Steemit Tutorials - How to Use Tags to Maximize Visibility for Your Posts and Gain More Upvotes

Many people come on to Steemit from other social media networks and blogging platforms thinking that everything transfers over 1 for 1, or that things on the Steem blockchain will function in the same way as things outside of the blockchain. This thinking especially carries over into their use of tags on Steemit. This is my second post in a series of Steemit Tutorials aimed at helping my friends and other new Steemians use Steemit effectively.

Far too often, I see posts from new users with tags that they created themselves, usually with "unpopular" tags that are relevant to their posts. Some even tag their posts with random tags that they notice are popular, but have nothing to do with the content of their posts. Both of these behaviors are improper use of the tags on Steemit, if you're truly trying to maximize your visibility with the hopes of growing your following.

I realized that there is still much confusion on the subject, so I am writing this post now in the hopes that whatever knowledge I've gained in the 9 weeks that I've been on the platform so far will help my friends and other new users out and prevent them from making these typical mistakes. I'm no expert on the subject matter, but I like to think that I have a pretty firm understanding of how to effectively use the tagging system on Steemit for optimal results. If anyone reading this actually is an expert on the tagging system on Steemit, please feel free to correct any misconceptions I have in the comments below.

Anyway, on to the tutorial on tag use. This is about to get kind of meta with this screenshot that I'm about to drop, though. :P When you make a new post, under the main body text field, just about the Post button, you will see the section for Tags.

As you can see from the text field in the screenshot above, the first tag you use will be your main category. This is significant to note because it will become a permanent part of the URL for your post. For instance, if you choose "minnowsupport" as your first tag, then "minnowsupport" will become part of your address for your post, right after the "steemit.com/" part of the URL. This can never be changed, so you will need to make sure that whatever tag you choose to use, you will want it to always be associated with your post. This first tag will also show up in your post, under your title and in between your name and the age of the post, as you can see below.

The next four tags that you decide to use are editable until payout, which is when you can't edit anything in your post anymore, so make sure that you use tags that are relevant to your post. Before we get into that, though, let's talk real quick about how tags on Steemit are different from tags on other platforms.

On other platforms, tags are permanently associated with your post, and you will always be able to find any post that you make under a tag when you look up that particular tag. Unfortunately, the tag indexing system works differently on Steemit, and aside from the first tag being permanently a part of your post's URL, none of the tags that you use are permanently associated with your post, meaning you will not always be able to find them under that tag. They will only show up through that tag until the post hits its payout, and after 7 days it disappears.

For instance, as you can see in the screenshot below, there are currently no posts showing up under my tag #thedancingdreamers, because I have not written a post for my The Dancing Dreamers blog in over 7 days.

This brings us to the subject of using your own tags/creating your tag for your personal brand on Steemit. I use personal tags to distinguish between my different types of posts on here, such as #thedancingdreamers for my EDM blog, #friendshipinanewage for my friendship blog, #talesofkaoz for my short stories, #kaoticmusings for my poetry posts, #kaoticcarolling for my daily singing video posts, and #thetidesofchange for my novel that I've recently started posting onto the blockchain.

I use these as my first tag on those posts, so that they will forever be a part of the post's URL, which is a way for me to permanently establish my brand for each of those categories on the blockchain, even though you won't be able to randomly find them on the site by going to that specific tag after the post has matured past 7 days. For the most part, this is the only instance in which I use personal tags on Steemit. The other four tags that I use are typically tags that fall under Trending Topics, because this is how you truly maximize your visibility on the platform.

The only other time that I use personal tags as one of my other four tags on my posts, is if I'm trying to get seen by a specific person on the platform who has specifically told people that they can use that tag in order to try to get their attention on the post. @jerrybanfield is one of those people, who has said in the past that people can use the #jerrybanfield tag if they think it's a high quality post and want to increase their chances that he will see their post.

When you create your post, if you are truly tying to optimize your experience with getting seen and gaining those upvotes that we all want so much, you should first check out the Trending Topics tags page here, which you can see in the screenshot below.

From there, you can see which tags are popular, meaning the tags that a lot of people use, the tags that are guaranteed to always have posts showing up under them. You should look through the tags and find ones that are relevant to the content of your post (this is super important), and have a pretty decent audience based on posts, comments, and payouts. You'll have to decide which ones to use based on how saturated the tag is (posts, as in how many people are using that tag for their post), how engaging it is (comments, meaning how many comments are being posted for posts that fall under that tag), and how rewarding it is (payouts, meaning how much has been paid out to posts in that particular tag).

DO NOT, I REPEAT, DO NOT use tags for your posts just because they are popular, if they have absolutely nothing to do with the content of your post. This kind of behavior is quite frowned upon here on Steemit, and instead of gaining you some followers, it could have the opposite effect, with people muting you or otherwise or completely ignoring you after that point for abusing the tags. Sure, you might have gained some quick visibility, but is it really worth it if what you're going for is real, long-term growth on the platform? @poeticsnake wrote a post about tag abuse recently, you should check it out here.

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So, long story short:

• The first tag you use will forever be a part of the URL for your post, so choose wisely, as there are no second chances.
• Use a personal tag as your first tag only if you're trying to establish your personal brand for that particular niche/category for yourself.
• Posts will not show up under a tag after they are older than 7 days.
• Check out the Trending Tags page before posting to determine which relevant tags you should use in order to optimize your chances for your post to be seen by as many people as possible.
• Use only tags that are relevant to your post's content, don't just use tags that are popular in order to gain quick visibility. That is the quickest way to turn people off to your posts/account, and is considered tag abuse.

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I hope this has helped you understand the tagging system here on Steemit a little better. Again, if any experts on the Steemit tagging system are reading this post, please correct any misconceptions I have about all of this. I'd really appreciate it, and it will help me learn so that I can better help others as well. Thank you so much for reading! If you liked this tutorial and found it helpful, I hope you will consider resteeming it so that other new users can see it as well!

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Check out some of my other posts!

What You Need to Know About Telling Veterans "Thank You" on Veterans Day
How The Minnow Support Project Helps You Achieve Your Dreams on Steemit
How I Achieved 200 Followers in My First Month on Steemit
Why I Chose to Invest $100 in Steem
How To Set Up Your Steemit Profile
The Dawn of The Dancing Dreamers
The Dawn of Friendship In a New Age
I'm Just an Island Boy Living in Utah who Loves EDM

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