The Bloom Agency CEO Silvana Massolo’s Tips on How to Grow Businesses Using Instagram Hashtags
Written by Silvana Massolo, CEO at The Bloom Agency. In Partnership with New York Weekly
Everyone wants to know the secret sauce to grow their followers on Instagram. Though there are various strategies one could implement, today we are going to focus on how we may effectively use hashtags on Instagram to grow your followers and engagement (these are your likes, comments, shares, saves).
If you are a local business: Leveraging from a hashtags strategy on Instagram when you’re a local business is key to reach your ideal consumer. If you are a local restaurant – for example – you want to use local hashtags your local customers are using on Instagram. Why is this? Because general hashtags like #foodie will not help you reach them.
Let’s say you want to reach “Annie”. Annie lives in Dallas, is 35 years old and works in Downtown Dallas. She loves to discover new restaurants. She is your ideal customer. To reach Annie you need to put yourself in Annie’s shoes and reach her locally via hashtags she is either using herself or she may be using to find businesses like yours.
Here is an example: #dallasfoodie #dallasfood #dallasfoodblogger #dallassingles #dallastx #dallasfun #dallasmuseumofarts #dallasart #dallasstreetart #uptowndallas #downtowndallas. Using hashtags like #food #foodie #restaurant #newrestaurant #ilovefood #foodlover #foodporn may increase the reach of your post and potentially get some people to engage with it but it likely won’t be Annie. You may be reaching someone in Ohio or New York who is a foodie but if you’re a local business, how would that impact your success? You are looking at getting people to come to your restaurant or maybe order online next time they are hungry and don’t want to move a finger. Same approach would apply to a local sports team if they are promoting a game at home – or to a local school, bar, museum, run club, store, etc.
If you are a national brand or coach: Though local hashtags are good to reach your local customer, the reality is that what you do has no boundaries. This allows you the opportunity to use general hashtags that are tied to the topic you are advocating for. The trick is to use hashtags that are close to your niche vs. hashtags that may be too wide as these may miss the mark.
Let’s say you are a motivational speaker. However, you really focus on women who are starting their own business while also being a mom and maybe having a full-time job. Let’s call this target consumer Betty. Betty has opened her Instagram business account or maybe hasn’t yet. Maybe Betty is looking for inspiration during the 10min she has before the kids wake up or her next meeting starts.
The hashtags to reach Betty would be: #mompreneur #motivationalspeakerforwomen #bossbabe #bossbabes #womenowned #womensmallbusiness #womensmallbusinessowner #womenbusiness #latinaowned #latinaownedbusiness #womenmotivation.
Always keep your target audience in mind and put yourself in their shoes. You want to be strategic and remember that it’s not about growing but about attracting the right audience to get to know you, follow you, and engage with you.
Last but not least: Here is a hashtag tactic that works but requires some effort. Within 10-15min of your post going live on Instagram (remember to try to post every day but quality will always trump quantity) go to the search bar and type in #dallasfoodie (if you are a local restaurant) and like the posts of those…
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