Tagging for Maximum Views

Why Is Tagging Soo Important?

Consider this scenario: two facebook pages for two nearly identical businesses (A Inc & B Corp) each with 500 followers post nearly identical articles at the same time on the same day. A Inc’s post gets 327 views in the first day and B Corp’s post gets 1,582 views in the same time period. Why you ask? Tags! But, let’s just start at the beginning, shall we?

Tags are denoted on Social Media platforms with a hashtag (#) + a word that represents a topic/keyword/etc. For example if you’re posting on blogging techniques, you might use the following (Hash)Tags:

• #blogging
• #bloggingtechniques
• #greatblogging
• #bloggingforbeginners

Tagging is how Social Media sites like Facebook, Twitter & Instagram link inter-link posts via topic. Or in other words when a post gets uploaded to Facebook with the tag #blogging it is linked to every other post on Facebook that has been likewise tagged with #blogging.

What does that mean?

Well… in the post ‘#blogging’ actually becomes a link that you can click on and get a list of all the posts (in chronological order) on Facebook/Twitter/Instagram/etc (whichever network it was posted on) that contain the same tag! The implications of this powerful feature should be fairly obvious. But for those that the implicit value is lost on, here’s the clincher: if you post and choose your tags wisely, your post reads can go up by orders of magnitude.

So, How Does One Choose GOOD Tags?

1. Do your research – make a test post and use all the tags you’re thinking may be good for your topic. Publish it and then click on each tag in your post, skim through the list of results. Are there many? Are there few? Are they interesting? The more posts with that tag indicates the popularity of using that tag which means there’s more folks clicking/reading the posts in that list. However it also means that your post will only get the top slot for a brief moment (in the case of a popular tag).
2. It’s important to choose a range of tags (popular -> unpopular) so that your post is at the top of some of the popular lists for short periods of time with lots of exposure, at the top of semi-popular lists for a little longer and at the top of slightly popular tag lists for potentially days and days at a time.
3. If the posts for a particular tag are very interesting and hold your attention, MAKE SURE that your post is as well (spend time crafting your post) or it will pale in and won’t receive much attention.
4. Last but not least: Tag as much as is necessary and as little as possible. Over- or Under-tagging can make or break a post’s success! Too few tags and you won’t get the exposure your post deserves and too many tags will make it look like you’re just trying to tag-spam your way into getting more views which turns people off…

Tagging is also useful on your WordPress Website! It links your posts together and can be used to create ‘Tag Clouds’ that contain your most used tags throughout all your blog postings. Tag clouds display as cluster-links of tags that users can click on and get a list of all the posts on your site that contain that particular tag. Tags can also be used to cross-link information on your site. For example, a product with the tag #Blogging can link to a post with the tag #Blogging. Tagging is also used by plugins like Zemanta Related Posts to create short ‘post lists’ with pictures & summaries at the bottom of every post you upload to your blog! This is yet another great feature/capability of the all-powerful tag!

I hope this post on tagging has been useful for your blogging and writing on Social Media platforms. Please feel free (as always) to ask questions – dave@webgardenllc.com!