Categorizing Your Blog Posts

I had a question yesterday on how to label (or categorize) blog posts.  I went online looking for great tutorials but I couldn't find any with pictures.  I'm a visual person myself and do much better when I see how something is done rather than trying to imagine it.

Whether you're just starting your blog or you already have one the ideas on how to categorize your posts are pretty much the same.  It will definitely take a little more time if you have to go back and edit previous posts but the time and effort will be well worth it (it really doesn't take that long either).

When starting out, your blog will look like this:

On the right side you will see a sidebar that says Post Settings.  You'll want to click on the word label and a white box will appear beneath it.

Now, you'll want to take a few minutes to think of how you're going to categorize your posts.  I found that when first starting out I used any and every word that came to my mind.  That is not necessary!  The best advice I can give is to think of one Main category and two or three Sub categories!  This will make it much easier for your readers to find your posts and they won't have to scroll through hundreds of keywords to find what they are looking for.    

As you can see from the above picture, Blog Updates is my Main category while Powerpoint, and Tutorial are my two Sub categories.  When you're finished typing in the categories you want click the done button and then publish your post!

Congratulations!  You've just finished adding labels to your posts!  Now, lets put it on your blogs home page so that your readers are able to utilize this feature!

The first place you'll want to go to is the Layout tab under the My Blogs section.  You can find this on the left sidebar of your overview page.

Next, you want to click on the Add Gadget link.  This allows you to be able to add different things to the sidebars of your blog (pictures, labels, etc).

Clicking on the Add Gadget link will pull up a separate page that gives you a list of all the gadgets you can add to your blog.  Scroll down a little ways until you see the word LABEL, then click on it.

Once you click on the word LABEL another page will pop up.  This will let you decide how you want your categories to look on your homepage. 

This is the standard layout that Blogger provides.  You can hit save and then the preview button on the top of the page to see if you like how it looks.  If you want to customize it, please continue reading!

When I customize this gadget, I change the name and the layout.  I choose to display all of my labels but you can also hit the Selected Labels button and choose which ones you want to display for your readers.  I also choose to display the gadget in the Cloud format instead of the list because it takes up less room on my home page.

After you hit save you will be brought back to your Layout page and you'll see the new gadget you just added (mine is right above the Old Blog Posts gadget).  

If you hit the Preview button (located at the top right of the page) you'll be able to see how the new gadget looks on your blog.  If you do not like the fact that you have empty white space to the left of your labels, then you can fix that easily.  

You're almost done....just a few things left!  

Go back to the layout page and find your Labels gadget again (mine is called Take a Peek).  Use your mouse and place it in a spot that covers both the left and right side.  I held my gadget over the Old Blog Posts button until it moved down so I could put my Take a Peek gadget in it's place.

Then, hit the Preview button again to make sure you like the way it looks on your blog.  If you do, hit save!  

Congratulations!  You're done adding a new and user friendly way to find posts on your blog.  If you have any questions sound off in the comment section below!