As someone that manages more than one Instagram account as part of my job, Iâve always known that for social media management, hashtags are useful and that I should be using them â but I didnât really know how or why. On top of that, posting on Instagram is just a facet of the work I do, and I donât have any time to manually create strategies each time I make up a new post.
It wasnât until after the Flick team explained to me, did I understand how useful hashtags are in terms of gaining traction and reaching my target audience, but also how to effectively pick the right ones. I broadly work in the fashion industry, and so was blindly making up random fashion-related hashtags â without even knowing that #fashion was being posted over 350,000 times, daily by people competing for the same audience. It frustrated me because I didnât realize that I should be optimizing my hashtags, so I was just continuously trying to a) think of new hashtags and b) not seeing results.
If this sounds like a familiar story then this guide might be interesting for you. Or, if youâre not sure about hashtags at all, this should be able to bring you up to speed. This is aimed towards social media managers and coordinators who are in the same position I was in â you know hashtags are important, but you donât really know how to use them effectively.
Why are hashtags useful?
So, first off, letâs answer burning question number one â why are hashtags even useful? Like I said, we all know we should be using them, but a lot of the time if someone were to ask us why, it would be hard to give a detailed answer.
Hashtags are like categories for your content. If you categorize your content into the right hashtags, people that are interested in those categories are more likely to find your photos, videos and your page in general. The reason why they are useful only really applies if you use them the right way. You need to pick the hashtags that match your account the best. So â hashtags that contain content that perform at around the same level as yours do (in terms of likes and comments), hashtags that arenât too competitive (something like #love is a no-go if you want to appear in a hashtag feed, because itâs so popular), hashtags that are specific and descriptive to the type of content you are posting, and hashtags that arenât banned (#fashion, see you later). If you have the perfect mix of all of these elements in the hashtags you use, you can increase your account visibility by about 14%-40%, which is great if part of your job is to foster and manage an Instagram account.
Think about it, if you post daily on Instagram, and on average reach 5,000 people per post, and reach an additional 20% through hashtags, youâre gaining an additional 1,000 eyes every single time you post.
Thatâs 7,000 new people per week,
28,000 per month,
Meaning a total of:
336,000 new sets of eyes on your content from your target audience per year!
Not too bad for 30 minutes of work a week!
And, just to give you a snapshot, hereâs a look at some of the results Iâve seen on one of the accounts I manage, since optimizing my hashtags:
These are the basics when it comes to hashtags, but the bottom line is, when they are used correctly, they will increase your visibility, your Instagram performance, and will help you reach audiences that actually care about your content. So the next time someone asks you why, hereâs your answer:
âHashtags can get our content in front of our target audience on Instagram.â
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What hashtag types are most applicable to you?
There are a lot of different types of hashtags out there. And, itâs helpful to be aware of the ones that will work for you if you are managing a social media account.
One of the most important hashtag types if you are representing a brand, is, you guessed it â branded hashtags. The beautiful thing about branded hashtags is that they have more than one use-purpose. First and foremost, they help you store content related to either a specific campaign or just your brand in general. Beauty brand Glossier use their branded hashtags really well and managed to go viral with #topshelfie, which encouraged their customers to share snaps of their bathroom top shelves. They are also a way to encourage your audience to share posts about your brand, engage with you, and create content that you might want to highlight or repurpose later on. If youâre having a slow day and donât know what to post, you can head to your branded hashtags to pick a piece that will spotlight a customer of yours â itâs like an image bank for your brand.
Product-specific hashtags are also really great if you are selling a product, or representing a brand. You might think about your main product offering and consider the hashtags related to that, so that if someone is searching for that type of product â your images will appear. For example, if you are a provider of tech solutions software, you might look at hashtags relevant to this, and more specifically your type of product.
