Google Books is a digital publishing platform that allows authors and publishers to make their books available in digital format on the Google Books website. The platform is designed to make it easy for authors and publishers to self-publish their work, and reach a wide audience of readers. One important aspect of Google Books that plays a role in discovery and SEO is the use of metadata.
Metadata refers to the data that describes a book, such as its title, author, publisher, and description. This information is crucial for discovery because it allows users to search for and find books that are relevant to their interests.
In Google Books, authors and publishers can provide metadata such as title, author, publisher, ISBN, categories and keywords, a brief description, and cover image. This information is used by Google's algorithm to match books with user's queries and make them discoverable.
Additionally, metadata is also important for SEO (Search Engine Optimization) as it helps books to be indexed and ranked by search engines such as Google, Bing and Yahoo. By including keywords in the metadata, books are more likely to appear in search results for those keywords, making them more discoverable to readers.
Furthermore, Google Books uses structured data and schema.org markup, which allows Google to understand the information on the webpage and use it to enhance search results.