Before reading this page
Have you imported a list of ISBN-13s into Consonance from your local data agency (Nielsen in the UK; Bowker in the US)? You should do this before you add ISBN-13s to your products. Read how in this article: Import a list of ISBN-13s.
Add a new ISBN-13 to a product
First, go to Work › Metadata.
On the Metadata page, click to edit the Identifiers region, which displays a field for each product that does not already have an ISBN-13 assigned.
- Click on the ISBN-13 field for the product you want to allocate an ISBN-13
- Choose an ISBN-13 from the list assigned to your imprint.
If there’s nothing in the drop down list, it’s because you haven’t imported your unused ISBN-13s that Nielsen or Bowker sold to you. Read how to do that in this article: Import a list of ISBN-13s
Change the ISBN-13 of a product
Once an ISBN-13 has been entered into Consonance, you are now unable to edit it without assistance.
If you have made an error, and your ISBN-13 has not fed out into the supply chain - e.g. if you catch the error immediately - please raise a support ticket marked ‘urgent’. We will change it for you behind the scenes.
What do I do if my ISBN-13 has fed out into the supply chain?
If your ISBN-13 has been communicated externally, the official advice is not to change it. Your ISBN-13 has fed out if it’s been communicated via an ONIX feed or manually through an email, spreadsheet update or AI.
- Cancel the product in question. Head to the Metadata page for your work, go to Publishing > Dates, and set the Publishing status to ‘Cancelled’. This will communicate the change via ONIX to your third parties. Update any other third parties manually if need be.
- Next, create a new product and allocate a new ISBN-13. The easiest way to do this is by duplicating the original product, and then amending the details. Read how to duplicate a product to create a new one, belonging to the same work.