People who trade the financial markets have to be aware that they are not getting in touch with just one asset/product but a whole range of possible products. To buy and sell these different products, traders need to know what kind of product they want to acquire, which specifications it has and how much it will cost them.
This information is gathered in a trading platform by typing in specific parameters. These parameters are used to find the ideal product within the realms of a trading platform’s search function. The following paragraph deals with one specific parameter: tags.
Tags are the fuel for your search engine.
In financial trading, tags can be compared to keywords for your search engine at home or work. Speaking of tags is synonymous with speaking of the essential search parameters for most traders. If they want to buy Apple Inc. and look for this stock within their trading platform, one of the first things they must do is type ‘Apple’ in the search field and press ‘enter’. This basic process can help traders narrow down a whole list of products that fit this primary tag – all Apple related products – but more specific tags (read more here).
A tag is nothing else than a keyword aimed at having as many filter possibilities as possible to find the ideal product on the market. The necessity for these tags becomes apparent when you consider that most financial products have certain specifications or characteristics that distinguish them from others.
While Apple Inc. produces iPhones, laptops and computers, Marcopolo S.A. produces buses and cars used worldwide by many different companies. These two products can be observed in their respective tags: ‘Apple’ deals with shares of the famous brand, while ‘Marcopolo’ deals with shares of a Brazilian manufactory specialised in building goods transport vehicles and light commercial vehicles.
The proper tags are the key to success.
Even though financial trading might seem automated to some people at first glance, it is not uncommon for traders to perform manual tasks such as looking up the perfect stock for their portfolio. For this reason, correct and accurate tagging is of great importance because it directly influences the search for a product in a trading platform’s database.
The perfect tag is a user-friendly tag.
When we look at the Apple example from above (i.e., ‘Apple’ as a tag), we must consider that traders will type this into their trading platform every time they want to acquire shares of Apple Inc. The likelihood of typing ‘Apple’ correctly on your first try is relatively high; however, tags are also more complex and seem to be way harder to understand or remember. An example of such a complicated tag would be ‘(ICL: A3JU)’. Whereas spelling out ‘Apple’ was pretty straightforward, the tag ‘(ICL: A3JU)’ is not user friendly at all.
What traders tend to do when faced with such a complicated tag is either to try and understand it by researching the different elements which make up this tag or to ignore it completely. The latter can be compared to writing down somebody’s phone number without dialling it first, just because you happen to know some of these digits. If you fail typing in the whole telephone number correctly on your first attempt, the chances are that you will never get through with that person on the phone ever again (or vice versa). You might even miss out on an important call due to this lack of information. A similar logic can be applied to tagging in trading platforms.
So, how can you make your tags user friendly?
When traders look for a stock on their platform, the last thing they want is to be confronted with complicated tags which seem hard to remember. Therefore, most of them find products with ‘user-friendly’ tags.
A user-friendly tag does not have to be simple or easy; however, it should be clear enough so that traders can understand what they are looking for when scanning through the list of securities in their systems.
