Category Archives: SEO and Hashtags

Hashtags and Facebook

Facebook is getting harder to manage due to the ever-changing algorithms. This makes it really hard for you to make your small businesses visible to your followers if you’re not paying for ads.

One of the ways to help with your organic reach is to use hashtags as they can help you improve your content’s engagement.  

Why do hashtags help small businesses?

Here are four reasons why hashtags are worth the time and effort on Facebook:

  • Posts with hashtags can be found in a Facebook search. We’ve all used the Facebook search to find what we’re looking for – for example I’ve looked for old school friends using the search bar. In the same way, you can search a hashtag. So, using hashtags on your post to make them more visible is going to help your reach.

    Using relevant hashtags will help you with your visibility – for example, a local hashtag such as #scentedcandlesswindon, can help your local visibility for scented candles. Or if you use a hashtag such as #smallbusinessweek2024, someone looking for that could come across your page.

    The people searching hashtags may not all have a genuine interest in your type of business, but if they do, they’re likely to look at your page and content.
  • If you are using other social media channels, such as X or Instagram, and running a particular campaign, or talking about a particular product or service, using hashtags on that channel, add them into your post on Facebook to keep your channels consistent. You can use the hashtag IN the post, not just at the end, so long as it is relevant. For example, if I’m doing a marketing post about Small Business Week, I could incorporate it in my post – ‘Good morning. The week is #smallbusinessweek2024, so today I’m going to talk about …….’ You get the idea.
  • Hashtags can also help to create a community on Facebook. If you share or create a unique hashtag, you can find people who have the same interests or who are in the same group as you.

    Using your own unique branded hashtag on Facebook can also increase the visibility of your business, such as the one I use #cindymobeymarketing (which is also the URL of my website). This also makes it easier for people to find relevant related content.
  • If you host an event or regularly host events, creating a unique hashtag for that event can give people an easy way to stay updated on that event. You can also do posts about the event using your own branded hashtag for your business.   

How do you know which hashtags are good for your posts?  

To decide which hashtags are good to use for your business and your posts, you need to know that it’s relevant and popular before you use it. You can do this by:

  • Checking which hashtags your followers and customers use. This means they will relate to you and if they’re searching a hashtag they regularly use, your content could pop up.
  • Use Facebook’s recommendations – when you are scheduling posts, as soon as you start to type a hashtag, you’ll get a drop down menu that will give you variants of what you’ve typed and the volume for each of those hashtags, so you’ll be able to see which ones are popular – try and use a mix of volumes.  
  • Look at your competitor’s posts on their Facebook business pages and see what hashtags they use. They might have great engagement partly because of the hashtags they use, so you can add some of them to your list. This is not stealing their ideas, it’s just doing competitor analysis, which is all part of social media marketing.

Facebook hashtag best practice

Here are a few extra tips for Facebook hashtag best practice.

  • Use hashtags in sentences. For example, if you were sharing information about an event you’re attending, such as a night market, you’ll be doing a post about that. Instead of writing ‘This weekend you can find us at Makebelievemarket on Saturday #makebelievemarket’ – use the hashtag in the sentence, ‘This weekend you can find us at #makebelievemarket on Saturday. It looks tidier and incorporates the hashtag into your sentence.
  • Don’t use spaces in hashtags. For example, you would use #makebelievemarket – NOT #Make Believe Market – as only the first word after the hashtag will count and it will be a completely different one – and not relevant to what you’re talking about!
  • Don’t use too many hashtags. It is recommended to only use up to five hashtags on Facebook posts. If you have too many, it can confuse the algorithm as hashtags act as keywords to help people discover your posts. Using fewer hashtags is also easier for you analyse which ones work best for you, as not so many to look at.

