Please someone further clarify Tags for me

[Peachesbackwards]

One of the things I still don't quite understand after blogging for 6 months with decent organic traffic now averaging about 1000 uniques a day is Tags.
Specifically: 1. Can you do an unlimited amount if tags or will the amount of tags hurt you after say 10 or so? 2. Should tags be specific? Lets say I am doing a review of HDTV Sets. Would just one tag "HDTV" be too general? SHould I have seperate tags on HDTV Plasma Sets, HDTV LCD sets, etc? Would I them need another tag saying Review of "HDTV sets"? Review of Plasma HDTV sets?, etc. ould appreciate some clarification/help on this. THanks

[Blognemesis]

You'd want tags like: HDTV, electronics, product reviews

....and maybe even brand names which could carry over to sound systems and DVD players. Im sure Sony and JVC make all of these items and a tag for Sony would produce all Sony products you tagged with it.

Thats what I think of when I think of tags.

[whiteshark761]

Yeah, I'm in the same boat on the whole tag confusion. I understand how it can be useful within the confines of a website/blog (for users to find other posts related to that topic), but I don't quite get the importance Google assigns them or what not.

[Ferox]

Spend some time looking at tag clouds on other websites. The more frequently you use a particular tag, the stronger association you will have in it.

Generally it's considered better to focus on a handful of tags, because using every possible tag word distracts. But that doesn't mean that you can't use ten or twelve tags for each post (if appropriate), just aim to have a few common tags across your blog.

[Peachesbackwards]

Yeah my confusion is about the Common Tags and also tags with the same title as your actual title. I know if I just wrote a Blog titled say TV it would be buried in Google God knows where. Most of my Blogs are indexed very high on the first page anyway. But your saying you should always use a Common Tag like if I write about What to Look for in an HDTV one of my tags should just be HDTV?

[Ferox]

Well yes, but what I mean if you have a blog about technology, try to use technology in the tags for most posts. I mean aim for a few tags that you will use in every post.

I'll give you an eample if you visit my fiction & writing blog (in signature). In the lower right column there is a tag cloud, with the bigger words representing my more commonly used tags. The more commonly used tags best define what my blog is about.

[Nathan]

I think that tags are merely to help your visitors find other similar posts. They don't seem to boost your Google PR, etc.

[mdamin76]

Your tags can be fetched by mybloglog and technorati, thus it gives backlinks to your site.

[Trey Baird]

So, the smart use of tags involves tagging similar posts with the same tags, and using words that people will be searching for... if I am understanding this issue properly.