeping up with your Metadata: A ... Brunch Slideshow, May 2020.pdfThe earlier...

BIC Brunch, May 2020Keeping up with your Metadata:

A Lesson in Increasing Sales and Bettering Communications

#bicbrunch

Agenda

12pm Introduction and update on BIC

Alaina-Marie Bassett, Business Manager, BIC

12:05pm Keeping up with your Metadata

Cecilia Rushton, Head of Editorial Operations, Hodder & Stoughton, Headline,

John Murray and Quercus

Graham Bell, Executive Director, EDItEUR

Clive Herbert, Head of Professional Services, Nielsen Book

12:50pm Question and Answer and General Discussion

1pm Wrap-up and end

Alaina-Marie Bassett, Business Manager, BIC

bic.org.ukBOOK INDUSTRY COMMUNICATION LTD #bicbrunch

bic.org.uk

Some housekeeping before we get started

Reducing background noise: We kindly ask that all non-speaker attendees mute

themselves to reduce any background noise.

Questions for speakers: Questions will be invited at the end of this event (time-permitting).

If you would like to ask a question, please either indicate this by messaging the meeting

organisers (only) in the chat box provided or unmute yourself in order to speak.

Remember to re-mute yourself once you’ve asked your question.

Recording: This event is being recorded for BIC to use in its marketing and to allow people

who are unable to attend this session today to still enjoy the event later. Unless you speak,

you will not be identified in the recording.

Social media:

We will be tweeting during this event using the #bicbrunch hashtag. Feel free to join in!

BOOK INDUSTRY COMMUNICATION LTD #bicbrunch

Who we are

BIC (Book Industry Communication Ltd) is at the cornerstone of the book industry,

creating standards, delivering best practice and improving margin.

If you are in the book industry supply chain you need to be a member of BIC.

bic.org.ukBOOK INDUSTRY COMMUNICATION LTD #bicbrunch

bic.org.uk

BIC Committees

Digital Supply Chain Committee

Libraries Committee

Metadata Sub-Committee

Physical Supply Chain Committee

BOOK INDUSTRY COMMUNICATION LTD

DIGITAL

PH

YS

ICA

L

METADATA MATTERS!

#bicbrunch

bic.org.uk

BIC Events & Training

BIC Breakfasts / BIC Brunches / Green BIC Brunches

Networking Events

Annual seminar at London Book Fair

Extensive training programme (runs throughout the year)

Social media: Facebook

LinkedIn

Twitter:

@BIC1UK

@BIC_LCF

YouTube


bic.org.uk

What is a BIC Brunch?

Monthly

Short (60 minute)

Online sessions

Dedicated to supply chain topics and/or issues


Green BIC Brunches – coming soon!

Bi-monthly, starting June 2020

Focus on the steps being taken by the

book industry to make our supply chain

as environmentally-friendly as possible

bic.org.uk/99/What-are-BIC-Breakfasts?/

bic.org.uk/97/Upcoming-Breakfasts/

#bicbrunch

bic.org.uk

Over to our first speaker…

Cecilia Rushton, Head of Editorial Operations,

Hodder & Stoughton, Headline, John Murray

and Quercus


Keeping Up with Your Metadata

27 May 2020

Cecilia Rushton, Hachette [email protected]

What are we going to cover?

• Why does good metadata matter and why does it have to be up-to-date?

• What is the BIC PDEA scheme and how can it help?

• What can publishers do internally to ensure top data practice?

• The refreshed BIC PDEA scheme

Why does good metadata matter?

Metadata does two key things: it helps retailers to sell our products and customers to find them.

The better the data (the more complete, accurate and more timely), the more information we provide to retailers and the easier it is for customers to find our products.

There are two levels of data:

• Basic elements

• Descriptive/rich data elements

Basic and Descriptive Data

Basic data elements: • ISBN • Title • Author• Territorial sales rights• Format• Subject codes (BIC, BISAC, Thema)• Pub date• Price• Cover image

Descriptive data: • Description• Reviews• Biography• Keywords

According to Nielsen’s 2016 White Paper, titles that include all basic data elements sell 75% more copies than

those that don’t

Adding a cover image increases sales by more than 200%

Including Description, Reviews and Biography increase sales by 72% Including keywords

increases sales by 34%

Why does it have to be kept up-to-date?

