The keywords you enter in a post show up at the bottom of your article or blog post in WordPress and are commonly called ‘tags.’ If your blog post is about your trip to New Zealand, your post might be tagged Travel and New Zealand.
Do you add so-called ‘tags’ to your blog posts? Do you think much about what the tag might be?
There is so much debate about whether tags are beneficial or deleterious to SEO, I have assembled some tips for you to decide, for yourself, based on the purpose of your blog.
Tag Pages in WordPress
WordPress will create a Tag Page linking your post to all other articles tagged with that keyword. This is important from a Search Engine perspective as it can help you rate higher in a search index.
Did you know that if you repeatedly use a tag word indiscriminately, WordPress will bump you from the WP reader? This lowers the chance for readers to find your site.
Tag your posts accurately
Google reads tags or keywords completely differently: “website” and “web site” and “websites”.
Duplicating the same term in a category, as well as a tag, will confuse Google and the search engines will not know which page or site to rank first.
Be consistent in the way you tag your posts.
There’s nothing wrong with either keyword, [‘web site’ and ‘websites’, above], but choosing one form and using it that way consistently increases your chances of getting ranked for that form of the keyword.
So pick one and stick with it. Either you always use “website” as your tag or you use “web site”. Don’t use both interchangeably or you’ll be missing the chance for better rankings and more traffic.
theblogpress.com/
Use Tags that relate to your article
Doing your homework and looking up the number of searches each version of a keyword gets, is time-consuming and tedious, but it will help you when you are starting out. If you add bogus keywords as tags, then your “tag pages” will be full of spam.
theblogpress.com/
How Many Tags is a Good Number to Use?
What is a good number of tags to use?
The jury is still out on this question. Some recommend 4 – 12 tags, others say the less the better and still others maintain the more you use, the higher you will rank.
When visitors click on a particular tag, they reach the page whereon all posts, having the same tag, are displayed. It allows them to look for the desired content easily. Tags and categories are both examples of a taxonomy system. When used correctly, a good taxonomy system can boost your site’s SEO. The opposite is also true: when used wrong, it’ll break things. (theblogpress.com/)
What have you found worked for you?
Less tags or more?
Do you use Categories and Tags, or one or the other? Let me know in the comments.
Something to Ponder About 
Like many of your readers, we are new to WordPress ourselves. We certainly use tags and definitely keep them relevant to our posts. We use anywhere from 5-12. It has been tough to get our Travel blog seen in the community and online.
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Welcome to the WordPress community. I had to give it at least twelve months before my blog was visible. However you can raise interest by doing just what you did here, visit other blogs and leave comments that spark conversation. Good luck with your blog. Travel is having the toughest time right now. Australians are one of the countries that has the highest rate of travel, so many here feel it.
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Wow, thanks for the supportive words. 😁 We are wanting to talk with other travelers that share common interests. 12 months. Ok, we will work hard and be patient. Its tough.
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It is tough to begin with, but a wonderful community is to be found here if you can stick with it and be interested in what others have to say. All the best. If you are interested, send me a write up for a guest post and I can direct more bloggers your way. Joining in on our fortnightly challenge is also a great way to grow your community. I release a new prompt next Friday.
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That’s very kind of you! Yes, I would very much like to do that. Where do I send you one of my posts? Also, I am interested in this fortnightly challenge.
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You find my email on my contact me page. It would be great fun to have you along on the fortnightly challenge. The next prompt is released on Friday. Full instructions will be on that post and the header tab on my home page. Here is the link so you can get a heads up of what is required.
https://forestwoodfolkart.wordpress.com/instructions-for-the-friendly-friday-photo-challenge/
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