Location-based hashtags are also really useful if you are trying to reach a target audience in a specific area, or just want to communicate with people where you are based. This is useful if your brand frequently hosts live events in specific areas, and wants to attract an audience that will engage and attend. If you are a beauty brand based in Dubai you might pick hashtags like â#makeupartistDubaiâ, â#Dubaibeautybrand,â or âDubaibeautyjunkie.â
Finally, audience-specific hashtags are also important when it comes to social media management and hashtag types. These are based on what your target audience would be searching, so youâve got to do a little research and prediction here. However, a lot of the time itâs common sense. If you are a beauty account, you probably want to reach people searching for things relating to that topic like #makeuptips or #beautyhacks. Try and put yourself in the mind of your target audience or customer persona.
If you take a look at Flickâs Complete Hashtag Guide, you can see more hashtag types that are useful when it comes to the categories you should be using in your posts. These are just a few, and depending on the brand you represent, some will be more applicable than others. Â
Hereâs how to use hashtags
Most people implement a hashtag strategy when they first select the hashtags they want, and this is probably the best way to do it. When I refer to a âhashtag strategyâ it might sound like a serious commitment, but really it just means âusing hashtags in the right way.â For me, having set groups of hashtags I can pick from each time I post is important, because it saves me a lot of time thinking, or researching every single time I post. Everyone works differently, but as someone who manages social media accounts as part of my job, I appreciate a strategy that saves me time, as well as gives me results.
So, itâs important to figure out a strategy that suits your work style, but hereâs how I do it. As I said, efficiency is key for me, and Iâd rather spend time on my research phase once or twice â giving me more time to focus on other aspects of my work. You can come back to your strategy once a month or so to see whatâs working and refresh/update your hashtags.
To find my initial hashtags I use a version of the ladder strategy, which you can read about here. Before that, I define what types of content I want to post so I know what groups of hashtags I need. As I work largely in the fashion and beauty industry, I started from there. I knew I would be posting content like beauty and fashion facts, inspirational images, and original content like campaigns pushing reports and blog posts. Once I determined the types of posts I would be creating, I sectioned them into groups, like âfashion factsâ, âbeauty facts,â or âfashion inspiration.â From there, I started my hashtag research and implemented my strategy, by selecting hashtags for each of these groups that I could pick from and use when I posted any kind of content that fit this style â this means that I could easily go into my âbeauty factsâ hashtag collection, and pick hashtags that would work when I was posting.
The most important thing when you go to pick your first set of hashtags is to look at hashtags that are of the correct size, in relation to your account. You can use the suggested filters on Flick by linking your Instagram account, in order to ensure you are getting hashtags that will match your account size, so you donât use hashtags that are too big, or that you wonât rank on. When picking your hashtags, remember to look closely at average likes, competition score, and potential reach, in relation to your account.
Once I created my collections for each type of post I would be creating in the future, I saved them so I could easily go to them each time I post. Now, whenever I go to post something, I head to the corresponding hashtag collection I have, copy the ones I want and then post. You can also change the hashtags in your group every so often, which will definitely help your strategy.
One thing I will say, which I will expand on in the next section, is that you should take advantage of the type of content you are posting, to throw in a few hashtags that are relevant to that specific post. Whilst you might have your collections, if your post is topical or from an event, for example, make sure to swap out one of your hashtags for the event hashtag, or one that might be trending in relation to the content youâre posting. This fits really well for pieces of news, events, or really specific content, that require a little more attention in your hashtag selection.
So now that Iâve talked a little bit about my strategy, I want to expand on the most important part: the process. Creating a process that makes implementing hashtags easy, quick, and simple is probably the most important thing if you are a Social Media Manager. So, Iâve drawn out this little guide that you can follow and adapt when you start your hashtag journey. Â
If you want to improve your social media process at work, Iâd suggest giving Flick a try. For me personally, it changed the hashtag game when it came to the accounts that I manage, and Iâve seen results since learning a little more about how to optimize hashtags. Now, itâs something I can do quickly and not worry about until I check back again for results. Instead of hashtags being something Iâd do for the sake of it, Iâm using them for growth. So, if youâd like to check them out, just head to the link below and grab yourself a free trial.