#Hashtags are everywhere you look. They’re deeply embedded in the online culture of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and other social medias. You’re either nailing the hashtag game or you’re making a complete mess of your digital marketing campaign. These are a few strategies and best practices to help you hack your hashtags.
Hashtag Usage Varies
This may come as a surprise to you, but hashtags don’t provide the same purpose across all social media platforms.
Here’s a quick breakdown to help you:
- Twitter: One or two hashtags can help you with engagement. One hashtag should be a business or branded hashtag. The second should be one that supports the content of that particular post.
- Instagram: You’re allowed up to 30 hashtags, though a minimum of 11 is highly recommended. Your entire post can be nothing but hashtags, especially if your photo or video says everything needed.
- Facebook: Hashtags aren’t too relevant. You can use them, but they’re not going to help with engagement. If you want, they can be eliminated entirely.
- Pinterest, LinkedIn, and YouTube: Surprise, you can use hashtags here, too. Don’t use and abuse them, but they’ll make it easy for people to find a particular hashtag if they’re looking.
Don’t Be Afraid of Research
A bit of market research is going to help you considerably. Look at some of the hashtags being used by your competition. You can click on the hashtags to see if they are particularly active, too. There are a few research tools, like Hashtagify, that will show you how popular the hashtags are, making it easier for you to expand your reach and boost your followers.
Create a Branded Hashtag
Everywhere you post, you should be using a branded hashtag. It makes it easy for people to find you, follow you, and engage with you. This hashtag doesn’t have to be super creative. It can be as simple as the name of your company, like #GoGetterMarketing. It can also be a bit fun, such as or #Allaboutthemarketing. What’s important is that it’s easy to remember and a bit catchy. That, and you have to use it religiously on every post, similar to how you would sign an email with your name. It’s your new signature.
Change it Up
You don’t want to use the same hashtags each and every time (with the exception of your branded hashtag). Create a content calendar so you know what hashtags to target on different days or weeks. By making sure that you branch out, you increase the chance of reaching new followers.
Use Trending Hashtags
Some trending hashtags can easily be connected to your brand. With Twitter especially, you have to make sure the hashtag is relevant to you (otherwise you end up temporarily suspended). If you have to, connect the dots so it’s easy to show why you’re using a particular trending hashtag. #Justdoit already!
Incentivize Your Hashtags
Getting a hashtag trending is made possible by everyone talking about it. This means that, sometimes, you have to be blunt about what you want. Ask people in a video to share your video and use #whatever. You can even turn it into a contest, saying that if a certain number of people use the hashtag, you’ll do a giveaway.
You also want to make sure that you’re posting the hashtag you want to catch on in a few different places. Be sure that the hashtag is the first one listed. Utilize multiple social media platforms, too.
At Go Getter Marketing Group, we work closely with small and mid-sized businesses, answering their questions about social media. We also provide free consultations, showing businesses how they can benefit from a better social media strategy, including knowing how to develop and use existing hashtags. Contact us to learn more.