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Model your taxonomies the right way

Jan Cerman
6 min read
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If you already know what taxonomies you want in your project, it's time to give them life. This way you can tag your content items and assets, and boost your productivity.

Dive deeper into taxonomies

If you're completely new to taxonomies, go through our crash course on taxonomies where you'll learn about what a taxonomy is, what it's useful for, and how you can start using it. 

Table of contents

    Key points

    Choose the taxonomy approach that works for you

    You can create taxonomies in Kontent.ai using either the built-in taxonomies or linked items. The approach to choose depends on your requirements.

    RequirementBuilt-in taxonomiesLinked items
    Build a sitemap✅✅
    Control who can edit the terms without access to content model❌✅
    Enhance terms with contextual details like scope and definition❌✅
    Find assets and content items by a term✅❌
    Limit the number of terms to a range✅✅
    Limit the number of terms to exactly one✅✅
    Tag assets with a term✅❌
    Tag content items with a term✅✅
    Set the taxonomy terms as non-localizable✅✅
    Use flat hierarchy (terms on the same level)✅✅
    Use nested hierarchy (terms on different levels)✅❌

    Built-in taxonomies for flexibility and findability

    The built-in taxonomy groups are the most intuitive and easiest approach to implement taxonomies in Kontent.ai. The benefits? You can tag items and assets, find the items and assets by your tags, and create complex nested taxonomies.

    It takes three things: taxonomy group, taxonomy element in your content types, and tagging you content items.

    1. Create a taxonomy group

    1. In Content model, select the Taxonomies tab.
    2. Create a taxonomy group for your taxonomy.
    3. Add taxonomy terms.
    4. Click Save changes.

    Time to use that taxonomy group in an element.

    2. Add a taxonomy element to content types

    To enable tagging of content items, add a taxonomy element to any of your content types. We recommend you limit the element to a specific number of terms for added validation. 

    Add content groups to keep focus

    Taxonomy element in content type

    To enable tagging of assets, add a taxonomy element to the asset type. Asset tagging requires advanced asset management.

    Taxonomy elements with selected taxonomy groups in the asset type

    3. Tag items and assets

    With asset elements in place, start tagging your content. Check out how to tag content items and tag assets.

    Linked items for permissions and added context

    If you need to add extra contextual details to your taxonomies and let content creators update them, you need to implement your taxonomy using linked items.

    It takes a few things: a content type that defines your taxonomy, content items based on the type that define the taxonomy terms, and linked items elements in the items you want to tag.

    Let's take a look at an example of a taxonomy for tagging educational content. 

    Example: Humanities and Natural Sciences are your taxonomies created as content types. The terms of the taxonomies are created as content items.

    See the diagram on https://viewer.diagrams.net?lightbox=1&nav=1#Uhttps://raw.githubusercontent.com/KenticoDocs/kontent-docs-diagrams/master/content_modeling/taxonomies/taxonomy_-_illustration-for-linked-items-approach.drawio

    1. Create a content type for the taxonomy

    1. In Content model, click Create new.
    2. In Content type name, type a name such as Humanities.
    3. (Optional) Add guidelines elements to explain the taxonomy and tell content creators how to use it correctly.
    4. (Optional) Add a rich text element so that content creators can include information about taxonomy definition and scope.
    5. Click Save changes.

    Time to create content items based on the new content type. These items will define your taxonomy terms.

    2. Create content items for taxonomy terms

    1. In  Content & assets, click Create new in the upper right corner.
    2. Select a content type such as Humanities created earlier.
    3. Click Create.
    4. In Content item name, type a name of the item such as Philosophy.
    5. (Optional) Add details about the term you just defined.
    6. Repeat steps 1 to 5 as needed.

    After creating content items for every term in the taxonomy, you just need a linked items element to link the terms to other content items like articles.

    3. Add linked items element for linking the terms

    Make a list of the types of content you want to tag. Then follow these steps for each type:

    1. In Content model, open a content type such as Article.
    2. Add a linked items element.
      1. Give the element a name such as Subject.
      2. Limit the element to the types of content used for tagging such as Humanities.
      3. (Optional) If you want to limit the number of terms to select, limit the number of allowed linked items.
    3. Click Save changes.

    Now you can start tagging your articles. Open each content item and link the item with the appropriate term in the Subject element.

    A content item tagged by a taxonomy term represented by a linked content item.

    When you link your content item to the right term, it will look like this.

    What's next?