You’ve just done your hashtag research and created many gorgeous sets of promising hashtags, all well-tailored and matching your niche. Ta-dah!
You’re ready to start using them to attract new followers and potential customers to your business. You have a bunch of bulletproof choices, and you’re going to use this power, along with your awesome content.
First of all – a smart move, good for you! With its engaged audience (at the moment, more than one billion monthly active users – according to official data, and Statista platform), a wide range of different user personas, and features like Reels, Instagram Stories, and Lives, you have so many opportunities to attract and interact with your ideal audience.
But, wait, wait. Hold up.
Questions may start crowding in with the Instagram landscape wide open right before you. As a result, new doubts may start creeping in.
When should you use these hashtags? How often? Even better question – you see many Instagram creators posting the same set of hashtags multiple times, sometimes dozens of times – how often should you change your hashtags? And how many hashtags should you use per post?
This is the evergreen question. The thing is, the honest answer probably isn’t what you want to hear:
It depends. However:
If you’re a newbie and have a small account, the key is to make your profile as discoverable as it can be. And hashtags are here to help, so don’t underestimate their power. Every hashtag = your chance to attract a totally new group of people. Kick off with as many relatable hashtags as you can – sure, quality over quantity, but if you can find 30 well-tailored hashtags, then use them!
But that’s just the short answer, to put it in a nutshell.
Let’s dive deeper into all the hows and whys so you can get the most out of the hashtags’ power. Let’s go!
There is the golden rule: keep ’em, and use them – as many as you can (as long as they’re accurate and well-researched), and people will find you and stick with you.
Each Instagram hashtag works as a keyword that you can use to help the ‘Gram identify your content and make it much easier for users to know what your post is about. Side benefit? Hashtags can be valuable tools in establishing the topic and relevance of your regular posts or Reels! That’s why you need to select your hashtags wisely to correctly classify your posts so that they will be found by the right audience – your target followers.
Instagram is home to billions and billions of different posts and Reels, with that number growing exponentially on a daily basis! Needless to say, to make sure your ideal followers actually see what you’re posting, you need to use hashtags, and if you can find 30 good ones every time you post – excellent! More is more, at least when it comes to well-targeted hashtags.
Is there any magic formula, a well-kept secret about the most optimal ratio, or some other insider secret-sauce knowledge you can employ to help your profile grow and get seen by the people you try to attract? Can you Harry Potter the heck out of Instagram?
I WISH! If only!
Instead, look carefully at the hashtags you choose. As I said before – every single hashtag is a new chance to attract people from your target audience. That’s why I would recommend using 30 hashtags every time you can. It doesn’t necessarily have to be 30 – this rule is not that strict, don’t you worry. If you can find 25-28 good ones, that’s totally okay. You don’t have to use 30 hashtags just for the sake of using 30.
Every business and every profile is different, with different marketing goals, target audiences, means, and approaches. What works for other creators may not suit you and who you want to attract, but hashtags are a universal helper; they’re a tool for every profile and business.
Some trending hashtags become outdated pretty quickly, that’s why it’s such a good practice to do hashtag research at least once a month.
“Why SO OFTEN?” you may want to ask.
Well, that’s what brings the best results for my clients and for me, so I always recommend updating your hashtags every 4-5 weeks – because it WORKS, and it’s always the most crucial reason for me. Don’t forget you can also outsource your hashtag research a bit – for example, you do it with the IQ Hashtags Search Hashtag feature – that’s the most optimal choice. That way, it will take you up to 5-10 minutes, and you’ll gain this clarity and confidence that your new hashtags are the ones you truly need.
Instagram wants freshly baked, early morning apple pies, tasty as hell, and still hot from the heat. Likewise, they want your content to be valuable, up-to-date, and trending. They do not want your day-old, stale apple pies – that’s why you need trending hashtags, to keep delivering the best content and make sure your target audience sees it when it’s still hot!
Naturally, to make your fresh content seen, you must choose the best trending hashtags for your niche in the first place.
