Get a Better Tag Cloud
Tags and tag clouds are important elements for helping people and (search ‘bots) find your content. A Better Tag Cloud by Nicholas Kuttler is one of our favorite plugins. Here’s what you need to know and why it’s so useful.
WHAT’S A TAG?
Tags are like keywords – they are relevant words or phrases you attach to a post. Here are some tags I might use for this post:
tag, tags, tag cloud, wordpress, plugins, blog, blogs, blogging
Ideally, keywords should match words or phrases in your blog. Think about it this way: if someone searched for one of your keywords, would you want them to view your post?
WHAT’S A TAG CLOUD?
We set up tags for each post when we write the entry. Your viewers, however, use tag clouds to navigate and aggregate your content.
A tag cloud shows your most popular tags in a linear format (one next to the other as opposed to a list). A common convention is for tags with more posts to appear in a larger font than tags with fewer entries.
A BETTER TAG CLOUD
The default WordPress tag cloud offers the basic functionality. But, often, you need more styling options or greater control for the best presentation.
A Better Tag Cloud is a plug-in that gives you lots of extra options for how your tag cloud is displayed. A handy admin panel lets you fine tune the sizes displayed, total number of tags shown in the cloud, even include a count of posts to help viewers understand how to use the info.
HOW TO INCLUDE A TAG CLOUD
Tag clouds are usually deployed from the Widgets page in the WordPress admin area.
In case you are unfamiliar with widgets, WordPress gives you an option to totally control the content of one of the sidebars. You can add a weather map, a google map, a youtube video or ad space. Or a tag cloud. Widgets exist for almost every desirable functionality.
This guidance is for installing Better Tag Cloud on self-hosted WP blogs:
- Download the plug-in from the developer site, unzip if necessary and upload it to your blog (wp-content/plugins/).
- Login to your blog in a browser.
- Go to Plugins –> activate Better Tag Cloud.
- Go to widgets –> drag Better Tag Cloud to the sidebar
- Set the Options –> when you drag the widget to the sidebar, it will open a small window and you’ll see the link for the settings page.
Try some different options and see what looks good in your theme. You can always change the options under Settings –> Better Tag Cloud.
WHY TAG CLOUDS ARE IMPORTANT
Tag clouds have been around for a while. But their usage and importance is definitely on the rise.
The reason may be the maturation of blogs. As we all create more content and become more adept at blogging, we all have bigger and bigger blogs. Categories and menu navigation becomes a less efficient or even inclusive way to organize content.
Tags allow us to create new keywords on the fly, one post at a time. Who knows how many posts you’ll do under a new tag – maybe one, maybe dozens. Tags allow you’re meta-information to grow organically.
Tag clouds present a compact way to display your topics. Tag clouds don’t replace categories or top navigation. You should use them all.
But as our blog streams become more rich and complex, tag clouds offer readers a new way to navigate to the content that interests them most.
GET BETTER TAG CLOUD
Try it for yourself. Donate if you like it.