Using the right hashtags is also one of the best ways to get discovered by new people who are interested in your brand's topic. Combining the right hashtags with inspiring content can ultimately lead to more engagement, followers, and hopefully more sales.
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Each Instagram caption can be accompanied by up to 30 hashtags. Depending on the topic or category of your posts, there is always a set of relevant hashtags. By using the right combination of hashtags, your post gets categorized and shared with people interested in the same topic or theme.
It's not only relevant to add hashtags to your feed posts but also to your Instagram Stories. This gives you even more exposure. As you can see, using hashtags is a great way to reach new people who don't yet follow you. Here's a guide to get started with using hashtags on Instagram:
1. Find the Most Effective Hashtags
There are a few handy ways to find the right hashtags. Always check what your competitors or accounts on the same topic are doing and which hashtags they use. The general rule is: the more niche the topic, the more conversation and engagement it will generate.
It's therefore important to find hashtags that generate a lot of engagement while still being very niche. When you type a specific keyword in Instagram's “tags” search, you'll also find recognizable hashtags. You'll need to do some research to see whether they belong to the broader or more niche category. There are also some tools that help you find relevant hashtags, such as Later.com or Hashtagify.me. Another source is to check which hashtags relevant influencers are using.
2. Use More Niche Hashtags
Instagram has “top posts” on the hashtag pages (this also determines whether your post will be visible to people who follow that specific hashtag). Top posts are posts that receive a lot of engagement (likes, comments, saves, etc.) within the first two hours after posting. You can see how much engagement is needed to get featured. With very popular hashtags, the threshold is high. Try to find more niche hashtags, which makes it easier to appear on the top posts page.
3. Follow These Hashtags on Instagram
In 2018, Instagram added a feature that allows you to follow relevant hashtags. This way, you always know what's being posted on social media about the topics that you or your brand care about. It's a form of social listening that many people haven't yet considered. It also means that people will now automatically see your posts in their feed if they follow a hashtag you used.
It has therefore become even more important to include the right, relevant hashtags in your posts—but this also means your content absolutely needs to be good, as people now have the option to “hide this post from this hashtag.” You can also place hashtags in your bio. What's great about this feature is that it makes your bio even more functional—you can use hashtags for everything, from promoting your Instagram community to highlighting your brand content and announcing Instagram campaigns.
5. Organize Your Hashtags
The best thing you can do is save the hashtags you use somewhere, like in your notes or a spreadsheet. You can use up to 30 hashtags on each post, and it's recommended to use all 30. Try to find at least 60 relevant hashtags. Create different groups of hashtag combinations so you're not always using the same ones.
In the past, it was believed that if you kept using the same hashtags on every post, Instagram would “ghost” you, causing the algorithm to reduce the visibility of your posts. However, this has never been proven. The theory behind this is that if you keep posting with the same hashtags, you might be marked as “spam.” This is especially true if you use generic engagement-driven hashtags like “#likeforlike.”
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It's good to have hashtag groups that include some large hashtags, some medium-sized ones, and some very specific ones. Large hashtags are generic hashtags such as #throwbackthursday, #tbt, #ootd, #foodporn... These are usually used thousands of times per minute, so your post can disappear from the Explore page within seconds.
It's important to mix these with medium-sized and very specific hashtags relevant to your topic. For example, if you post a picture of your cat and you really want to make your cat Insta-famous, using very general hashtags like #catsofinstagram won't make your post very visible. This hashtag has been used over 117 million times. Using a smaller hashtag like #instakitty works better, as it has only been used 2.8 million times.
Smaller or very specific hashtags (like #pdxpets = 28K) work well because they reach an audience that is already highly engaged with the topic.
6. Evaluate Your Hashtag Strategy
With an Instagram Business profile, you can view the analytics of your posts. By tapping the insights button, you can see how many people your post reached and how many of them came through hashtags. One downside, however, is that you can't see which specific hashtag performed the best. Tools like Hashtagify.me country Later.com allow you to track key insights about the hashtags you use, including a breakdown of which hashtags generate the most likes, comments, impressions, saves, and reach on your Instagram posts.
Knowing which hashtags are most effective in helping people discover your posts is extremely beneficial for businesses. It can help you refine your hashtag strategy by eliminating the hashtags that don't produce results while doubling down on the ones that do.
Finally, hashtags are still very useful for building your community, as long as you put effort into finding the right ones and researching your niche. Leave the generic and cheap options behind and focus on specific ones. It's a process that takes time, but as a community manager, it's a very valuable tool.
Article by Celien Feys, Social Media Manager at Chase Creative.
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