When to Use either a Page or a Post for the Website?

Oliver
Age old questions still up fr debate:
Do the experts still not know the difference between using a page vs a post for websites???
I am starting to do affiliate blogging on my business website and want to do a special page/post for an affiliate resource for clients/users.
Q. Can you tell if you have the url and inspect the source code and see if it is a page or a post?
If you can then I would say that if Google sees a PAGE it tells them it is more of a static page vs if it was a POST it would tell Google that it is more active and perhaps may rank it higher since Google always like to give the latest in their Search Engine Result Pages (SERPs).
Does this seem logical? Thoughts?

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Micha
I don't have an opinion on whether a Page or Post would do better. However …
"Q. Can you tell if you have the url and inspect the source code and see if it is a page or a post?"
Vanilla, default WordPress (unaltered, right out of the box) has separate Page-Template-Default and Post-Template-Default classes. They are used in the BODY tag.
So, theoretically, yes, a search engine -COULD- tell if a URL is published as a Page or Post by a WordPress-like Content Management System (cms).
I don't know of any evidence to support or contest the hypothesis that such awareness by the algorithms would make a difference.

Oliver » Micha
Thanks for the feedback.

Truslow
I agree with Michael in his analysis of that part – so read that and pretend I included all that info here. I won't repeat it.
There are some other things that can affect this, though.
Posts from blogs typically have taxonomies attached – categories and/or tags. These connect posts in a different sort of way than pages. If you're not using taxonomies, of course, then there would be no difference there.
Also… Your theme can affect this – at least if the theme follows normal WordPress standards. Pages typically don't have author or published/updated info on them – blog posts typically do in the meta section. (On some themes that can be turned off, though) Just making the meta section "hidden" wouldn't hide it from spiders – so there's a bit of a difference there.
Plus, your SEO plugin will make a difference – though there are some settings there that can make them identical on the major ones, too. Your SEO plugin is going to put the author, publish and update dates into the <head> meta tags for posts, but not pages (by default).
If you want ALL your posts to be treated as pages, you can easily just turn that off, but if you want just SOME of your posts to be treated as pages, but the rest to work like a normal blog – all of this will be somewhat problematic.
The final thing to consider is your schema plugin – whether you've got a specialized one or you're using Yoast or Rank Math Pro – is going to default to your pages having "Article" schema and your posts having "BlogPost" schema. These can typically be changed pretty easily on a post-by-post level so it's not a huge deal, but remember to take a look there.
Now… since there ARE some differences in how they are marked up and the supporting structured data that goes with each post type – it means things will be slightly different. If you check all the boxes and do the things, it probably won't make much of a difference.
BUT… if you are planning on having a blog and then just a couple of "posts" that you want treated as pages – I'd question the soundness of that choice. It probably won't affect too much, but it could easily send some mixed signals to Google. Enough to tank you? Nah. Enough to have some affect in rankings? Maybe a smidge, but maybe not. Enough to make Google feel like it might need to look at your site more closely and pick nits about other things or be hesitant to make some assumptions that it might normally make about a newly posted piece of content? Yeah… I'd say probably. It'll take new stuff a bit more time to find it's place and generally just lower the trust signals. Google likes patterns and if something doesn't fit the patterns it thinks it sees – then that pattern is broken.
Since the key word in SEO is "Optimization" – I'd say, make a page a page. Send a clear and consistent signal to Google as to exactly what everything is – and then send as many of those clear and consistent signals as you can muster. In fact, I'd say it's better to do something wrong with absolute consistency than it is to get it right just sometimes.
Kutcher
A Page and a Post would have different schema, and that schema's main difference is the usage of the date published information. But this goes beyond the technical and into intent. The usage (shown vs hidden) of the date information would be a factor into relevance. Example being a reviews website, where the information would either be fresh or dated, and Google could boost (or not) as it relates to freshness.
Oliver
Taxonomies. Wow never heard of them.
I use my website for business not for actually blogging, so everything is customized pages. It's great.
I want to start doing affiliate blogging and was actually thinking of doing a fully new domain but people are saying it'll be extremely hard to rank a new site.
So now I'm trying to figure out if I should keep my big posts and make them pages since the current t we site is all pages and does pretty well. But I guess I can't tell since I don't have posts. Lol.
But what you brought up with the Taxonomies and tags is interesting g and I can definitely see how that can be used for signals for posts and help rank.
I think like I said. My pillar type large post 2000 plus I was thinking to have it as a page and then link it to supporting posts. But from what I'm gathering it may be better to have it I posts.
Gordon
To add to all that was written, it depends more on the hierarchy + internal linking, and the content, whether Google regards a content piece as news or evergreen.
So only if you use WordPress as it was initially designed, would it even matter if you're using a post or a page.
Today things are much more malleable (as with your own site, where you have various types of pages), that you can basically use things the way you want, so long as you strategize things properly ahead of time, and don't make a lot of structural / hierarchical changes along the way.
Campbell
Posts are Pages with a category.

Oliver » Campbell
Ha ha. Dude those 5 words are so good. My head is spinning now. Your right about that. Many people didn't even mention the obvious.
I'm putting important stuff on my big affiliate pages but now the issue is placing them where people can see them on my site.
Campbell
I am using RankMath to create highly SEO'd 'Pillar content'. These 6 pillars are Landing Pages with affiliate offers, reviews etc. A 3-5000 word article with TOC, video etc. Image boxes (Elementor) for each product. SO – The page should rank well as an authority page. I can also use it as a landing page for promotions. Obv interlinks everywhere – reviews, videos, comparisons etc. So it is a silo, a landing page, a pillar content, an opt-in page – All in one.

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Topical Cluster Keyword Mapping Winning Formula with Pillar (Post|Page|Content)

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