You’ve signed up for Redbubble, customized your storefront, and uploaded your newest designs. Great! How are customers going to find your work? Tags!

Proper tagging helps to bring your work to the top of the search results on Redbubble and in search engines like Google. You can review your tags on all of your designs on the manage works page of your Redbubble account.

What are tags and why are they important?  

Tags are descriptive words or phrases you add to a work to help potential customers find your products. When a customer searches on Redbubble or via a search engine like Google or Bing, the search algorithm uses tags to match relevant designs with the search query. Using relevant and specific keywords as tags increase the chances of your products appearing in search results when customers search for those terms.

How do I choose the best tags?

Focus on using clear and descriptive keywords that accurately represent your artwork. Think about the subject, style, medium, and any unique features that make your work special. Most importantly, consider the words and phrases that potential customers might use when they search for products like yours. Customers are more likely to engage with content that matches what they are looking for.

Relevant tags are words that clearly describe what you see in your artwork. Imagine you have designed a picture of a shark riding a bicycle. You could use tags like “shark” and “bicycle” and “cyclist.” Is there a background? Perhaps you could add “forest” or “city” depending on what other objects are in the design.

Tags can also describe the context or meaning behind your design. Think about that same shark wrapped in a blanket in front of a warm fireplace inside a snowy cabin. You might use tags like “home,” “cozy,” and “comfort.” This helps people find your work more easily!

What tags should I avoid?

It is easy to get carried away when tagging artwork. Good tags enhance visibility and attract the right audience to your designs. Certain types of tags can negatively impact how people find your work. Think twice before using the following:

• Generic Terms: Be specific. Avoid overly broad tags like art or image.
• Misleading Tags: Use tags that accurately represent the image. Don’t tag a photo of a cat with dog or car.
• Irrelevant Keywords: Tags unrelated to the content of your artwork confuse potential buyers.
• Brand Names: Unless it’s yours, avoid using brand names or trademarks in your tags.
• Special Characters or Symbols: Excessive punctuation and emojis can complicate searches.
• Complicated Phrases: Keep it simple and clear. One word tags are more effective than complex phrases.
• Duplicate Tags: Don’t repeat the same thing over and over. It clutters your listing and doesn’t add any additional value.
• Negative or Controversial Terms: Not only do tags like this deter potential customers, you may get flagged for violating community guidelines.

We have also seen an increase in superficial, misleading, and inauthentic tags. Google perceives these tags as spammy at best, and deceptive at worst. They are heavily penalized in search rankings and should be completely avoided. Examples include: best selling, top selling, trending, new design, new style, new product, cheap, hot sale, best price, best quality, money back, free shipping, delivery guaranteed.

Check out this great example: Room for Dessert?
(designed and sold by littleclyde)

If your designs are more abstract, it can be difficult to nail down the theme or content words that best describe your piece. Here’s some advice for picking the best tags no matter what design you’ve created:

Look for synonyms

Your Starry Night Sky design could be Celestial Night Sky or Starry Evening Sky or Twinkling Balls of Gas Dark Horizon Space Landscape…. You get the idea.

Ask a friend

Send your new designs to a couple friends and ask them to describe it – and how it makes them feel. They could have new ideas you didn’t think of!

Take notes

Many artists work in a similar style, color palette, or explore variations on a theme over time. Keeping track of the tags that work for your style will give you a solid foundation, then you can swap in specifics on each artwork. For example, “dreamy, neutrals, shapes, blobs, lines, doodle, modern, cottagecore, natural, earthy, grounded” can work over and over, while “succulent”, “faces” and “hearts” won’t always make sense.

Research

Once you have a couple tags picked, search them on Redbubble and see what else shows up! Looking at other designs and titles might help you brainstorm what you’re missing.

Ready to optimize your tags? Head to your manage works page and hit ‘Quick Edit’ to put your newfound knowledge into action.