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The Best Way to Use Hashtags on Instagram

Scroll through Instagram and you’ll see that nearly every post makes use of #hashtags. That’s right — Instagrammers love to use these handy words, each preceded by a pound symbol, when they share their photos on the platform.

But don’t underestimate the power of the mighty hashtag. These can be especially helpful in sharing content and engaging with others over Instagram.

I hate to ask, but how do Instagram hashtags work?

People who are brushing up on their social media savvy might feel a little out of the loop when they see hashtags used so heavily. There is, however, a method to the madness. Hashtags are often words or short phrases (in the case of phrases, they’re spelled without spaces) that are used to categorize or tag a post.

For example, if you’re posting a photo of a dog on Instagram, you use #dog in the caption and your post gets included among all the others using that hashtag. This means anyone following or searching that hashtag has a chance of seeing your post. For this reason, hashtags are the best way for your business to be discovered on Instagram, receive more traffic and possibly even garner more followers. Hashtags are a way for your target audience to find your content.

But it gets complicated because not all hashtags are going to be effective — and when you can use only so many of them, you want to make sure you’re using the right ones.

Which hashtags should I use?

Here’s the tricky aspect of hashtags — the broadest ones are so popular that your content will likely get lost among the deluge, whereas the niche ones are so narrow in their focus that fewer people are looking at them.

So if, as in our example, you use #dog — you have a pet-friendly office, and you figure it would be cute to share pics of some of your employees’ fur babies on Instagram — your post could easily get lost among the millions of posts with that hashtag. You could narrow it down and say #officedogs or even #annapolisofficedogs, but remember that the more specific your hashtag, the fewer people will be searching or following it.

That’s why it’s best you use a mix of broad and specific hashtags to get the best exposure. You can also create a branded hashtag so that all content shared about your business, whether by you or by your customers, gets categorized appropriately.

What’s a branded hashtag?

Your branded hashtag is just like any other aspect of your business identity: It’s a way for people to recognize you. Your branded hashtag might be your business name, your slogan or motto, or the name of your most popular product. Make it short and easy to remember, and be sure to include it both in your Instagram bio and on any marketing material.

Those who are following your hashtag in addition to your page will see not only your posts but the posts of all your customers who have shared photos and used the hashtag. This is a way for your brand to reach all of your customers’ followers in addition to your own — and when their followers tap on the hashtag, they’ll be exposed to all the content you’re sharing from your page.

How do I choose from trending hashtags?

When you post an Instagram photo, you can include up to 30 hashtags in the caption (you can include as many as you want, but only the first 30 will show up in searches). The good news is that 30 is more than enough.

Don’t just employ the guess-and-test method, using whichever hashtags you can think of and seeing whether they’re successful. Instead, you should be strategic. Your best chance of engaging the most people is to use a mix of wide-reaching and specific hashtags.

When you are writing your caption for your photo, you can either integrate hashtags into the caption text or you can include them as a string of tags at the very end. Either one is acceptable practice, and both fare equally well with Instagram’s algorithms.

When you hit the hashtag (pound) symbol and start typing in the hashtag, popular options will come up. Aim to use about five to 10 extremely popular hashtags (those used more than 500,000 times), five to 10 moderately popular hashtags (those used between 50,000 and 500,000 times) and five to 10 specific hashtags (those used less than 50,000 times).

Any other important tips?

Look at some members of your target audience to see what sort of photos they post and what hashtags they’re using. If you’re a restauranteur, you will want to check out the feeds of your local foodies who are always trying out new eateries. That’s when you notice they’re using hashtags like #goodeats and #foodporn rather than basic ones like #restaurants.

Avoid using the same string of hashtags with every single post. Even though you might think this will help you, the repetition will be picked up by Instagram’s algorithm and marked as being spammy.

Finally, don’t be afraid to jump on some of the biggest — i.e. far-reaching — hashtags as long as you are posting relevant content that ties your business to each of these Instagram trends. Hashtags like #picoftheday, #TBT or #throwbackthursday, #FBF or #flashbackfriday, #selfie and #manicmonday are great ways to get your business more exposure and join in the Instagram interaction.

Ann’s Social Media & Marketing can help you master the art of Instagram and make it benefit your business. Email Ann@AnnMarkets.com today to get started.