    That’s not more than five in the whole post, including any you use in the sentences too.
  • Make sure the hashtags you use are relevant to your content and your business. This seems obvious but a lot of people use hashtags for days of the week, for example #throwbackthursday. If your post is about a happy memory or a throwback of a previous product that you remember fondly, it’s relevant. If you’re writing about a new product or something irrelevant, it won’t help you with engagement if your post is found on that hashtag and that person is searching for #throwbackthursday.     
  • Check your privacy settings. If the settings on your Facebook business page is set to followers only, then you’re wasting your time using hashtags, as you need your setting to allow non-followers to view your content. All my settings on my business Facebook page are set to ‘public’ so anyone can see anything I post. Ensure that your posts are ‘public’ too.

    Please note: If you’re using your personal profile page to test your hashtags, you’ll need to make your posts ‘public’ manually.  

Measuring your hashtag use  

You can measure how your hashtags are doing by looking at your ‘Insights’ on Facebook.

  • Go to your insights and click on ‘posts.’
  • You’ll see a breakdown of your engagement rate, type of post and total reach for each post.
  • Now, it won’t give you hashtag performance, so you’ll need to work through your posts and data to find out whether your Facebook posts with hashtags work better than those without (so some testing to do), and over time you’ll be able to see which posts with a particular set of hashtags work better than other sets – again this will be through trial and error, and a bit of insight research

At first you may not see that much difference in results because you won’t have used a particular hashtag enough for it to build a connection between the hashtag and your page/business. This is another reason why fewer hashtags are easier to manage – you won’t know the results if you use shed loads!  

I hope this has helped in understanding how hashtags can work for you and your business on Facebook.  It might seem complicated, but once you get going, it will become second nature.

As always, if you need any help, feel free to message me on Facebook @cindymobeymarketing or email me cindymobey@outlook.com

Other blog posts I’ve written about hashtags include:

Are hashtags still viable in 2024

Hashtags FAQ 

Hashtags FAQ

If you run your own small business, you probably use social media sites to promote your products or services. We all know that Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is important in promoting your website and blog content, but what about HASHTAGS? Do they help?

What are hashtags?

Originally hashtags were used to help filter and organise conversations on Twitter, but they are now used on all social media platforms. A hashtag is the sign # followed by a phrase such as marketing, so would be #marketing. It’s a category that posts relating to that subject can be streamed into; anyone can use it for their content, be it a blog post, Instagram or Facebook post.

How can I use hashtags on social media?

A really easy way to get started is by using popular hashtags. One hashtag that I see regularly on Facebook and Instagram is #throwbackthursday or #tbt. This is used as a weekly theme by some Facebook groups where people and brands share posts, or experiences from the past. For example, they may post their first ever product.

There are different hashtags depending on what niche your business is in. For example if you are in the fitness business, you might use #fitnesstips #fitinspiration or #gymspiration to name a few….or if you are in marketing, you could use #marketingtips #marketingstrategy. There are thousands to choose from and research on what are the best hashtags for you to use for your business is crucial. If you go into Instagram and click on the search icon, you can type in a hashtag you think would suit your business – for me it might be #marketingtips. Then that hashtag group comes up, with hundreds of the most popular posts that have used that particular hashtag. Doing your research in this way can help you to decide which hashtags to use (if you are a small business with a small to moderate following, you don’t want to use a hashtag that has over a million posts, as your post is unlikely to be ranked under that hashtag. I try to stick to a variety, some that are under 50k – some 50k-100k – some 100k-500k and then others that are over 500k posts up to 1 million.

How many hashtags should I use?

How many you use depends on what social media platform you are posting on.

  • X (formerly Twitter) allows space for hashtags, but advise using no more than two.
  • Facebook advises using between three and five.
  • Instagram – you can use up to 30 hashtags, but most accounts use around the 10 mark. It’s up to you – I tend to stick to between 3 and 5.
  • TikTok don’t really advise hashtags as they can look spammy, but if you do, no more than three to five – but they should be used with purpose.
  • LinkedIn advises a maximum of three per post.
  • Pinterest state you can use up to 20 hashtags per Pin description, but it is advisable to use no more than 10.

