Tagging images: How to use keywords to improve your media management

When using a search engine, keywords are second nature. They also help your company: smart tagging makes it easier to find the exact files and images you need. This article explains how image tagging and keywords support everyday work and how to tag photos efficiently with the right tools.

Tags are keywords or short phrases that describe an image and help categorize it. When using cloud storage, a CMS, a PIM system, or any other media library, they make it much easier to browse and search files. 

How tags work 

If tags are used to navigate a media library, users typically type specific words or word combinations into a search field, and the software returns matching results. 

For this to work, tags must be assigned in a meaningful, consistent way. Depending on which tool your company uses to organize photos and graphics, tagging can be manual or automated. Some tools use artificial intelligence to make working with tags even more efficient. 

Smart tagging in practice 

Effective tagging means describing files clearly for easy team access so that other team members also can find them quickly. 

For employee photos, tags like “HR” or “team” can be combined with contextual details: was the photo taken in the office or outdoors? Those are important signals that should also be reflected in your tags. 

If you have already investigated image tagging, you know that both tags and metadata matter. But they are not the same. 

• Image Metadata is generated automatically by the camera when a photo is taken.  

• Tags, in contrast, must be added manually unless you use dedicated tagging software. 

How to tell tags and metadata apart 

Tags describe what is visible in an image. Metadata stores information about the image file itself. 

For a photo of the Sydney Opera House, tags might indicate that the roof of the building is visible. The classic metadata, on the other hand, contains details like GPS coordinates, exact capture time, camera model, and the photographer’s name. 

If images and media files are part of your daily work, file chaos can quickly get out of hand. In folder structures that have grown over years, many teams lose valuable time searching for suitable visuals. 

Once a media pool reaches a certain size, a purely hierarchical folder structure is no longer enough -especially when campaigns require images from multiple photo shoots and sources. 

Benefits of tagging images 

Several strong reasons speak for using tags to structure your company’s media files: 

• Tags help you find what you need faster. You save even more time if you use software that supports image tagging. 

• Each image receives descriptive tags that allow you to search countless files in seconds via a simple search field—for example with “banner, fall collection, influencer.” You then see all files that match this query. 

• In a medium-sized media pool, what might have taken up to two hours can be done in just a few seconds with the right software and tagging strategy. 

This time saving really pays off in professional environments: corporate media archives tend to be far larger and more complex than any private photo library and many more users rely on them every day. 

Cluttered folder structures cause file chaos. 

If you want to benefit from software-driven tagging in your daily work, these tips will help you keep both existing and new images under control. 

Keep in mind: tagging existing images takes time at first but the effort pays off later. 

Tip 1: Define clear rules 

If several users share one media pool, you need consistent rules for selecting and assigning tags. The following examples can help: 

• Use nouns either only in singular or only in plural form. A search for “horse” should return all horse images, whether there is a single animal or an entire herd. 

• Avoid very specific technical terms—such as tagging every horse with its exact subspecies. Unless you are running a zoo image database, hardly anyone will search for “Przewalski’s horse.” 

• The same applies to the level of detail and the quantity of tags: less is sometimes more. Assigning 1,000 tags to one photo might make it highly discoverable, but that level of depth will never scale across all assets in the archive. 

• The focus should always be on the most essential tags. 

Tip 2: Create a shared tag catalog 

pixx.io lets you define a central tag catalog. Certain users can only choose from this list when tagging images. This is especially helpful for larger teams: it ensures everyone uses the same terms instead of mixing “fall collection” with “autumn range.” 

Think about which terms you need for your images and media. Start with broad categories such as vacation, travel, event, city, landscape. Time-related tags like day, night, 2023, winter, or summer can also be helpful. 

Then gradually move into more detail: Greece, beach, ocean, airplane, birthday, Berlin, plants, forest, tree, snow, rain. This creates a mental hierarchy but keep the rules in mind: 

• If several users share the media pool, the tag catalog should be binding for everyone. 

• When new images and media are created or uploaded, only tags from the existing catalog should be available. 

• New tags should be reviewed and only added if they fit the overall concept. 

Tip 3: Put yourself in the searcher’s shoes 

Everyone searches for images and files a little differently. Try to understand how colleagues or partners look for content and provide tags that match their habits. 

For example, someone in HR might search for “outdoor shot” rather than “outdoor,” or might look for a certain mood instead of the specific subject. 

The best approach is a mix of general and specific keywords so that everyone can find what they are looking for. 

Tip 4: Be careful with synonyms 

Synonyms are a common pitfall in tagging. To avoid this, define one preferred term in your rules or in your software’s dictionary for example “car” instead of “vehicle” or “automobile.” 

Most good media management tools also support synonyms: images are tagged with “car,” but will still be found when someone searches for “vehicle” or similar terms. 

Tip 5: Describe what you see 

When tagging a photo, you took yourself, you are always one step ahead of the viewer: you may know the person’s job or that they were in a bad mood despite smiling. 

However, anything that cannot be seen in the image does not belong in the tags. “Man” and “smile” are sufficient. Whether the smile was genuine or whether the person in the picture is your brother is not relevant for tagging. 

To organize large volumes of images and allow multiple users to manage and maintain them, many corporate marketing teams rely on professional media management software such as pixx.io’s digital asset management. 

The tool simplifies organizing and sharing media content and all related workflows. It also makes tagging photos easy, whether manually or automatically. 

Instead of assigning tags manually, you can let AI support the process. If you use pixx.io as your DAM, Smart Tagging is available for this purpose. As soon as you upload product photos, event images, or infographics, the AI analyzes the visual content and automatically assigns suitable tags. 

The benefit of AI-powered tagging: marketing teams save at least three work weeks per year and gain more time for creative and strategic tasks. 

If you want to see how pixx.io simplifies tagging for your own images, you can start a free trial now and experience Smart Tagging directly in your workflows.