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A need for accuracy
Publishing professionals, particularly librarians and companies working with them, are the most likely users of Audience, Audience Ranges and Subject information and these values should work together to provide them a clear picture of the book. Unfortunately Unfortunately the data supplied by publishers for these values is notorious for being contradicting or unsuitable for use by professionals and it their use.
It follows that these values are the most likely to be modified by retailers and other data aggregators . but this page should give you an idea how to make sure your data is used and left alone. Many publishers do a great job here and are highly professional about proficient in their assessments. Some may not be great at metadata, and may inadvertently add errors and contradictions to their data. Still others may try to be all inclusive in a mistaken belief that saying "0 to 99" or portraying their their audience as limitless will include them in more selects by professionals. It will not . Here's some points to keep in mind:and may result in their data being excluded from a select.
Professional users expect to be able to create book lists or "selectselects" from databases based on the primary Audience code values:. Children and Adult are a common responsibility breakout for duties – and increasingly Young Adult is handled on its own. It’s always been recognized as it’s own section of Children’s books. YA publisher is intentionally associating their book in it’s broad category to direct it to the librarian or retail book buyer best able to assess your book
ONIX Code List List 28 for Audience Codes
01 - General/trade (intended for a non-specialist adult audience)
02 - Children/juvenile (intended for a juvenile audience, not specifically for any educational purpose.)
03 - Young adult (intended for a teenage audience, not specifically for any educational purpose.)
04 - Primary and secondary/elementary and high school (intended for kindergarten, pre-school, primary/elementary or secondary/high school education.)
05 - College/higher
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education (intended for universities and colleges of further and higher education.)
06 - Professional and scholarly (intended for an expert adult audience, including academic research.)
07 - ELT/ESL (intended for use in teaching English as a second language.)
08 - Adult education (intended for centres providing academic, vocational or recreational courses for adults
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.)
09 - Second language teaching (intended for teaching native English speakers a second language.)
Codes 01 to 03 are trade book categories – books intended for sales to consumers. The balance are for books designed to fulfill the needs of these specialized markets.
In North America retailers expect a book to carry single “trade” audience code. Audience codes can be repeated but it’s rare and normally only done for a specialized audience book that fits more than one special audience category, but sometimes includes books with potential for trade sales.
An example can help: A novel like Huckleberry Finn may be sold in stores and used in schools, but the “01” trade book and the “04” school book would be different and designed for their audience group. An “04” book would include additional supporting materials designed for a limited grade range and may include reinforced binding. The trade book may still contain an introduction that provides context for reading a problematic text, and it’s even possible it may be bought by schools who may want a less expensive book without extensive supporting resources. It’s even possible that a book club might prefer to use a school edition for it’s rich supporting resources and a retailer may choose to stock it. The point is simply that a single audience category still supports those choices better than an ambiguous layering of multiple codes. You can help professionals and consumers find your book by being specific and accurate. An example where a dual Audience Code might make sense is a beautifully illustrated scholarly book on the ecology of sea shores that is designed to fulfill the needs of beachcombers and as well as academics. In such an exceptional cases, especially for publishers associated with a specialized market, adding a trade code makes sense when it’s appropriate for the book to be sold outside of the publisher’s typical market.
When in doubt, use “Trade” identifiers as they are the most common and generic.Professionals, using a BISAC Subject Code, would then expect that all "Main Subjects" and "Additional Subjects" to correspond to this primary audience identifier:
Audience Codes and Subject Codes support each other
Trade subject schemes like BISAC or Thema are used with a “main subject” – a single primary subject code. If Audience Codes are used to create broad categories of books their creators would expect to see subjects appropriate to their selected category.
Books identified for Children/juvenile or Young adult MUST be supported by appropriate Subjects lists for Juveniles or Young Adults
Books intended for Adults MUST be supported by appropriate subjects from the non-Juvenile or Young Adult subject lists.
No one says this is a perfect way to do things, but professionals actually know what they are doing and allowances are made -- — particularly for YA novels as cross-over to adult products . Please note that Thema Subject Codes are not used in quite the same way but this would remain true at the Main Subject level. (In Thema secondary codes are handled more loosely, so a Fiction book where, say, Slavery forms a major part of the plot might well apply the non-fiction Subject Code for Slavery.)
