Hashtag 101: How To Choose the Best Hashtags for YOU!

1. Intro: Hey, everyone. And welcome to my skill share course. In case you don't know me, my name is Sylvia and I am a virtual assistant and a social media manager from Portugal. Um, and this is my course all about Hashtags. It's called hashtag guano one. How to choose the best hash sticks for you. I actually ran this course as a challenge on my instagram YouTube and broadcast throughout the month of February. Ah, and I thought you would do really well as a course. That's why I'm turning it into a course right now that you're watching. Um, I also have a previous course on skill share, all about how you can become a virtual assistant, or it could be applied to any other kind of freelancer through a pork. And after I'm done with this course, I'll film a follow up course. That one is an entry level kind, of course, and I'll film another one that guides you through filling out your profile and the best things to put in each detection. And I've also gotten requests to do a course that I'm also going to work on after all, about how you can bid for projects on a pork, so those are coming soon. So follow me if you're interested in seeing those when they come out. But this one is all about Hashtags. I'm really passionate about Hashtags. I could talk about the mole day. I'll try to keep this concise eyes. Um, and if you have any questions, either throughout the whole course or at the end, let me know in the comments, and I'll do my best to respond to you. So, yeah, that's freedom, much it, and I'll see you in the next lesson. 2. Disclaimer: all right. So before we get into the meat of the course, I wanted to just do a quick disclaimer here, Um, hashtag research specially with the tips and tricks I'm going to give you. Um, it's something that's pretty simple, but it is time consuming, and that's why I offer it as a service to my clients. But you can also d i y it. And that's what this course is all about, of course, So you can learn how you can do it yourself. Um, but please know that these rules and best practices that I'm going to share with you on this cores like everything with social media, it's not an exact science, and it will. It can. And it will change over time. So, yeah, just get that in mind. But I hope you learn something with the scores and that you implemented and also that you share on the project on this course. I'd love to see you. You guys is Hashtags. And I love to see you succeed overall. So that's going to the next Listen 3. What are hashtags all about?: So let's start from the beginning, shall we? What are hashtags really all about? Why should you use them on your posts? And what will they give you in return? So I don't know if you're familiar with platforms such as etc or YouTube. Um but you basically, in those platforms you use tax to index your content and tell the platform what it's all about. And what they give you is that they give you more visibility and help put your contents in front of your ideal audience. That's what happens when you use a hashtag on instagram. Ah, given that you use the correct hashtags for you and I'll help you with that later on the course. But basically what I'm talking about is that if you take a photo of a cat and you use hashtag dog, that won't really help you get in front of your ideal audience. Some people that like dogs, may like the full o of your cat, but you definitely want to use the correct hashtags for you and I'll talk to you about why you want to do that later. Um, but basically Hashtags work as the S CEO of Instagram Paseo Search engine optimization is what's used to optimize your content so it could be shown in search results such as Google or even at sea. Um, and on Instagram, you can actually search for hashtags. So if someone is searching for a hashtag, you want to be able to read for it, whether that is on the recent step or ideally in the recommended tab, and we'll also talk about that later on a course. So basically, hash size will help your content be shown to more people. Um, those people get that can find your content through hashtags are either searching for the hashtag on instagram. You can just like you would with a Google search you concert for hashtags on Instagram or people that are following that hashtag because you can actually follow the hashtags that you like, and they'll be shown in your feet. Okay, so you can use up to 30 hashed expert posts and there's contradictory information here, but I personally recommend you use the 30 if you can find 30 relevant hashtags. If you can only find 20 good hashtags. I think that's better than using 30 crappy ones, but I'll give you some tips that will help you find the 30 Hashtags every time. But basically the thought behind us it is that you if you use the 30 hashtag x, you'll have 30 opportunities to be found for that continent. And if you only use turn 20 then you're missing out on 10 opportunities. So I've I'll talk to you about what you should dio. But I want to start out with what you shouldn't dio So