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    Hate the hashtag? Here’s why you should use them!

    Hashtags are a great tool for improving your social media presence. However there’s still a huge resistance to using the hashtag effectively. I completely understand why, you don’t want your content to look spammy. Well, let me tell you, you can use hashtags to market your content effectively without feeling as though its spam.

    We have to remember, hashtags are a crucial part of most social media channels. They have a role and are meant to be used. Its all about how you use them.

    Boosting your Content with hashtags

    We have to remember the many people use hashtags to find content that they’re interested. So when applying a hashtag to support your latest blog or social media post, you have to remember to keep it as relevant as possible to the applicable text.

    I use trello to keep a hashtags list to help support my content. These are split into categories like beauty, wellbeing, business, Cambridge etc. Depending on what the content of my instagram post or blog post, I’ll use hashtags which are related closely or loosely.

    Little tip though. Never repeat the exact same hashtag set consistently more than twice, as instagram may pick that up as spam. Also I always recommend leaving your hashtags in the actual caption of your post. If you put the hashtags in the comments, instagram may shadow ban you. You can check if you’re shadow banned here 

    Finding a conversation

    Hashtags are also useful for social listening. What are those, using the same hashtags saying? You ca use hashtags to pin point and really focus down your content. This will allow you to bring more value to your audience too. What topics are trending with that hashtag?

    Trending topic in general are also a good way to join a conversation and also show a little personality in blogging. Think about using holidays, awareness days and other current trending topics. Use the designated hashtag to start a conversation. Sometimes its not about you creating a social media post and getting those to join in. Sometimes its about responding to a conversation already happening.

    You can also follow specific hashtags on instagram and search what type of content is popular on instagram. A handy tool.

    A hashtag community

    This is another perfect example of why hashtags are useful and not spammy. People use hashtags to build an community, find people and strike up networking relationships. Take twitter chats for example. For an hour or so, a community comes together to talk about a specific topic utilising a hashtag to do so. What’s more social than that? It’s the perfect use of social media.

    So are you more comfortable with the idea of the hashtag now? Just remember pretty much everyone who is switched on about social media, will be using hashtags. If they’re not, utilising them, then they need to step up their game. One last tip; don’t hashtag every word in your posts. Especially on twitter. Just keep it to two or three and you should be good to go.

    Looking to see how you can maximise your copy on social next? Check out my favourite types of Social media copy, that are super engaging.

     

     

     

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    1 Comment

    1. Erin
      April 21, 2018 / 10:28 am

      I must admit I love the Hashtags for finding new accounts to love and follow! 🙂

      Erin || MakeErinOver

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