Tag It!

A tag on a blog or article is just like a tag on your shirt: it’s a label that provides brief information about the item in question. A tag on a shirt usually gives the name of the maker or sometimes (in the case of my kid’s) the owner’s details. In other words tags give brief information pertaining to that particular shirt. With a blog or other web posting its the same: a tag is a word or very short phrase that describes concisely what the subject of the piece is all about. Think of them as keywords used to identify the content within.

Extending the shirt analogy, if I lose my shirt and there’s a tag on it with my name on then I’m more likely to find it again. Same goes for tags on the Internet: they are used to make it easier for people to find items such as articles, blog posts, photos, video clips and so on – stuff that interests them.

Blog search engines and bookmarking pages such as Technorati and Del.icio.us use tags extensively to make it easier for users to navigate the blogosphere – users can even give articles their own personal tags so that they can organise information in a manner suited to their needs.

Marshall Kirkpatrick has some more great reasons why you should use tags in his 13 Reasons to Use Tags article.

Tagging a blog article is really easy. Most blog software allows you to create categories that are relevant to each post. These categories are the tags that blog search engines will use to categorise your piece. To use them, simply categorise each blog post before publishing by checking the appropriate word or phrase or adding a new one and checking that.

Here are a few points to remember when you’re coming up with tags:

1. Tags must be concise (1 -2 words max);
2. Tags must be relevant;
3. There is no limit to the number of tags you use;
4. Remember to check your spelling.