So what do hashtags do for my business?

Hashtags are a great way to build your brand, boost a marketing campaign or sales campaign, and launch a competition or to just keep in touch with your target audience.

Using hashtags on Instagram and Facebook can really increase awareness of your business and engagement with you and your products/services.

They are an effective way to build your brand, for example use them to launch new products/services, share your promotional material or for just generating interest in what you do.

Hashtags are also great for creating a buzz with your website, spreading news and information about new products, events that you’re involved in or just creating hype for your business.

How do I find the right hashtag words?

It really is as simple as putting a search into Google. Just type in ‘popular hashtags for XXXXX’ whatever business you’re in – fitness, food, crafts, artist, and so on… a list of hashtags will come up. If you are using them on Instagram, as soon as you type the first hashtag, you will also see a list of other similar tags which you can also use. Try and avoid really long hashtags. When writing posts using hashtags, don’t forget to put links to your website as this will encourage more traffic.

Can hashtags help me find my target audience?

Yes, they can! For the purpose of this question, I’m going to talk about Instagram.

When you’re posting for your particular niche or business, you need to find the keywords that will be specific to your business. So, a generic term like ‘photographer’ or ‘blogger’ just won’t cut the mustard. You need people to be able to find out more about you, so for example on my Instagram account, I will post #marketingincharente as I am a Marketing Consultant and I live in the Charente…you get the idea! Or if you are a café, you could specify something on your menu, #fullenglishbreakfast and maybe the town you’re in. It’s more specific.

Being specific is what will help your target audience find you.

How should I use my hashtags?

Use a mix of hashtags on your posts to give yourself the best chance of being discovered and getting ranked on that particular hashtag. Here are some examples of the kinds of hashtag categories you can use:

  • Your industry – #smallbusiness #handmadebusiness
  • What you sell – #candles #babyclothes #smallbizmarketing
  • Your specialty – #vegancandles #naturalfabrics #marketingtips
  • Who wants to buy – #homedecor #babyshower #socialmediastrategy
  • Location – #candleslondon #babyclothesuk #marketingcharente
  • Event hashtags – #mothersday
  • Daily hashtags – #manicmonday #throwbackthursday

    The reason you use all these different types of hashtags is to keep your content in view for as long as possible. The most popular will bring a brief flurry of activity, then the moderately popular hashtags will kick in and your content will stay active on those for a few hours. Then your more niche specific hashtags will be noticed.

    Of course, you will also receive activity from your followers, so you are still reaching out to your existing potential customers, as well as new ones.

    Can I set up my own hashtag?

    The simple answer is ‘yes, you can!’

    But, there is a but! You cannot legally own a hashtag. If you find one that hasn’t been used, which will take a lot of research, you can register it. However, even registering the hashtag will not stop other people from using it – it’s not like owning a website domain. Registering just means you’ve staked a claim to that hashtag and adds you to the hashtag directory, where you can go into a bit more detail as to what the hashtag is for…you can write a description.

    How do I register my hashtag? 

    Once you have found a new hashtag relevant to your business, you can register it on sites like Hashtags.org

    As soon as you have registered it, use your hashtag ALL THE TIME! Use it a lot…as much as you can! At first you will be the only one using it, but after time you will find others using it for articles, posts or blogs that talk about the same subject.

    Do hashtags help with SEO?   

    Again, the simple answer is ‘yes’. Hashtags are basically keywords, so they help you to categorise your content and help social media users to find it. Using hashtags in your social media posts will give you more opportunities to have your content in Google search results.

    Finally, just be aware that hashtag use varies greatly with each social media platform so you need to be mindful of which platform you’re on!

    Happy Hashtag Hunting! Let me know how you get on, and if you find hashtag research all a bit overwhelming, give me a shout and I can help you with your hashtag strategy.