Just Tagging Along

In Chapter 9 of Paul Gillin's book, New Influencers, I learned some pretty valuable information on tagging. Gillin told us how to properly tag blogs and videos and podcasts, and he explained exactly how tags worked and how they could be used effectively. Before I read this chapter, I would just pick out some keywords that I used throughout my blog and use those as my tags. These tags are used so search engines and websites can judge the content of your blogs and make them available to the people who want to read about that subject.

When checking out my tag list - the list of all the tags that I've used in my past blogs - I found that I have used 64 different tags! Of course most of them were only used once, but a few of them, like AdRants, AMA, New Influencers, ONU, viral and social media were used a couple times. YouTube, however, has been tagged in 5 of my blogs.

My list consisted of pretty general terms, and after reading Chapter 9, I realized that I could actually get more in depth in my word choice and tags don't have to necessarily have to be topics. Gillin used Volvo as an example and they tags that he used would be, "Volvo, car, sedan, Eurpoean, 4WD, snow, safety, vehicle, upscale." If I would have written an article about Volvo, I never would have thought about using those words as tags.

After gaining a much better understanding for the usage of tags, I have a better idea of what to do and plan to implement that to increase the effectiveness of the tags that I use for my blogs.

New Book: New Rules...

In our textbook, The New Rules of Marketing and PR by David Meerman Scott, I really liked the section in chapter four called "Understanding Blogs in the World of the Web." I found this section to be very true. I liked how it was comparing the world online to the world in reality. Basically it was describing how the site Amazon is the bookstore, eBay is like the garage sale, and blogs are just the people that you can chat with in restaurants or at the bars. They may not be completely accurate, but they have things to say. These things could be relevant to you and your life, like for finding a job or keeping up with the happenings in the industries and world. Other things being said could also be helpful tips and advice or just sharing funny stories. You can follow any blog, basically like keeping in touch with friends. It's pretty interesting that pretty much every aspect of life can be found online and are only a few clicks away.
Another thing with blogging that was talked about in the chapter was that bloggers are usually more focused on opinions or one side of a topic, rather than how a journalist writes in a more balanced form. I would say that bloggers write in a more subjective manner while journalists have more of an objective writing style. I also think that bloggers have more freedom in choosing what they're going to share with the world.