Books are not static products. They are reissued, retitled and re-jacketed. They are put into new formats, published in new markets and new territories.

The more dynamic your product, the more dynamic your data needs to be.

And the most dynamic data are:

Description

Categories

Keywords

These should be regularly checked and updated to keep them fresh and relevant to the market.

Why does it have to be ready early?

The earlier the data is ready and feeding into the market, the better:

• Suppliers and retailers know about your product in plenty of time to order

• Customers can pre-order titles, which builds buzz

• Publishers have time to check and change elements that are not working

Titles with a complete data set that feed into the market 4 (or more) months

before pub, sell 25% more copies

Why does it matter now?

If you’re not reaching your customers online, you’re not reaching them at all.

More than ever, digital presence is crucial, and getting to the top of the digital space can’t be done without great metadata.

Description, Category codes, Keywords

Nielsen’s new paper: ‘The Impact of COVID-19 on the UK Book Consumer’,

suggests that reading is up but publishers are competing more than ever with

other forms of entertainment

Popular Fiction:crime/thriller/adventure,

general/popular fiction and romance/sagas

Popular Non-fiction:cookery, puzzle and quizzing, gardening/

DIY and health and fitness

What is the BIC PDEA Scheme

The Publishing Data Excellence Award (PDEA) is an annual award scheme run by BIC and assessed by Nielsen. It measures the completeness and timeliness of data.

Under the current scheme, there are three levels: BIC Excellence Plus, BIC Excellence and BIC Basic.

The scheme measures:

Data completeness : all data elements complete by publication date: title, author, format, price, category codes, description, cover, etc.

Data timeliness : all data elements are in place 16 weeks before publication.

All members of the scheme receive monthly reports and charts from Nielsen to help them keep track of their data.

Nielsen Completeness and Timeliness Graphs

The black columns indicate % of titles with complete data at time of publication

The blue columns indicate % of titles with complete data 16 weeks ahead of publication

For BIC Excellence Plus, 80% of editions must be complete and 60% need to be timely

Nielsen Reports

The reports also include a breakdown of compliance by imprint as well as more detailed reports showing each ISBN

Deep-dive cleansing examples

1) A sudden drop in a division’s stats

Problem identified: a new imprint missing covers on backlist titles

Solution: missing cover images uploaded

2) A gift-book series that consistently had a high ‘fail’ rate

Problem identified: ‘Dimensions’ consistently failing

Solution: change to internal process to add dimensions to a format type

What else can publishers do to ensure great metadata?

• In-house reports

• Early cover images

• Retailer site checks

• Checking titles on all devices

• Post-publication checks

• Metadata best practice

The Refreshed BIC PDEA scheme

The scheme is being simplified so that members are awarded Bronze, Silver or Gold.

All product formats – including print, digital and audio – will be assessed as one.

New data elements have been added to keep up with changing industry requirements:

- Thema category codes are mandatory for all levels

- Use of ONIX 3.0, including eBook Accessibility data, and adult content warnings are all necessary for Gold accreditation

- Quality elements are being included for the first time (TBC)

When?

First applications will be welcome for 2021. All organisations (including those accredited on the current PDEA Scheme) will need to submit an application to gain an award on the refreshed scheme.

Great title metadata…

• Has complete and accurate basic elements

• Has complete and rich descriptive data

• Is ready early (at least 4 months before pub – but aim for 6+)

• Has regularly reviewed and updated dynamic data (pre- and post- publication)

How is this achieved?

