High Intensive Writing Session

New Writer, Don’t Skip Tag Day.

Make sure you read this before you hit publish.

Welcome. This is one of my fun educating/entertainment lessons for my dear fellow writers.

Many of my beloved writers have warned you about the dangers of inserting tags into your pieces.

Think of tags as hashtags on other platforms. If you never use them don’t worry. My witty fun way of teaching will give you a light on how this works.

What the heck are tags?

Tags are bags. Also known as topics. Think of it as those doggy poop bags when you are on about walking man’s best friend.

You will not bag your lunch in the same bag, will you?

Bag it in the proper place. That’s what you are saying to Mr. Algo.

Let me explain. If you are writing about how to collect your pet’s fecal matter, don’t tag it as ‘Food’, m’kay?

Avid writers and owners of the most awesome publications, have warned you. Don’t skip the freaking tagging.

Where can you find it? Look this is way easier than finding Waldo.

Heck, they even give you a final warning. “Add or change topics…”

When you are giving tags to your stories, you’re telling your friendo Algo where this story goes.

Other readers will find your story if they are searching or interested in that tag or topic. But make sure you use the proper tags.

Don’t write about “How I pick my best friend’s fecal matter” under philosophy.

You could create your own tag, but that will take your story into some dark corner of the Medium sphere.

What you should know about tags.

There are so many of them. And it can feel overwhelming for the least experienced.

Let’s say you want to know how many tags are there and what are the most important. To find a specific tag, go to the same screens I’ve shown above and start typing anything. Let’s say you want a tag for ‘Dog poop sucks’ — Hmm…

There isn’t one for that tag. There are two for ‘Dog Poop’ and ‘Dog Poop Bags Pouches’ — Is that a name for a publication? If not I call it dibs.

You have two options. You can either use one of the existing tags or you can create one of yours. I won’t recommend creating a new tag unless it’s a name for a new publication.

Creating a new tag will send your story to the void. It’s like creating those empty and annoying ‘new folder’ folders in Windows Explorer.

Which tag shall we use?

That is your next question. There are so many tags and it’s hard to find the most adequate for your story. This is what I recommend my little friend Waldo:

Figure out what is your story about.

If you are writing about dog droppings, it’s allowed to use the ones shown in the previous image. If it is something hilarious, you use ‘Humor’. If it is ‘A Dog Poop Away Keeps Climate Change Away’, I bet you will use ‘Satire’ for that.

There are all kinds of tags, so spend all the time you need to know which ones you should use.

Am I using the right tags?

I’m hollow as a pecker’s hole but I read your mind. I was able to do this after hours of monkey brain processing information.

For you, is doing research. If you see other writers with similar stories as yours, check out what they have. You can see them at the bottom of a published story.

Check if they are relevant to your story and use what you see most adequate.

This is where trial and error comes into play. If you put your ‘Doog Poop’ story under religion, don’t expect many cult followers to read your story.

Strategies for using tags.

Right, so now you’ve graduated as an apprentice in using tags in your stories. Now, let’s leave Waldo to blend into the crowd, and take it to the next level.

We have Tags for general relevance and for specific relevance. What I mean is some of them are more general than others. ‘Writing’ is more general than ‘Writing on Medium’. Where can you find the general tags available? Mr. Handsome Beard will show you where.

If you click ‘See more topics’ it will show you the topics page.

You can see a search bar on the top. Followed by all kinds of topics where your stories will find a proper nest. You notice that there are tiers on each different topic. ‘Self Improvement’ is the most global tag, while ‘Life Lessons’ is more specific.

Why does this matter?

Higher general tags will expose your story to a larger audience. Going back to the ‘Dog Poop’ story, the tag ‘Pets’ will sound broader and you will reach a wider audience. The ‘Cat Meme Lovers’ audience will not be so interested in their mortal fiend’s droppings.

The ‘Dog Poop’ tag is more specific. It will reach a smaller audience. Those readers will resonate with your love for fecal pet dung.

If you mix both broader and specific tags, you will reach different audiences. You want to attract new ‘Dog Poop’ fans. That’s where your broader ‘Pets’ tag will get those interested in your content.

Nailing this right, your views and reads will have a significant boost.

That is the lesson for today’s fellow writers. I hope that you find this useful. Make sure that you now use those damn tags.

Share it with your fellow writers and let them know what they’re missing.

If you want to know how to embezzle your stories, check out this piece right here:

Thank you for reading, if you like what you’re reading don’t forget to follow and subscribe to read more of my writing.

I’ll see you in the next one.