Sites typically organize content using content categories, making it easier for users to navigate to topics of interest. Tags are an additional way for users to find similar content. But tags are generally not part of formal site navigation. When a user has finished reading content from one of the site’s pages, they can find keyword tags that lead to similar content.

Difference between categories and tags

If we know that WordPress is by far the most common CMS in our country, in the rest of the text we will focus more on this platform. Category is one of the default taxonomies in WordPress . You can use categories to sort and group blog posts into different sections. Categories help visitors quickly see what topics your site is about and allow them to navigate the site faster.

The default category in a WordPress installation is “Uncategorized”. If you do not select a category for the post, the post is automatically placed in the default category. Only the WordPress admin can change the default category.

Adding a post or page to a site should always mean assigning it to a specific category. Of course, you don’t have to limit them to just one category. Sections on the site can be added to as many categories as you like, but it’s good to keep the user’s intent in mind when organizing your content. It wouldn’t do any good to confuse them.

The term tag can be a bit confusing, as we use the single word “tag” to refer to several things: analytics tags, meta tags , blog tags, and hashtags .

Purpose of using tags

The purpose of tags is to help site visitors research similar topics. Tags usually appear at the beginning and/or end of the article, and sometimes appear elsewhere along the right or left side of the page. When you add a tag to a post, it is added to that tag’s archive. This is, of course, very useful, because when people click on the keyword tag that the article deals with, they will find a complete overview of all the posts on that topic. Also, Google will understand that all posts in this archive belong to that topic.

Do tags directly affect SEO?

However, a legitimate question arises as to whether these tags can directly help positioning on Google . In short, the answer is NO!

Google ‘s John Mueller answered a question about blog post tags and their impact on rankings. The question he was asked was whether there is any benefit from tag links on the site. He says the tags could be a way to help Google discover more pages on a site about similar topics. In this way, you present users with a link to all pages of the site with a topic that interests them.

It has long been believed that keywords used in tags can influence search engines to rank those articles according to the keywords used in them. Tags do not have a direct impact on the algorithm and search engines, but they improve the user experience and make it easier to find the desired content. Thus, they could indirectly affect the positioning of your site.

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