• By using the support available – the BIC PDEA scheme is a great help

• Making metadata central to in-house process

• Resolving data issues quickly

bic.org.uk

Over to our second speaker…

Graham Bell, Executive Director, EDItEUR


Keeping metadata up-to-date

Graham Bell

EDItEUR

BIC Brunch, 27th May 2020

About me

• 20+ years experience in book publishing

and technology

• exec director of EDItEUR, standards

organisation that works closely with BIC,

responsible for development of ONIX,

Thema, EDItX standards

• formerly senior manager in IT department

for HarperCollins UK

• led development of bibliographic, editorial

and digital asset management systems

Metadata is dynamic

• publisher’s metadata is never ‘finished’ – it’s always subject to change

• particularly in the pre-publication period

• but some key metadata continues to change throughout the product’s life,

particularly…

• marketing collateral

• links to other (newer) products

• distribution details, price and availability

• data supply chain relies on ability to update data at any time

Multiple methods for metadata updates

• basic product metadata, marketing collateral, distribution details

• ONIX for Books – rich data from publisher

• ongoing price and availability changes during active part of lifecycle

• ONIX – including block updates, mostly from publisher

• EDIFACT and Tradacoms EDI messaging – mostly from distributor

• EDItX and BIC Realtime – mostly from distributor

• push or pull?

• have a clear strategy to avoid contradictions

• either careful system integration between publishing and distribution

systems, or a strict separation of methods and responsibilities

Tradacoms updates

• most Tradacoms messages are orders,

acknowledgements, invoices, credit notes

and the like – messages defining

transactions

• exception: price and availability update

• supports only basic price and availability

• unchanged for two decades, ’not

recommended for new implementations’

beyond 2010, but still probably most- used update method post-publication

STX=ANAA:1+5023456789541:XYZ+5098765 432156+070130:103045+P4371++PVUHDR'

MHD=1+PVUHDR:1'TYP=9021'SDT=5023456789541'CDT=5098765432156'DNA=1+206:T01'

DNA=2+207:006'FIL=1+1+200527'MTR=8'MHD=2+PVUINF:1'NOI=1+AMEND+200601'

PRN=1+1+1:1+9780001234567++1'AVL=1+1+RP:200621'RPR=1+1+1++179500+GBP+++Z'

MTR=6'MHD=3+PVUTLR:1'PVT=1'MTR=3'MHD=4+RSGRSG:2'RSG=P4371+5098765432156'

MTR=3'END=4'

STX=ANAA:1+5023456789541:XYZ+5098765 432156+070130:103045+P4371++PVUHDR'

MHD=1+PVUHDR:1'

TYP=9021'

SDT=5023456789541'

CDT=5098765432156'

DNA=1+206:T01'

DNA=2+207:006'

FIL=1+1+200527'

MTR=8'

MHD=2+PVUINF:1'

NOI=1+AMEND+200601'

PRN=1+1+1:1+9780001234567++1'

AVL=1+1+RP:200621'

RPR=1+1+1++179500+GBP+++Z'

MTR=6'

MHD=3+PVUTLR:1'

PVT=1'

DNA=2+207:006'

FIL=1+1+200527'

MTR=8'

MHD=2+PVUINF:1'

NOI=1+AMEND+200601'

PRN=1+1+1:1+9780001234567++1'

AVL=1+1+RP:200621'

RPR=1+1+1++179500+GBP+++Z'

MTR=6'

MHD=3+PVUTLR:1'

PVT=1'

MTR=3'

MHD=4+RSGRSG:2'

RSG=P4371+5098765432156'

MTR=3'

END=4'

– price and availability update

– amendment, active from 1st June

– ISBN

– reprinting, availability 21st June

– price £17.95, zero-rated for VAT

– confirmation – 6 lines in this section

ONIX updates

• ONIX is a ‘catalogue message’ carrying

the full range of rich metadata – can

specify or update any part of the data,

including price and availability

• in ONIX 2.1, a special ‘P&A update’

message

• in ONIX 3.0, a more sophisticated

message structure with ‘block updates’

