7 effective ways to use hashtags and grow your audience rapidly

We all are well familiar with the term 'Hashtag'. For those who don't know, a hashtag is a tool that helps you connect and engage with a wider audience; even beyond your fans and followers. Hashtags help us increase traffic on our website, posts, videos, or photos.
But here is one thing most people miss while using hashtags for their brand and that is strategy. Many feel that the more hashtags you use, the more traffic you get on your website, which is not completely true.
Here we will cover how you can use hashtags in most effective ways to acquire better reach for your social media handles.

Story: Anshika Awasthi

Keep it simple
In the world of social media filled with millions of hashtags, always make sure you are choosing words that are easily searchable and words that people can remember. Long and complicated ones won't probably fetch you better traffic.
So the bottom line here is, always write short, simple to spell, and precise hashtags that people can easily find.

You must have seen 'trending now' hashtags on your social media timelines. Trending simply means the topics which are most popular at any given point of time.
Most of the time trending hashtags are centered on a piece of major world news or topic.
So whenever you find a trending or most talked-about hashtag, do utilise it without delay.
One more important thing that needs to be kept in mind is that, before using a hashtag, make sure it's adding value to the existing conversation.

Now, this is an interesting part! Before using hashtags, one more interesting question to understand is how many hashtags we should use. Many on social media bombard their posts with hashtags in hope of getting huge traction. But this tactic doesn't necessarily land us to the desired outcome.
Here is how many hashtags you should use for your social media handles.
Twitter: Keeping in mind the word limit, you shouldn't use more than two hashtags for your posts.
While keeping it to two is the minimum you can do, you can use more than that if you have enough space or you've more than two trending hashtags.

Facebook: Ideally, you can use two on Facebook. The trending one and the custom one.

Instagram: Instagram allows you up to 30 hashtags. You should, however, narrow it down to 11 for better reach of your posts.

LinkedIn: There is no limit to hashtags on LinkedIn. But it is recommendable to use up to five. Otherwise, the LinkedIn Algorithm could mark your post as spam.

Search before you use it

Hashtags help to create conversation and increase your brand reach.
So before using hashtags, try to check other social media as well. Make sure the hashtag you want to use hasn't been used on other social media platforms for wrong reasons.
Check if another brand is simply using hashtags for its own promotion or it is just a custom hashtag. If they are promoting themselves with their self-created hashtag, then it isn't advisable for you also to use it. There are also instances where people are saying negative things using a particular hashtag. In such cases, be a little smart and don't use it since it can backfire and wrongly impact your brand image.

Hashtags are key to brand management

The very purpose of using hashtags is to create brand engagement so that it reaches the targeted audience and allows you to engage with them. Carefully using the hashtags helps you reach a wider audience.

Using too many hashtag is a big no-no

Use your tags when it makes sense. Simply overusing hashtags for your posts leaves little impression on viewers. As we have already discussed, using one trending and one custom hashtag is sufficient. Using more hashtags means you are trying to spam your followers.
Also, avoid using hashtags for every single post and use only when they make sense.

Tools for finding hashtags

There are tools which can help you find effective hashtags for your brand.
RiteTag: It offers you instant hashtag suggestions. From suggesting trending hashtags to hashtags for Instagram and other social media platforms, offers suggestions in real-time management.

Hashtagify.me: This tool also helps you to catch hold of popular and trending hashtags.

Keyhole: Widely popular, this tool helps users track automated hashtags. You can use this tool to track URLs, usernames, keywords, and hashtags for Twitter and Instagram.