5 Hashtag Rules You Should Know
Hashtags today can either work for you or against you. It’s up to you and the way you use the hashtag rules in your social media and marketing efforts.
There are a few rules and tips you should know that will help you out when it comes to figuring out the hashtag formula. Instagram makes it difficult to be free and creative with using hashtags. The algorithm has a certain way it likes hashtags to be used, therefore you have to go by that formula. Make sense? Let’s take a look at these tips.
Here are the 5 hashtag rules you should know:
- Number of hashtags allowed. Instagram limits the amount of hashtags per post to 30, so make sure you’re using only the best and most relevant hashtags for your brand and your posts.
- Your 30 Instagram hashtags. Pick and choose them wisely! It is suggested to use hashtags that are most relevant to your brand image. Find hashtags with less than 100,000 hits for better results, specifically ones between 25,000 and 75,000 hits. Your post will have a higher chance of being reached rather than using hashtags with over 1 million hits.
- Create 2-3 sets of hashtags. Instagram doesn’t like for the same group of hashtags to be used on all of your posts. To avoid algorithm issues with this, create 2-3 different groups of hashtags to alternate onto different posts. Still use the same rules as above: 30 hashtags and less than 100k hits. Just use different hashtags that still relate to your brand. Keep these groups somewhere where you can easily grab them like a word document or a digital sticky note.
- Hashtags in comments. Put 3 rows of spaces (usually with periods) followed by your hashtag group in a comment below your post caption. You can easily do this by using one of my favorite tools for writing Instagram captions and comments.
- Hashtags in captions and bios. Your branded hashtag should always be in your Instagram bio and in all of your captions. It is best to use 3-7 hashtags in your caption (including your branded hashtag) and the others in the comment below.
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Happy Marketing! -PM Team