ONIX updates

• full update – send all data

• once or twice a year for forthcoming and active products, to eliminate errors

• delta updates – re-send all data for products where any data has changed

• filter out products where data is unchanged since last sent

• send delta update at least weekly for forthcoming and active products

• block updates – re-send only data that has changed

• more correctly, send block zero plus blocks that contain changed data

• filter out unchanged products and unchanged blocks

• considerably more efficient for recipients – less redundant processing

Blocks in ONIX 3.0

• ‘block zero’ – record reference, product identifiers

• Block 1 – basic product description

• Block 2 – marketing collateral

• Block 7 – promotional events

• Block 3 – chapter-level metadata

• Block 4 – publisher and imprint, sales rights, pub dates

• Block 5 – links to other products

• Block 6 – markets, suppliers, prices

<Product>

<RecordReference>com.mypublisher.01734</RecordReference> – ‘block zero’

<NotificationType>04</NotificationType>

<ProductIdentifier>

<ProductIDType>15</ProductIDType>

<IDValue>9780001234567</IDValue>

</ProductIdentifier>

<ProductSupply> – block 6

<SupplyDetail>

<Supplier>

<SupplierRole>01</SupplierRole>

<SupplierIdentifier>

<SupplierIDType>06</SupplierIDType>


</SupplierIdentifier>

</Supplier>

<ProductAvailability datestamp="20200527">32</ProductAvailability> – reprinting

<SupplyDate>

<SupplyDateRole>08</SupplyDateRole> – availability 21st June

<Date>20200621</Date>




</Supplier>

<ProductAvailability datestamp="20200527">32</ProductAvailability> – reprinting

<SupplyDate>

<SupplyDateRole>08</SupplyDateRole> – availability 21st June

<Date>20200621</Date>

</SupplyDate>

<Price>

<PriceType>02</PriceType>

<PriceStatus>02</PriceStatus>

<PriceAmount>17.95</PriceAmount> – 17.95

<Tax>

<TaxType>01</TaxType>

<TaxRateCode>Z</TaxRateCode> – zero-rated for VAT

<TaxRatePercent>0<TaxRatePercent>

<TaxableAmount>17.95</TaxableAmount>

<TaxAmount>0.00</TaxAmount>

</Tax>

<CurrencyCode>GBP</CurrencyCode>

<Territory>

<PriceAmount>17.95</PriceAmount> – 17.95

<Tax>


<TaxRateCode>Z</TaxRateCode> – zero-rated for VAT

<TaxRatePercent>0<TaxRatePercent>



</Tax>


<Territory>

<CountriesIncluded>GB IM</CountriesIncluded> – valid in

</Territory>

<PriceDate>

<PriceDateRole>15</PriceDateRole> – valid from

<Date>20200601</Date>

</PriceDate>

</Price>

</SupplyDetail>

</ProductSupply>

</Product>

BIC Realtime updates

• ONIX, Tradacoms are ‘push’ methods, advertising the prices

available to all

• BIC Realtime provides a ‘pull’ method – metadata is delivered in

response to a specific request (this is sometimes called an API)

• most Realtime messages are orders, acknowledgements, invoices,

credit notes and the like – messages defining transactions (and many

of these are based on EDItEUR’s EDItX standard)

• exception: product metadata APIs

• request a full ONIX record, or a price and availability record

• responses similar to conventional ONIX / EDItX records

<PriceAvailabilityRequest version="2.0" xmlns="http://www.bic.org.uk/webservices/priceAvailability">

<Header>

<AccountIdentifier>

<AccountIDType>01</AccountIDType>


</AccountIdentifier>

<PriceAvailabilityRequestNumber>017</PriceAvailabilityRequestNumber>

<IssueDateTime>20200527T103058</IssueDateTime>

<SupplierIdentifier>





</Header>

<Product>

<LineNumber>1</LineNumber>

<ProductIdentifier>




<SupplyQuantity>6</SupplyQuantity>

</Product>

</PriceAvailabilityRequest>

POST the query, or use a GET request:https://www.supplier.co.uk/PriceAvailabilityService?

