Hashtags are both one of the most misunderstood features of social media, and one of the most effective ways to get more eyes (and engagement!) on your posts in 2022. But what ARE hashtags? How do you find the best hashtags for your Instagram account? And how many should you use? Read on as we answer these questions and more while exploring the role of hashtags on Instagram and TikTok.
Hashtags are fundamentally a way to label and categorize your content. Keywords or phrases are preceded by the “#” symbol and can be used anywhere on a social media platform.
When you use a hashtagged word or phrase, your content will be added to a pool of other content that includes the same hashtagged word or phrase. This makes it easier for people to find your content, as well as for you to find relevant content from other people.
Hashtags began on Twitter but have since been adopted by most other social media platforms, including Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook.
Hashtags can be used to categorize content, make it easier to find, and help with SEO. When it comes to hashtags, there are a few things you need to keep in mind.
In addition to general and specific hashtags there are five main types of hashtags to consider:
Location: Location based hashtags, such as #Disneyland or #StanleyPark
Branded: Branded hashtags for campaigns or events, such as #BellLetsTalk
Industry: Industry hashtags that describe your niche, like #SocialMediaManager or #TorontoRealEstate
Community: Community-focused hashtags to bring your community together, like #VanLife or #Vegan
Descriptive: Descriptive hashtags which describe the content of your actual post, like #RedDress
There are plenty of free and paid tools you can use to find hashtags. Personally, I love Later’s Instagram hashtag tool, Hashtag Suggestions, an easy way to find hashtags based on the content of your post and similar hashtags in your industry.
To use it, type a hashtag into the tool’s search bar, hit “Suggest,” and it’ll immediately generate new hashtags, sorted by relevance.
You can also use Instagram’s hashtag explorer to find popular hashtags on Instagram.
Hashtags can help make it easier for people to find your content online, as they are essentially keywords that help people find what they are looking for. By using hashtags, you can reach more people and get your content seen by more people. In addition, hashtags can also help with SEO. Hashtags can help your content show up in search results, and they can also help you get more followers.
A viewer can also follow just a specific hashtag, and their feed will be filled with content that has that hashtag. For example, someone with interest in photography can follow #photography, and they will be able to see content even from creators that they do not know.
Hashtags serve the same or a similar purpose on TikTok and are one of the most effective ways to get more eyes and engagement on the content you are posting. However, there are a few key differences between Instagram and TikTok hashtags.
Whether you use 3 or 30, a consistent hashtag strategy is still one of the most effective routes for growth on social media, so figure out what works best by testing hashtags on your account and digging into your analytics.
Do you have a question about hashtags I didn’t answer in this post? Leave it in the comments below!