Are you interested in tagging? Using tags on your blog is a good idea. But somewhere along the way, using tags (whether it be on blog posts or social media posts) seems to have gotten carried away. 
Guess what?
#ExcessiveTagUseIsHurtingYourSEO
That’s right. This excessive use of tags on your blog posts can hurt you instead of help you.
How does tagging work on your blog?
Tags are intended to improve user experience by grouping ideas together so readers can find the kind of content they’re looking for. They also help search engines know how your site is organized, and what kind of information it contains. Each tag creates a new archive page — where all the posts with that particular tag show up. If each archive page only has one or two posts, this is not useful to visitors nor is it appealing to Google! This means if you use 20 tags per blog post, each tag creates a haphazard archive page on your website, and this doesn’t help Google understand your site or your content.
Long story short: Using tags wrong can have a negative impact on SEO, meaning your site will rank lower in search results.
The good news? Tags can improve user experience, and SEO results — but keep it simple.
When it comes to tagging blog posts, DO THIS:
- Keep it simple: Don’t use more than 5 tags per post.
- Keep it specific: Don’t use vague tags. Only use a tag if it’s super-relevant to that post.
- Keep it together: Only use tags that are also used (relevantly) on other posts.
When tagging blog posts, DON’T DO THIS:
- Don’t add too many tags to a post (no more than 5).
- Don’t make up tags for each new post.
- Don’t use fake words as tags. People won’t actually search for these in Google, so it’s not going to help them or you.
- Don’t use tags that don’t relate specifically to the current post.
- Don’t use tags that only relate to a few posts on your site. Your tags should be systemic and apply to many posts on your blog, not just one or two.
When tagging, ask yourself:
- Which tag best applies to this post?
- Which tag truly represents this topic?
- If somebody finds this using a certain tag, will they get relevant information from this post?
It’s okay to just have one blog tag.
Don’t really have a tag that fits? It’s also okay NOT to tag a post if you don’t have one that represents it. It’s better to have no tags than to include tags that don’t relate to that post and other posts on your blog.
Get organized. Clean up your blog’s tags. Do a tag audit.
If your blog tags have gotten out of control, take a step back. Look at the common denominators of your posts — only use the most relevant tags moving forward — and adjust past posts accordingly. If you have posts with more than 5 tags, delete the irrelevant tags. If you have a tag that is only used on a few posts, untag or replace with a more relevant, widely-used tag.
Want to Start Tagging? Let’s Talk
Need help getting your tags under control — and employing a strategy that supports SEO and business growth? Let’s talk.
Want to know more? Learn about how tags and categories work together.