WordPress categories vs tags. What’s the difference.
WordPress and most other blogging platforms allow you to organize your content in one of two ways: Categories and tags. I’ve often been asked about tags and so thought I would write my thoughts down. Personally, I don’t use tags. Here’s why.
Categories are easy to grasp
Sorting out your blog posts is crucial. This simple act alone will tell your readers what your blog is about. I currently have 291 posts organized in 22 categories. Visitors to my site can clearly see what my blog is about simply by scanning the category list. I like to think that these categories are similar to the sections of a book store or library. If you’re looking for the latest Neil Gaiman novel, you’re most likely to go in the Fiction section instead of the cookbooks. The same is true for your blog categories.
Thus when planning your blog, you should think of broad categories that will guide your users towards the content they are seeking.
Tags are too personal
On the other hand, tags aren’t very logical. As Michael Fields pointed out in his excellent article, tags are found on items sold at department stores and on Christmas presents. When applied to blog posts, they don’t make as much sense and are highly personal. Sites such as Delicious and Flickr use tags and I find myself frustrated to see that there is no proper tagging convention.
As a result I find myself only using categories and so far have never had a request asking me where are my tags? Perhaps that’s because my blog is simple and doesn’t have that many articles. A blog with numerous writers or that focuses on many different subjects may benefit from the combination of both tags and categories. In fact a complex blog may also benefit from Custom Taxonomy. Michael Feilds’s article describes how custom taxonomy can be used to organize your blog in new and exciting ways. I highly recommend that you have a look at it and learn about the many ways you can use tags appropriately.
Thanks, Christine!
Didn’t know about the taxonomy plugins–they look very useful! Too bad I missed the WP group where Michael Fields spoke last week.
Personally, I’ve used tags, but they never seem to mean much, except for possible search terms. I think I’ll play around with the plugins.
I can see how you’ve worked without tags, especially because your categories are clear and specific. I think the category/tag confusion becomes apparent over time as blogs grow. Probably many blogs could benefit from some housecleaning (categorically speaking!) ;-)
I hear you, I was thinking that I need a new category for this type of blog post. I think that this blog is due for some spring cleaning.
I’ve found a comfortable arrangement of categories and tags, where categories are few in number and broad in scope, and the tags narrow the topic of a post down within a category. I’m not rigorous with my tags, but do rely on them as a kind of secondary navigation.
That said, tags did feel like a bit of a bolted-on item in WordPress and other blog platforms, a way to stay relevant when tag clouds and folksonomies came into play in a big way in web 2.0 apps. If it had to happen all over again, I could see just renaming categories as tags and making them as good as they can be.
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