While hashtags can often be seen as confusing or unimportant, they are actually key elements to sharing your content and tracking the use of your brand — and the hashtags associated with it. Hashtags work as searchable keywords that enable others to locate (or even stumble upon) your public content.
But choosing the right hashtags for your social networking sites can be challenging. Sometimes simple things like making it plural or changing the organization of the words can make a big difference. Even doing your research to find a hashtag for your business can be daunting, since you want to make sure the hashtag you associate with doesn’t already have a following. Here are five tools to help you find and use hashtags.
Targeted specifically for Instagram, this app allows you to track hashtag use in real-time for a variety of subjects and categories. You can even save your searches and results for quick access. Through Leetags, you can search for hashtags related to your post subject, business, or most popular hashtags, as well as get professional tips on how to boost engagement.
If you can provide a base set of hashtags, the Hashtag Expert app can provide you the most popular ones associated with the topic on Instagram. You can even save hashtag groups for quick access, so you don’t have to waste time re-typing the same hashtags over and over. Want to see how you’re doing on hashtag engagement? You can get a Hashtag Report Card to see how these groupings perform.
Not only can you identify hashtags that are popular for a topic or subject (or just generally popular), but you can identify top influencers on Twitter and Instagram as well with Hashtagify. Through hashtag searches, this program can generate analytical data about the hashtag, and can generate others that might be relevant. Once you start building data on a hashtag or multiple hashtags, Hashtagify can track the reach and influence of it for up to eight weeks. It can even provide data on hashtags that are similar to the one you’re using — like if it’s plural versus singular.
While RiteTag has a lot of the same features as the other apps and programs mentioned, what sets it apart is its trend alerts. If you’re hashtagging around a specific subject for your brand, RiteTag will provide real-time suggestions about trends that have started within that subject. With real-time suggestions, you can see if something has gone viral that is influencing the number of views on a specific hashtag, enabling you to incorporate it and increase your engagement.
Want to know how your hashtag is being used? Keyhole can provide you information about whether your hashtag is being used in positive, negative, or neutral ways. While it’ll give you the related hashtags and keywords, it’s important to know how your already established hashtags are being used. Did someone leave you a nasty review that needs to be addressed? Or perhaps someone has raved about your newest product? It’s important to know these types of posts quickly, so you can react in a timely manner.
You’ve probably realized by now that Social Media is no longer an option. In fact, it is a vital and highly successful tool for building a business. Aliya Hammond Consulting is an online Digital Marketing, Training, and Consulting Company headquartered in the greater Philadelphia area. We specialize in Social Media Management and Marketing, Social Media Training, Blog Writing, and Graphic Design Services for small and large businesses, entrepreneurs, and non-profit organizations. If you are looking to improve or increase your online presence, you can rest assured you are in good hands with us. Contact Aliya Hammond Consulting today to find out how we can help your business grow!
