Hashtags are a huge part of social media marketing, especially now that Instagram has offered users the option to follow hashtags in addition to following other users. With this new feature, the potential that hashtags have has grown even larger. Hashtags give a social platform the ability to categorize postings, which then allows users to have more specific search results.
The goal for your company should be to utilize hashtags to the fullest read this post on how to successfully conduct an Instagram takeover, this means finding the hashtags that your targeted audience is most likely to follow, use, or search.
When your posts are attached to these hashtags, you boost your chances of reaching potential followers, which will then become potential customers! However, when doing this, be sure not to string too many words together. Doing so gives your hashtag a smaller chance of being found because a user would have to be very specific with their search. Your posts have a better chance of being found when tagged with short, commonly used tags, such as #freshfruit, or #interiordesign.
Be sure to think about how to use hashtags in a creative way to describe your product.
Hashtags that describe your product are more likely to be searched by users who may want to follow your account and learn more about your brand.
Remember that your hashtags do not have to specific to the photo that you’re posting, for example, if you post a photo of a new hand lotion, the only hashtag does not have to be #HandLotion. Instead, you can tag things such as the scent, or things that the lotion will do for you such as #Heal or #Smooth.
Get creative, and don’t be afraid to try different things to see how they work. Another great feature that Instagram offers is adding hashtags to your Instagram stories, this creates another opportunity for your content to be discovered by potential followers.
This is a great strategy because Instagram stories get more engagement that Instagram posts, because of the sense of urgency offered by the expiration date of a story.
An important aspect of using hashtags is to keep it interesting, don’t use the same hashtags such as “#LikeForLike,” over and over again on all of your posts. While these hashtags are insanely popular, this could be flagged as “spam” behavior in the Instagram algorithm and are also unlikely to help you gain any loyal followers, but rather a few likes here and there.
Check out this website for endless hashtag suggestions, sorted into different categories for different types of posts! Another important way to avoid your account being flagged as “spam” is to use hashtags sparingly, avoid tagging every single word in your caption.
Hashtags are used differently on different social media platforms, and it’s important for you to be aware of these differences in order to get the most out of your tags. Hashtags, when used correctly can boost your engagement, when used incorrectly they can have the complete opposite effect. Twitter does well with hashtags, but only in small amounts, try to use a maximum of two hashtags per tweet, and follow a similar rule with Facebook postings. Instagram, however, does very well with hashtags.
On Instagram hashtags and engagements are positively related, upward to about ten hashtags, at that point engagement begins to drop again.
Another interesting way to use hashtags, that will get your brand out there on the social media platforms is by joining in on trending conversations. Trending conversations occur when users of a social platform are all talking about the same thing, and using a specific hashtag in order to categorize all of their tweets about the specific conversation topic together.
These conversations can be about anything, from a large political or social event to a new episode of a popular television show coming out, all you have to do is write a response and add the hashtag, adding your brand into the conversation. It is important, however, when using this approach, to be conscious of what it is that people are talking about, and to be careful not to offend anyone with your response. One way to be sure that your contribution to the conversation isn’t taken the wrong way is to choose trending conversations that are more light-hearted, such as #NationalPizzaDay, click here to see a calendar full of hashtag worthy holidays.
Other than using popular hashtags to bring traffic to your posts, you can also create a “branded hashtag.” A branded hashtag is a hashtag that is used only by your brand, it should be something that represents your brand clearly. A branded hashtag does not necessarily have to contain your brand name, for example, our company, Social Motto, uses #WhatsYourMotto. The goal of these hashtags is to resonate with your audience, they should be unique and also easy to remember.
Hashtags may seem daunting, but with practice, anyone can get the hang of it. The first step is to try it, go post something and tag away!