ClientID=MyShop&ClientPassword=******&PriceAvaila

bilityRequestNumber=017&IssueDateTime=20200527T10

3058&ProductIDType=03&ProductIDValue=978000123456

7&SupplyQuantity=6&CurrencyCode=GBP

Summary

• keeping your metadata up-to-date is commercially valuable

• applies to bibliographic, marketing and supply chain metadata

• expect more frequent post-publication updates in the future

• multiple methods for update

• mixing methods requires careful integration between publisher and

distributor to avoid contradictions

• EDIFACT and Tradacoms limited to very simple use cases – increasing

demand to move beyond EDI to support more complex pricing models in

ONIX, EDItX and Realtime

• EDItEUR ONIX 3.0 Specification, global Implementation and Best Practice Guide, various XML tools, code lists, mailing list

• https://www.editeur.org/93/Release-3.0-Downloads/

• https://www.editeur.org/14/Code-Lists#code lists

• https://ns.editeur.org/onix (interactive)

• https://groups.io/g/onix (subscribe via blank e-mail to [email protected])

• EDIFACT and BIC Tradacoms

• https://www.editeur.org/87/EDIFACT-Overview/

• https://www.editeur.org/30/Trade-Book-Supply/

• https://www.bic.org.uk/14/EDI-Implementation-for-the-Book-Trade/

• https://bit.ly/36numV9 (Tradacoms codelists)

• [email protected]

• EDItX

• https://www.editeur.org/88/EDItX-Overview/

• https://www.editeur.org/50/Trade-Book-Supply

• https://groups.io/g/editx (subscribe via blank e-mail to [email protected])

• BIC RealTime

• https://www.bic.org.uk/152/BIC-Realtime/


• EDItEUR general enquiries



bic.org.uk

Over to our third and final speaker…

Clive Herbert, Head of Professional Services,

Nielsen Book


This artwork was created using Nielsen data.

Copyright © 2020 The Nielsen Company (US), LLC. Confidential and proprietary. Do not distribute.

Nielsen Book

Clive Herbert

27th May 2020

BIC BRUNCH: KEEPING UP WITH YOUR METADATA

2Cop

yri

gh

t ©

20

20

Th

e N

iels

en

Com

pa

ny (

US

), L

LC

. C

on

fid

en

tia

l a

nd

pro

pri

eta

ry. D

o n

ot d

istr

ibu

te.

NIELSEN BOOKService Update

• Data is still being loaded 24/7 with the support of our operations team

• We continue to supply data on a daily, weekly and monthly basis to our retail customers

• Nielsen transactional services and networks are operating normally

• All our help desks are open to provide help and guidance to publishers: Service & Support,

Publisher Helpdesk and the ISBN Agency

• The ISBN Store is available for ISBN allocation and many other Nielsen services

• So if you aren't sure of what to do next we continue in these difficult times to provide our expert

guidance to support to the trade wherever we can

Support

[email protected] [email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

3Cop

yri

gh

t ©

20

20

Th

e N

iels

en

Com

pa

ny (

US

), L

LC

. C

on

fid

en

tia

l a

nd

pro

pri

eta

ry. D

o n

ot d

istr

ibu

te.

DATA COLLECTION

EDIDaily from all main UK distributors and other countries

ONIXOver 500 inbound ONIX feeds: a mixture of daily and weekly files

TITLE EDITOR PORTALFrom over 23,000 portal users on an ad hoc basis

OTHER STRUCTURED ELECTRONIC FEEDSFiles in other formats such as delimited and .csv

Wide Range of Collection Services

4Cop

yri

gh

t ©

20

20

Th

e N

iels

en

Com

pa

ny (

US

), L

LC

. C

on

fid

en

tia

l a

nd

pro

pri

eta

ry. D

o n

ot d

istr

ibu

te.

PRICE & AVAILABILITY VALIDATIONNielsen ONIX Validation Rules

• Check for the presence of some kind of availability status, publication status or market status

• Validate that <AvailabilityCode> or <ProductAvailability> is a valid code from List 54 or 65

• Check that prices are only numeric (i.e. do not contain currency symbols, spaces etc) and do not

contain more than 1 decimal point, that the price isn’t empty and that it isn’t just zeros

• Identify invalid dates eg 20200231, 202004005, 20200345 (it happens!)

