WordPress Categories vs Tags from an SEO Perspective

One of the dilemmas I face when launching a new Wordress site is whether I should use categories, tags or both to organize content. Both are good options, and when used properly, can be utilized effectively from an SEO perspective. Whatever you choose, stick with it. Changing from categories to tags or vice-versa, after you have a few hundred post will be a lot of work. Also, if you choose to use both categories and tags (and if you use a 3rd -  archives), make sure you only index one of them with search engines (to avoid duplicate content). This can be done using a plugin like the popular All in one SEO Pack.

Categories

Categories are pretty straight forward. You create different categories, then include your post into each matching category. As an example, if you have a post on GeekEstateBlog.com about “Mobile SEO”, you might place the article in the categories “seo” and “mobile”. Sweet and simple.

The great thing about categories is that they can be phrases (opposed to tags which are generally one or two words). Phrases are very useful when going after longer tail keywords.

Tags

Tags are a little more complicated, but also provide you will some added functionality. When you create your post, you add tags to it. So for the same post about “Mobile SEO”, you might add the tags “seo” and “mobile”. If the article was more specifically about optimizing for Google Local so it comes up on iPhone map based searches, you could also include the tags “Google” and “iPhone”.  The complication that arises from tagging is that it is very easy to go overboard with your tags. For the same post you could easily add the tags “Google Local”, “Maps”, “Mapping” and “Apple” (not to mention many others). This will dilute your tag cloud and make it hard for users to find content on your site.

The added functionality provided by tags cannot be overlooked, however. Say, after posting our article, you see a huge influx of traffic. After some quick research in Google Trends you notice that the amount of searches for “Mobile SEO” is increasing and you decide to create a few more posts on the subject. After creating these posts, you get even more traffic, and now you want to create a new “Mobile SEO” section of your site.

• If you are using categories, you create a new category, then go back through your old post and edit matching posts to included your new category. If this is just a few articles, no problem, but if it’s hundreds, this can be a daunting task.
• If you are using tags, you simply mash up 2 tags (or more) into a link like /mobile+seo/. So if Geek Estate were using tags the new link would be something like www.geekestateblog.com/tag/mobile+seo/. This will include all posts that have both the tag “mobile” and the tag “seo”.

If you decide to use tags like this, you could then create a set of links from within WordPress with all your tag mash ups, name it categories, and use them in your sidebar in place of the category or tag widgets (this is a good option for those of you who don’t like the look of tag clouds). This will also provide you with the great benefit of being able to use keyword phrases which were previously reserved for categories only.

The one problem that you come across using tags like this is that you have limited control of your title tags and main page headings for these mashed up pages (which are crucial of on page optimization). This is solved using a great plugin from Netconcpets called SEO Title Tag.

Both categories and tags can be used effectively to organize content and SEO your blog. These days I tend to lean towards tags because of their flexibility. However, when you have multiple authors (like Drew does here on GeekEstateBlog.com) I would favor categories because authors can get a little crazy tagging posts.