you shouldn't use the same 30 hashtags all the time. So if you want to do some hashtag research today and you come up with a group of hashtags of 30 hashtags, you don't just want aflac those into your next 100 posts and call it a day. What that will do is they'll actually Instagram sees that SPM and they'll they will hurt your rankings overall. So you don't want to do that? Also using hashtag there are two big I have a lesson totally dedicated to this, so I won't get into much detail here. But basically this is something I see many people do and it's a nisi mistake to make if you don't know the thought behind it, but actually hashtag are big like I like to give the example of hashtag blows. That hash tag has billions of posts, and instead of putting you in front of more people, it will actually you'll be competing with one point. I think it's 1.7 billion posts, so you definitely don't want to go that way. And also like a talked about before. You don't want to use hashtags that aren't relevant to you or your audience. Sort of content. I'll give you my hashtag formula later on another lesson as well. But basically, people that are following a surfed in hashtag can actually report your content. Ah, and say it's not relevant for that hashtag and like using the same 30 hashtags all the time . That will actually also hurt your rankings on Instagram, and you definitely don't want to get on their bad side. So avoid these three and he should be fine 4. Let's analyze your hashtags: So now let's analyze your hashtags If you're not currently using Hashtags. Well, of course, you can skip the Segars exercise. Um, but if you are, and if you have a business account, you actually need to have a business account in place to do this exercise. So you who don't I'd recommend you go switch to one, because it actually gives you some helpful insights. Oral, Um, but if you have a business account and if you've been using hashtags on your posts, let's continue with this exercise. So you want to click, go to your feet and click on the post that you want Analyze for your hashtags, and people should be fine. And you can do this with as many posters you want. Um, in the workbook that I gave you on this class and skill share, you can down a little bit down there. Um, but I think I give you the place to do this for three posts, which is a good number. But if you want to do it for more, feel free to track your results. And also, if you want to track your results before and after taking the course, that should give you some good insects as well, but basically want to click on the post in your feet and then go at the bottom of your image. You can see view insights. Click that and you'll be shown this part on your screen, which says you have a searcher number of likes a certain number of comments. These are the shares, and these are the saves, which are the new the new likes some people have been calling it. Um, they also help Instagram that servant your content is good, So if you want to create, say, verbal content, that's cool. That's what Instagram is all about now. So you wanna after you see this little screen, you want a scroll, so scroll until you see the discovery sections and then look at the impressions. So, like I show you here after you scroll, you'll see this. You have reached a certain number of accounts and then you see the impressions, and then you'll see how many people came from Hashtags as opposed from the home feet or G. Explore page, and that's what you want to track down on your workbook. You can go now and download the workbook in this course. And then, like I said, you can do that now and again after you complete. The scores are a couple months from now, and that should be interesting. And you can. And should I recommend you, Charite and the project for this class? I'd love to see it. So whether you print the workbook and take a photo of it or you, what I like to do is I feel it out on my bed so you can take a screenshot, uh, and share it on project. 5. The "minimalism" of hashtags: so hopefully you completely lack first exercise and you shared it in the class project. Ah, and now we're into the minimalism of Hashtags. And now I don't mean that you use five out of the 30 hashtags that instagram Let's you use again. Like I said before, I do recommend you use all the 30. Um, just not any 30. Okay, you shoot. And I mentioned this before a swell. You should stay away from the bigger hashtags. And I believe I used the example of hashtag love and I also will to use it later on the scores. But big hash tag doesn't like never equals big visibility. It's actually the opposite. Um, and the smaller that your account is, the smaller the hashtag use should be. Because what you want to dio is you want to neech down from that those big hashtags, what you can do and I'll teach you how to do later is you can use the be cash tags as guidelines to find the smaller ones, the niche hashtags. And that's what I'm teaching you on this part of the lesson. But Sylvia what? Why are big hashtags bed like some people think