Although social media is still relatively new to society, its becoming more and more the norm of everyday life, so much that the word hashtags is now recognized in the Oxford dictionary in 2010. By simply adding the (#) pound sign next a word or even emoji, categorizes the content and then makes it discoverable. This allows you and others to find that content. By using hashtags it allows you to connect and engage with other social media users based on a common interest. However knowing the definition of hashtags is not enough these days, to generate success on social media you’ll need to use hashtags properly which is why we’ve compiled a short list of ways on how to use hashtags on Instagram.
1. Use all 30 hashtags! Instagram allows you to use up to 30 different hashtags, why not optimize the chances of you being seen?
2. Put hashtags in your comments. Unless you’re creating a hashtag for your brand or hosting a contest that requires the use of a hashtag put all the other hashtags in the comment. It keeps your caption looking clean and its less intrusive on the quality content you are already posting.
3. Avoid using irrelevant hashtags. Over used hashtags like #follow4follow or #likeforlike might seem like they’re getting you more engagement but they aren’t really. The only people using those hashtags are bots and not real people. You want to use hashtags that relate to the content you are posting, that way you have real people interacting with the content you are categorizing in that particular hashtag.
4. Create a lists of hashtags that range from low and high traffic searches. If you’ve ever searched for a hashtag on Instagram you’ll notice there are 9 tiles on the top which are the ‘top posts’ for that particular hashtag. Usually these posts will stay there for 12-24 hours and to get there you need to have a certain amount of engagement. This is where you want your content to be, otherwise it will just be pushed further down into the realm of chronological ordered hashtags that rarely get seen. When searching for hashtags always find look for some highly used hashtags that generate a lot of traffic but also some low traffic. The higher traffic hashtags tend to take a lot more engagement to rank on the top 9, so if you’re not producing lots of engagement on your posts its best to start smaller then work your way up.
