Really Need Help With "Filters" for NON E-Commerce

Hey all. Has anyone been able to ever create filters for a non e-commerce site? I keep running into this daily where a client needs filters but these are not ecom sites. I set everything up in the content manager database with tags, etc. and use repeaters to display the content, but, we then need to be able to FILTER on the items displayed. Yes, i can use the settings to create a filter but it then gets really confusing and not user-driven.

Eseentially, I need a dropdown or selection filter much like you have in ecommerce but with non ecommerce. Surely, there must be a way using the database, dropdowns, or something else I’m missing!

Any help is greatly appreciated.