A method for retrieving metadata for use in a content guide is disclosed. The method includes: crawling one or more crawlable data sources; storing metadata extracted from the one or more crawlable data sources in an indexed cache; receiving a search request from a client according to search criteria, the search request requesting metadata for use in the content guide; searching a subset of the indexed cache according to the search criteria; extracting metadata from the indexed cache as results of the searching; identifying relevant metadata in the results, the relevant metadata including metadata suitable for use by the client in the content guide; and transmitting the relevant metadata to the client for use in the content guide.