Newcomers to any business can quickly become overwhelmed by the industry-specific acronyms. Publishing is not much different — ISBN, EAN, CIP/PCIP, LCCN, PCN, SAN, GTIN, ARC, ad nausem.
So what the heck is BISAC? First, let’s consider what the Book Industry Study Group (BISG) is, as they are the organization that maintains the BISAC database. BISG was established some 30 years ago and is, according to their own website:
The Book Industry Study Group (BISG) is a national, not-for-profit U.S. book trade association with the mission of creating a more informed, empowered and efficient book industry supply chain for both physical and digital products. We’re committed to the development of effective industry-wide standards, best practices, research and events related to both physical and digital products that enhance relationships between all trading partners.
BISG operates a number of committees that work to standardize publishing industry policies on a variety of supply-chain issues. One of those groups is the Book Industry Standards and Communications (BISAC) committee. Among the many tasks assigned to BISAC is the creation, maintenance, and update of the Subject Heading and Merchandising Themes lists. The primary BISAC list of interest to small and self-publishers is the Subject Heading list, which is a used throughout the supply chain to categorize books based on topical content and can help determine where a book is shelved in a brick-and-mortar store or the most likely genres to search for it in a database.
The BISAC committee posts the complete Subject Headings list on the BISG website. You can easily search through it to find the best headings for your book. You will find the BISAC headings on the top left of the back cover of most books. You can list more than one heading, but more than three will probably cause more confusion than none at all.
Think of the BISAC subject heading as the shelf label in a bookstore, and ask yourself where in a bookstore you think your book belongs.
When you put the subject heading on your book’s back cover, do not include the associated code listed on the BISG website. Putting in on the back cover will identify you as a neophyte. Just use the plain text version. That code is really only for exchange of data electronically when using the ONIX standard (uh-oh…another acronym).
You can browse the BISAC database of subject headings for free and select the appropriate one(s) for your book. The two links at the bottom of the page (BISAC Subject Headings List A-J and BISAC Subject Headings List K-Z) will take you to the top-level list of subject headings. Click on any one of them and you will jump to a list of subheadings that you can use (e.g., under History you can find “HIS027140 HISTORY / Military / Aviation”). Like I said, you wouldn’t include “HIS027140″ on the book’s back cover, just “HISTORY / Military / Aviation.”
So, should you bother with BISAC codes on your books? A better question, in my opinion, is why wouldn’t you? After all, it is free and just might make sure your book winds up on the correct shelf in a bookstore.
15 Comments
September 14, 2009 at 4:54 pm
While we try to stay with the BISAC categories, they are not always descriptive enough to help the bookseller shelve the book. Therefore, we have to extend the category on our own. For instance, BISAC has categories for Military History, but not for the Space Race (for our book Hornet Plus Three).
This lack of completeness on BISAC’s part hindered our categorization with Baker & Taylor (which uses BISAC and finally drpped its own category markers). Ingram has a proprietory category system that is not as useful as BISAC. I wish the industry would adopt BISAC, and that BISAC were a little more customizable!
September 14, 2009 at 5:47 pm
Fair point, Jacqueline. But I have to wonder how much value there is in splitting hairs that way. In all the bookstores, around the country, that I’ve been in, I’ve rarely seen any of them shelve down to much more than the second level (of something that at least approximates BISAC headings). Aviation books, whether history or something else, seems to get lumped into Transportation no matter what the headings are on the back cover. And military history is rarely divided into an aviation category but, more likely, split into time periods or wars.
Of course, it has been a few years since I was last in a bookstore of any size, as I prefer to remain up here in Paradise. My wife sometimes accuses me of becoming a hermit. Maybe, but I got all my travel urges out of my system after being raised an AF brat, spending 20 years in uniform, and spending another 19 years in the defense industry flitting back and forth across the continent on business.
Maybe things in big bookstores have changed.
May 3, 2010 at 12:27 am
Ingram does use BISAC categories (and LC subjects).
