How to Use Hashtags to Increase Social Media Engagement
Only second to having the most aesthetically pleasing grid, hashtags are the most important aspect of your Instagram content. What most people don’t realise is that hashtags can work strategically to grow your audience for you without a lot of effort on your behalf. All you need is a little bit of knowledge and you’ll be taking your Instagram game to the next level.
We know it is not always the most glamorous to see a long list of hashtags under a caption however, it is an aspect of marketing and a strategic use of Instagram’s algorithm that favours posts with high engagement. Figuring out how to best use hashtags for maximum impact for your target audience and your competitors can take some time with trial and error. To do this, you want to find out what your ideal target audience is looking at and interacting with.
You want to ask yourself what type of posts they following and liking. The more information you can gather from your followers, the better. You are able to post up to 30 hashtags in a single post however; research 1 states statically posts that do the best have 10 or fewer hashtags. If you’re not a fan of seeing the tags in your caption – try posting them as a comment. This method is still effective in terms of community engagement without a list of tags at the bottom of a caption.
Instagram introduced a feature recently to follow your favourite hashtags just like you can follow users themselves. By following a tag, you get an influx of different users who use said tag on your feed which is why it may be more important now than before to know your audience and their wants if you are trying to grow your following.
Along with your posts, you can also post tags in your story. Your story allows up to 10 hashtags including a drop pin for your location that people can also search. The number of tags in your story should be targeted on the community you want to focus on for your content – as your post hashtags should be doing anyway.
Utilising hashtags on social media is a fantastic way of keeping up to date on content and information. By posting the best content possible and using strategic hashtags, you have the ability to set the stage for your content and get the most number of eyes to be following your journey as possible. After all, this is the goal!
If you wish to authentically and effectively maintain your Instagram and Facebook accounts, contact us to find out how the team at Milk Bottle Projects can help.