My personal research showed me that when you update your hashtags once a month and add some fresh trending ones every time you do so, your posts perform better than posts without trending hashtags (yes, that’s the critical takeaway).
On the ‘Gram there isn’t such a thing as overtagging (overhashtagging to be exact, right). So you can use 30 hashtags every time you post – and there’s no need to worry, that it will be TOO MUCH. No way! Hashtags are yours to use, and the platform allows you to use up to 30 – so why would you give up on this chance?
The only thing you need to keep in mind is to make sure that your hashtags don’t mislead Instagram users: having random and inaccurate hashtags can increase your bounce rate, and users can report your content as SPAM (and we don’t want that, so good hashtag research is really worth it).
Essentially, hashtags on the ‘Gram are carefully chosen tags and keywords, telling the algorithm and platform users what your content is about. You can assign hashtags to each post as you post them on the platform. Then, as people use hashtags to search out different posts and Reels as well, the Instagram algorithm will scan hashtags to help determine what results to show off!
So, yeah, we need hashtags to categorize and organize content, draw attention to it, promote, and connect with the target audience. Using Instagram hashtags gives your posts a significant boostand organic promotion, right off the bat! That’s truly powerful.
Instead of only showing your posts to your current followers, you’re opening up the floodgates to all the potential followers who are already looking for what you’re sharing. For example, if you use the hashtag #carrotcaketutorial, your post will join the other posts under that same hashtag. The idea is that if someone is looking to learn how to bake a delicious carrot cake with a simple recipe when they search “#carrotcaketutorial”, your post will populate under that hashtag.
Side benefit: if you’re using trending hashtags, your Reels (and regular posts as well) can also be pulled into relevant Discovery pages for millions of users to discover.
Still have some lingering burning questions over how many hashtags should you use? Here we go! I’ve gathered answers to common ones on the most optimal number of hashtags, hashtag research, and hashtag collection updates frequency.
Don’t start hair-pulling. Not yet. Repeat right after me: quality over quantity.
These days, Instagram prioritizes trending, high-quality posts with mega-relevance to the ‘Gram users. That means it’s far better to post 3-4 times a week, more awesome content versus 2 times a day but mediocre posts, just for the sake of posting.
Coming up with new posts ideas isn’t as straightforward as it seems. You have to research best practices for pleasing your target audience and the Instagram algorithm while balancing your own creativity and content strategy in the mix. Create user-friendly posts. Keep on providing value, and you’re already way ahead – you don’t have to post two times a day.
And when it comes to 30 hashtags – if you’re able to find 30 GOOD, RELEVANT ONES – that’s gorgeous. But remember that research is the key.
There are no universal, “one fit all” best hashtags to use on the ‘Gram. Instead, I would focus on choosing hashtags that match the topic of your posts, so your target audience can find you. This way, users that are looking for content around that topic will be able to discover your profile which leads to a more targeted and engaged community.
As I said before – every hashtag gives you a totally new opportunity to reach a different group of people. I believe that what @creators truly meant in their article is that the quantity of hashtags doesn’t matter as much as the relevancy to the content.
Generally, most posts should have 25-30 hashtags, but it’s better to use fewer, than to use 30 random ones!
Be sure to include the hashtags that are the best descriptors to make it easy for your target audience to find your posts and for the Instagram algorithm to understand its contents. Continue to monitor how successful your hashtag sets are performing and adjust them as you learn more about what gives the best results.
And let’s end today’s article with these wise words:
Remember: Growth looks different for everyone.
So does Instagram hashtag research.
I hope that you got some value from this! Please like or share this Instagram lesson, especially if you know somebody who should read it. I share a lot of this information for free because I rely on word of mouth to reach people!
If you’ve got any questions or doubts, let me know down below. I’m here to help.
PS. Some time ago someone from our community asked me about the Instagram photo editing process, and presets I personally recommend – and SPOILER ALERT – I will spill the tea, and reveal all the parts of the process I use in the upcoming post. For now: I’m testing new Lightroom Instagram presets – have you heard about them? I find them pretty cool – hopefully we will analyze them in our next post!