May 3, 2010 at 8:42 am
Yes, as I said, BISAC Subject Headings are “used throughout the supply chain,” which certainly includes Ingram (a wholesaler/distributor).
September 14, 2009 at 5:35 pm
I figured out the BISAC real quick.
No neophyte here!
September 14, 2009 at 5:49 pm
As Jacqueline noted, it would be nice if BISAC had more third-level options (and even more second-level ones, for that matter).
But it seems a relatively painless thing to add to a book. And, who knows, it just might help someplace, sometime.
September 14, 2009 at 6:06 pm
Thanks for this post. The BISAC is very important for us because many times, as a reviewer, we have no clue what the genre or category is of the book. The book sometimes looks like a memoir but in reality it’s a novel or the other way around. Also, some times we don’t know if the book is an adult book or a teen/ya. Not only that, the supporting documents don’t indicate the genre/category either. When authors ask for free reviews from us and there is no BISAC on the back or there is no indication what type of book it is in the supporting documents, it automatically goes into the the donate pile. We do not play the guessing game. I’m in contact with many other review services and they all tell me the same thing – no guessing games.
Bottom line – BISAC is important.
September 15, 2009 at 7:42 am
Irene,
That’s an issue I hadn’t really considered – reviewers using the information to help make initial decisions. Thanks for bringing it to the table.
And any small and self publishers who aren’t familiar with your Reader Views services, needs to check it out! You provide a great service.
September 14, 2009 at 8:32 pm
I hear you, Walt, but JC makes a good point – which is possibly even more problematic in my industry. PETS and SPORTS AND RECREATION (even with the equine second level – some of my buyers probably don’t even know the meaning of the term) aren’t places readers would look for my titles. They want to know where the horse books are :-). It’s too bad so many of the categories aren’t intuitive from a consumer standpoint.
September 15, 2009 at 7:45 am
While it is true that BISAC leaves a lot to be desired with its list of headings, subheadings, and sub-subheadings, I would use caution before creating a new one.
Before doing so, visit some bookstores to see if any of them actually have a shelving section for the category you’re creating. If not, you might as well not bother with the BISAC at all, since they’ll just put it wherever they think it might fit (which may or may not be where you wanted it to go).
September 15, 2009 at 7:51 am
Thanks for the plug Walt. Yes, it sure is an issue, especially when we get 30 to 40 books in one day. The person that opens the packages doesn’t spend time trying to figure out the category or genre if it’s not noted on the book or in the first paragraph of the supporting document. When authors expect us to give them a free review, they need to make it easy for us. The bottom line is I can’t pay someone out of my pocket to try to figure out where the book belongs just to give a free review. So, yes, BISAC is important, not only for the potential readers but for the potential reviewers.
September 15, 2009 at 8:12 am
There’s no need to whine about BISG not being responsive, they are always interested in feedback from the publishing community. In fact, they added a new category at my request:
PSY022040 PSYCHOLOGY / Psychopathology / Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in BISG 2.9.
If BISAC isn’t working for you, you have only yourself to blame!
September 15, 2009 at 8:49 am
Thanks for the suggestion, Victor! I’ve wondered if BISG would respond to such requests.
That’s definitely worth a try if you can’t find a category that fits.
September 17, 2009 at 1:11 pm
Hello,
I’d like to know what BISAC is and what is it is used for. Do you need it for a P-CIP? Does somebody read the manuscript and then create a datablock, or does the publisher do it him or herself?
Thanks!
September 17, 2009 at 1:27 pm
I just wrote 842 words that describe what BISAC is (the post immediately above). Please read that.
BISAC has nothing to do with CIP or PCIP (and those two are different). BISAC is for bookstores and others in the supply chain, while CIP/PCIP is primarily for librarians or others involved with cataloging books.
For more information about all the various numbers and codes associated with publishing books, see our Book Publishing by the Numbers Instant Guide.
You might also find these other blog posts informative:
Thanks for stopping by.