that if they use hashtag love like it has so many people looking at it right so they will see my content. More people will see my content. It's not really it doesn't work that weight. With the example of hashtag love, you'll be competing with X 1,000,000 off boasts now. In the case of Hashtag Love, it's actually billions of boats on the hashtags, so you definitely that won't help you in any way, shape or form. What will happen of apart from you being competing with millions and billions of posts is that you'll have such a short window of time to be noticed in bag recent sap. So if people are looking at the posts that were post recently on that hash tag, they will see your content for like minutes, if not seconds. So your chances of being from are definitely really short. So with smaller hashtags as opposed to big hashtags, you'll be found over a longer period of time. Whether that is funny, 30 50 minutes, or even hours or even days, depending on how small you go with hashtag now, you also don't want to go for a hash tag. Did no one ever uses and the one will ever look at. But even those hashtags with hundreds or thousands of posts can be good for you, depending on the case, and you'll also using smaller hashtags. You'll be much more likely to show up in to recommend the tab and, like that, talks about before this is actual gold, especially for smaller accounts. Um, so let's do this. Eggs or size. Let's evaluate hashtag glove. So, like I said, it currently has 1.7 billions of posts. These are the number of posts that you're competing against for people's attention when you're using hashtag love. So like I shouldn't be. I shouldn't need to tell you anything else after this for you to see that hashtag love and other hashtags are a bad idea. And but continuing on if you go to the recent SAB of hashtag love. So this one here. If you go there, you can click on one of the photos I clicked on the ninth photo and you'll see that it was posted minutes or even seconds ago. In this case. It was posted 37 seconds ago when I took this photo, and that is the window of time that you have to be seen, uh, in search. Now, people can scroll of it on that half. Say that they won't go that for. So you'll get five minutes maximum, uh, to be seen with that hash tag. 6. How to find niche hashtags?: now, how can you find those needs hashtags that I'm talking about? I for this one I didn't used except look, because that's quite a bit too big and what it would take a longer amount of time to niche down from that. But you can also start from hashtag love. But for this example, I started from hashtag virtual assistant, which is a hash tag that I would be interested in using. But it's quiet a bit too big for me, this hash tag as 589 K posts, which is a bit too many for a smaller account. So how can you find those Nishi Hashtags you see here the related hashtags those horror where you can find the nature hash ties. So I went into the virtual assistant hashtag and I found the hash tag that said Virtual assistant for hire. Now this one sounded pretty interesting to me, so I clicked on it, and with my C, it has 30.4 k pose. So compared to the 500 K posts, that's so much, so much better for me. So I decided to use that for my own posts, and it will give you much better odds to be found and to rank for that hashtag. So now it's homework time again. So go back to your workbook and bake a post. It could be the same post as you did before, or it can be a different posts. And I want you to pick that post. Look at the hashtags you use. Now again, this has to be both to use Hashtags on. Um and I want you to write them all down. I give you in the workbook 30 slots so you can fill it up with this many hashtags that you're using. Don't worry. If you're only using 15 you can just Philip 15 slots but writes them all down on the left column and then try to find a nature hashtag for each of the hashtags that you're using. So I see you're already using one or two new shash eggs. Just copy them into the right volume. No need to find uneven nature, hashtag, but if you're using a bigger hashtagged with hundreds 100,000 boasts or with millions of posts, try to find a new sure hashtag and write it down on the right column. And don't forget again to take a photo of our screenshots of that page and share it with us on the project on skill share. So yeah, Go do that. And I'll wait for you on the next lesson. Talk to you, then. 7. What hashtags should YOU use?: So we've been through. We've covered what Hashtags are really for and why you should use them also. Why you should focus on smaller Hashtags as opposed to bigger Hashtags. But now you're wondering. Well, I know I should use 30 Hashtags and I know they should be small, but how do I choose them? I mean, Durst, plenty of them out there right now, I'm going to give you the hashtag formula that I like to use both for my own posts and some of my clients posed. As I told you before, I do offer this as a service hashtag research and hashtag groups. So I've tested its south on many