Amazon, Author Tools & Resources, eBook Publishing, Self Publishing Your Book

Kindle Tags: What are they and how do they differ to keywords?

[info] Please Note: As of early 2013, Tags are no longer a feature offered by Amazon leaving this post redundant. If you are looking for information on Kindle KEYWORDS, see here.  [/info]

 

As we discussed on Monday, getting the most of your book via searchable keywords, tags and categories can make a huge difference in the visibility of your book on Amazon.

Today, we’ll give you the low-down on tags:

 

Tags

Tags are the words you see further down each book’s Amazon page. These are tags that customers can submit (up to 15) in order for other shoppers to find items related to that word. Other readers can vote on the accuracy of which  these tags correctly describe the book, and the more votes they get, the more accurate Amazon deems them to be. They count towards your placement in the search results for this reason.

Tags differ to keywords in that they are visible to everyone and are voted on by the public – or at least anyone with an active Amazon account (meaning they have made one purchase through it.)

 

Note:

The paperback version of your book also has tags associated with it, but they are separate from the eBook tags.

Here’s an example of the tags from Kathy Lynn Harris’s Amazon page for her eBook Blue Straggler:

 

Amazon tags

 

To add tags to your title, go to your Amazon book page and scroll down to the “Tags Customers Associate with this Product” section. Add your tags here, and vote on any existing ones that you agree with.

Tags work to an author’s advantage in the following ways:

 

  • If you share a tag with another book (and it is voted on enough), then Amazon may recommend your book to people who have purchased that book.
  • If people search for the tag you use (e.g. Texas fiction) you are going to show up further up the search results.

Tips:

 

Take a look at similar titles that are selling very well and include the author’s name as one of your tags. I’ve seen this strategy work very well.

– Enter the tags you like and ask friends and family to vote on them.

– Because many indie authors have abused the tagging system in the past and participated in tagging circles, Amazon has lessened the strength of tagging in it’s algorithms. So don’t place too much emphasis on getting tons of votes; but do keep it in mind as one piece of the bigger picture.

We’ll have our weekly links up on Friday. The final part of this series – Categories – will be up on Monday :)