Categories and tags are created by you to sort and classify content; this makes it easier for visitors to your site to find the content they really want to see.

Categories describe the topic at hand in a very broad and general sense, whereas tags describe the specific aspects of the topic – often mirroring language used in the post.

For example, if you were creating a blog post about renovating or redecorating your bathroom, your blog post might look like this:

The above example shows that “bathroom” is the category (the broad and general topic of discussion) and the tags show the specifics of the topic: cute dinosaur toilet roll holders for the guest bathroom. The tags “funny” and “unusual” – were also added so anyone searching for funny or unusual toilet roll holders would be more likely to end seeing this post as a search result.

When creating a blog post in Word Press, it’s generally best to add the categories and tags once you’ve finished writing the content.

Blog posts aimed specifically at including keywords that can be used as tags and categories generally don’t flow very well, and tend to come across as stilted, or trying too hard.  Write your content the way you want to write it; something you would enjoy reading – something you’d find helpful and interesting. Once you’re happy with the content, the words or short phrases that truly reflect the content and purpose of the piece will jump out at you, and those are the words you want to use as your tags and categories.