Note that the ONIX standard allows Audience Codes to repeat, but that's not wanted using the first 3 identifiers for Trade audience. Repetition allows for the exceptional case when a book might be suitable for both Trade and Education and the reason repetition may make sense is that different professionals would be making the select. Think of it this way: A buyer or other book professional is trying to get a list of books to vet so they start subdividing entries based on Audience. The might "select" all books matching value(s) – OR – they might discard all books matching value(s). In either case they aren't expecting repetition of "trade" audience values and for the latter case the repetition might eliminate the book from any select, while in the former case finding records with dual trade codes would just be confusing. Accuracy is important because a list of Education books that was chocked with titles with tenuous educational merit simply is discarded and the selection process tries to workaround poor data. Selection starts with lists, the list starts at audience and Audience Codes need to be used in away that supports selection.
When supporting trade books a publisher must choose only ONE from 01 to 03 Audience codes and the BISAC Subject coding must be appropriate for that audience. (Thema is the same for Main Subject but there are slightly different rules around the balance of the subject code that <might> come into play. See our pages on Thema for more.)
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for adults. Also be aware that BISAC Subjects are created so that all subjects are isolated to a single Audience category within the scheme – mixing should NOT happen Thema is less structured in terms of mixing categories of codes to create a subject picture, so the Audience category association would apply to the main subject only. Please refer to documentation for each subject scheme for more information using it properly.
Audience ranges
Juvenile books (both Children's and Young Adult titles) must be supported by Audience Range information. If there are any points to be emphasized here it is that:
Useful range information is specific: Any range wider then three or at most four years is considered by professionals to be unusable for most purposes.
YA books
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can be identified using an open ended statement that implies extending into adults (an example might be 14 and up) but
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a specific end value is preferred.
Adult books are not typically supported by range information and it’s only appropriate for very specialized books
A range of 0 - 99 or similar extreme range has no value in a statement. Only a limited range has meaning and it diminishes without focus.Hyperbole may make sense in your marketing or promotional copy but it has no place in coded metadata.
Publishers of Juvenile books spend a lot of time and energy developing expertise in their products and one of the ways they demonstrate it is accuracy in Audience Range information. They mean what they say and are genuinely upset when their data is modified by other industry players. If you're new to publishing talk to children librarians about this their needs and try look to develop a basis for producing accurate informationan understanding of how they use this data (BookNet’s blogs and podcast are a great source for information about libraries). Considering getting help in making assessments from an experienced freelancer. The time spent developing an understanding of professional need will be repaid.
There are three Audience Ranges typically provided for slightly different purposes:
Interest Age information information is the least specific and generally means the content is appropriate to the interests of this age and is supplied as a general guideline to support trade sales. What age does the editor and author say the book is for? They should know. This information is recommended to be included on available all Juvenile books even if another range type is supplied.
Grade Ranges (US or Canada are considered equivalent) are supplied by many publishers. They are slightly more specific than Interest Age but because the grade ranges doncan highlight that book has potential for classroom use. A grade ranges doesn't correspond to any specific curriculum are assessment so they are still generic . It should be supplied when the book is can be considered a useful adjunct for teaching to that grade.and best supported by other types of documentation that provide curriculum support
Reading Age is a much more technical assessment of a book's content. For instance a book may have a high an older Interest Age and a low younger Reading Age if the book is combining a 10 year old 's interests with simplified languagereluctant reader. Doing this right requires real knowledge and should only be supplied if the publisher has developed the skills or had professional assistance in providing it. If Note that ONIX provides support for “Complexity Schemes” ONIX Code List 50 as part of a different section.
If a librarian or book buyer assesses your range information as wildly inaccurate it will taint the rest of your good work.
If in doubt, don't supply it.
Want to know more? A BISG whitepaper The US based Book Industry Study Group (BISG) has two publications:
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in Metadata contains information about audience and subjects with a focus on good keyword use
Recommendations for Citing Educational Standards and Objectives in Metadata contains information about audience and subject with a focus on complexity and curriculum values.