Just wanted to spread this news for people who don't know the new Tumblr updates that have to do with tagging on posts, both for user tag lists and for descriptive hashtags to help people find your post. I've had to learn them the hard way. 😅
User Tagging:
This first part is for people who have tag lists. Tumblr has recently changed the rules on tagging other blogs/users on a post.
You can still tag up to 50 blogs per post, but they must be spread out into groups of 5. Otherwise, the blog won't be highlighted/tagged and the person will not be notified.
Example (and more) below the cut: ⤵️
✅ Example:
And this is what it will probably look like if you don't spread them out into groups of 5:
Notice that only the first 5 blogs in each section are actually tagged.
Also something important to note: copy/pasting a tag list alone often isn't enough. After I copy over a tag list from another post, I always have to click on each blog name individually to select the blog and make sure it's tagged properly, so people get notified.
Trust me, I get why some writers have decided to ditch tag lists altogether. They can be tricky. 😂
Hashtags on Posts:
As most of you guys know, hashtags help people find your post. The limit of how many tags you can use has bumped up to 30 tags.
Now, this doesn't mean you have to use all 30 slots. But using the most popular tags will increase the likelihood that people will find your post.
By no means am I an expert on this, but I've been reading a lot of stories that should have SO many more reblogs, comments, etc. If some of them were using a few more key tags, they'd likely be getting much more traffic and notes on them.
Want to find out which hashtags are the most popular, relevant to your post?
Well, you can actually search them in the Your Tags tab, Tags You Follow, and go to Manage:
For Dean Winchester fanfiction, for example, here are the tags I use most often:
Ignore the first and last tags, which are just for me to organize the post for my blog. But I would say the most important tags here are the first few:
[character's full name]
[character's full name] x reader or [character's full name] x oc
fandom name
These three are absolutely key for any romance pairing fanfiction post, in my opinion.
Aside from being the most relevant for a pairing fanfic, these are often the most popular tags overall, as they are the tags with a high follower count. The rest can also be important supplemental hashtags relevant to the post.
You can also just start typing into this bar in your post draft and see what "popular tag" recommendations Tumblr gives you:
And that's it! For anyone who finds this PSA helpful, I salute you! 🫡 And I wish you all luck on future tagging endeavors. 💜
I'm also including some of my fellow writers just in case they have something to add to this — or if they don't know this info, though I'm sure they probably do already:
I've been tagged by @lesbianmastermind (amazing beautiful so talents) to share the last song I listened to,,, which I dont know,,, but this one has been stuck in my head all day (as well as Hot Shit) so here we go!!
I have no idea who likes doing these so,,, @sophiasoelberg @starlight-archer @stormybraindraws
it would be so cool if people tagged the things i don't wanna see so i wouldn't have to see them since they would be under my blocked tags but because they're untagged then i have to see them anyway because they're not tagged appropriately the op decided they didn't want to tag their post so that when me, someone who doesn't want to see it, sees it come on my dash i do have to see it rather than it being blocked thanks to the blocked tag feature this website has so that you don't have to see things you don't want to see causing me to see it because it relies on other people tagging the things i have blocked in order for me to not see it
what’s the fucking point of tagging posts if, when I go to search for that specific post on my blog, I CAN’T FIND IT, AND INSTEAD, A BUNCH OF POSTS I DIDN’T TAG COME UP?
@staff please fix this. This has been a problem for years
I know I’ve made one of these posts before, but I figured I’d make one again as my following is more than six times larger than it was the first time (thank you guys so much!). So with that being said, here’s what I’ve found to effectively tag things.
Your first FIVE tags are going to be the ones that show up in tracked tags (AKA the things that show up when people click on the tags they follow)
This means that you’re going to want to put your most common tags here. Not personal tags or comments. Tags like #writing, #writeblr, #writing advice are all good ones for your first five.
Your first TWENTY tags are going to be the ones that show up if you search something in the search bar (This includes the initial five from above)
This is where you’d put any tags that are relevant to your post that would also help people find it. #fight scenes, #my wip, #writing lgbt are all valid for the first twenty. Twenty tags is a lot, and you by no means have to use all of them, but the more tags you do, the more easily people will find it in searches.
After the first twenty, tags will only be useful for blog navigation
This is a good place for comments if you used up your first twenty tag spots. It’s also good for personal tags or wip tags.
Tags on reblogs have the same effect as tags after the first twenty
This means that by tagging something, it will not make it more searchable through the main search bar, but it will still work for blog navigation. This also means that you can tag your reactions right away without losing any reach.
Say I post a Whumptober prompt fill on one day using that day’s prompts, and then, on the same day, post a different prompt fill using one of the alternate prompts. Should I use the same number tag?
That's definitely possible and allowed :) if you replace a different, specific prompt from a different day with the altprompt you could also tag with that specific day's number. That's up to you?