• If the <AvailabilityCode> or <ProductAvailability> used (either from List 54 or 65) should be

accompanied by an expected availability date, we check for the presence of that and whether it is

the right ‘kind’ of date (e.g. past or future)

• Check that BIC Discount codes are in the right format

• For some feeds, we run some validation on the Tax composite (if sent) to ensure the values

calculate correctly

5Cop

yri

gh

t ©

20

20

Th

e N

iels

en

Com

pa

ny (

US

), L

LC

. C

on

fid

en

tia

l a

nd

pro

pri

eta

ry. D

o n

ot d

istr

ibu

te.

IMPACT OF ‘BAD’ DATA Impact of Incorrect or Out of Date Information on Retailers & Consumers

• Retailers buying decisions affected by inaccurate data

• Disappointed retailers & consumers if orders can’t be fulfilled when expected

• Lost sales

• Uncertainty and lack of confidence in your data

• Important to maintain the product record to the end of its life

6Cop

yri

gh

t ©

20

20

Th

e N

iels

en

Com

pa

ny (

US

), L

LC

. C

on

fid

en

tia

l a

nd

pro

pri

eta

ry. D

o n

ot d

istr

ibu

te.

TWO KEY AREASVAT on Digital Publications & Delayed Publication Dates

• VAT on Digital Publications

• The UK Government announced that from 1 May 2020 Standard rate VAT will no longer be applied

to digital publications in the UK. Previously VAT was applied at 20%.

• If any publisher has listed e-book product records with Nielsen we ask they update the VAT

statements and review the prices of their digital publications.

• Delayed Publication Dates

• Many publishers are delaying the publication date of some titles due to the pandemic

• Not just the publication date, re-supply the whole ONIX composite

• In ONIX reflect the delay in availability for the territories where it is delayed

7Cop

yri

gh

t ©

20

20

Th

e N

iels

en

Com

pa

ny (

US

), L

LC

. C

on

fid

en

tia

l a

nd

pro

pri

eta

ry. D

o n

ot d

istr

ibu

te.

COMMON PRICING ERRORS IN ONIX4 Most Common Errors

• 1. Tax breakdowns not calculating correctly

• If a price supplied is inclusive of tax (e.g. an RRP) and <TaxableAmount> and <TaxAmount>

have been sent, these two fields should add up to the RRP.

• 2. <TaxableAmount> the same as RRP when the product has Standard rate tax

• <TaxableAmount> should contain: the amount of the unit price of the product, excluding tax

• 3. Prices sent as ‘0.00’

• free of charge it should be sent with an <UnpricedItemType> and code 01

• 4. <AvailabilityCode> or <ProductAvailability> conflicting with expected availability date supplied

• <ProductAvailability>10 or <ProductAvailability>32, sent with past dates

8Cop

yri

gh

t ©

20

20

Th

e N

iels

en

Com

pa

ny (

US

), L

LC

. C

on

fid

en

tia

l a

nd

pro

pri

eta

ry. D

o n

ot d

istr

ibu

te.

SUMMARYKey Points

• Nielsen is processing data normally

• Even in lockdown the trade thrives on accurate, high quality data

• Doubly so in online retail environments

• Please update your e-book prices if you haven’t already done so

• Update the message fully when delaying publication dates

• Maintain your data

Ask your question either via the chat box provided

or direct to our speakers.

Remember to unmute yourself prior to speaking!

Tell us your:

bic.org.uk

Any questions?


?Name

Organisation

Your question (and who it’s intended for)

And please re-mute yourself once your question

has been put to our speakers.

#bicbrunch

Thank You!

Presentation slides will be made available on our website shortly

A recording of this event will be posted to BIC's YouTube channel

#joinbic

BIC Brunch, May 2020 Keeping up with your Metadata: A ... Brunch Slideshow, May 2020.pdfThe earlier...

Documents

Transcript of BIC Brunch, May 2020 Keeping up with your Metadata: A ... Brunch Slideshow, May 2020.pdfThe earlier...