different accounts. And why I like to do is I divide the 30 hashtags into three different categories and a little bit more in detail about each of those in the following slides. But basically I pick 10 hashtags are are about you in your business, then can hashtags about your ideal client. And in this case, if you haven't done enough market research and you don't know your ideal client that well, I'd recommend you do that first and then come back to this or do this exercise on this lesson and then do the market research and go back to it and redo your hashtags. Nothing set in stone right then, the less than hashtags. I like to do them about the Post's itself. So the hashtags about you should tell Instagram and whoever is looking at your content, what do you dio? What business are you win? What do you help your ideal client with? And what's your offer? Are you offering something right now? What's it all about? So some of these examples I took them from my own account. So I use I've used before social media managers, Etsy sellers and virtual assistant for higher. That's the one we found before in Nisshin. Down your hashtag X now hashtags about your ideal client. If you know them while what do they dio? What rd hobbies? What do they like to did in their spare time? Now, if you're a location based business, what's your location? Where are your client sets? I'm personally not a location based business, so I skip this part. But if you are, that's really important you included in your hashtags and what hashtags does your ideal quien cues in their posts. And what has tags do they hang out on what Hashtags are there searching for? What? Already following all of that. Some of the examples I use here are etc. Social makers and thinkers. I really like this one for some reason. And so for ownership, the less 10 Hashtags, the one about your constants. So you should think about on this ones. Are you posting a video? You can post videos on instagram up to 16 minutes. Second. Sorry, um or maybe it's a quote, boasts an inspirational quote or isn't in infographic. These ones are perfect for that terrible content. Um, you should definitely throw some infographic since your content marketing in What's the post all about? Like, Is it about hashtags? Is your post about mental health? Whatever it's all about, you should use that in your thanks. Some example examples that I've used before our instagram 101 insta advice and business help. This is an example of my own hashtags that I've used for a post before these first, then our about me in my business. These next 10 are about your ideal client and you can probably recognise here some of the examples that I told in previous slides and these last 10 are about that specific Contin. So this was opposed from the hashtag challenge that I based this course on. Actually, Now you want to change them up Like I've said before, You don't want to keep the same 30 hashtags for forever. For all your posts, You want to change them up regularly. So again, Instagram doesn't see it s pen. Now what I do recommend is that you change the 1st 2 groups. So the groups about you in your business and your ideal clients, I recommend you change those once a month if you can. And if you want to do that more regularly, that's fine. That's perfect, actually. But I do them once a month and the last group, like I said, it's specific about that continent. So you should change it with every post. Now, if you do a batch of, say, three or four posts, it's probably okay that you reuse some of the hashtags on this group, but try to change a least one or two around just again, so you don't follow into the span category. 8. Your own fillable hashtag formula: And now for the last exercise on this lesson, go grab your workbook whether you printed it or your using it teaches Italy and using the previous recommendations these Pashto groups find, try to find 30 hashtags that fit your own account. So 10 hashtag Does that describe you in your business than hash tags that describe who do you want to work for? Your ideal clients and San Hashtags? These ones you can use either a pass post or, even better, a future post that you're thinking about posting use that is inspiration for these less 10 hashtag X. That would be about your content. And again, don't forget to take a screenshot or a photo of your results and added to your project here on skills share. I'd love to see it and give you my feet back and again if you have any questions about the course or about anything, I said. Or if you have any questions that I didn't talk about in this course, feel free to ask me in the comments and I will get back to you. And also, if you have any requests for other courses about being a freelancer or about social media in general. I'm all years. I'm open to any suggestions and I'll try to make it happen if you once a surgeon course. So, yeah, that was basically it for this course. And I look forward to seeing your projects and your comments and look forward to seeing you here for my next course. Talk to you later. Bye.