Three ways Hashtags Boost your Business Visibility
Business visibility is crucial to success. How can anyone buy from you if they don’t know you exist. It’s an ongoing process and there are so many elements to creating visibility; it comes from your branding, your marketing, Your PR (how you interact in person) and your customer reviews and what they say about you.
To make your business visibility most effective you need to be visible to the right people by being in the right places and be memorable so that your message stays in the mind of your ideal client. There are so many ways to influence and achieve good visibility but for the purpose of this blog we are going to focus on how Hashtags can help with this.
Before I go any further, I want to mention that Hashtags can be used on many platforms, but each platform has its own etiquette. For example, Instagram loves them and allows up to 30 per post. Whereas Facebook (owned by the same people) doesn’t like them on mass and using more than a couple in a Facebook post can really put people off. It gives the impression your content isn’t being made platform specific. So do please bear this in mind when implementing these tips, pick your quantities carefully to maximise your impact.
When hashtags are clicked on or searched for, people are taken to all other content using that tag so they need to be put with content that is relevant otherwise you are leading your audience on a wild goose chase and that will lose your credibility. People click on hashtags that interest them; be it something they find intriguing, interesting or that they can relate too. This takes me to my biggest tip for hashtag usage.
Tip #1
Hashtag choices need to be done in the mindset of your customer not you and you from inside your business. Find hashtags your ideal client is interested in, what are they searching for that is in your content caption or images. It doesn’t always need to be business related to be a common shared point. If in your image you’re wearing Handmade jewellery and your ideal client has similar style use the hashtag about that piece. You can get talking to or noticed by your ideal client when your shopping for the same items!
Here is the bracelet that comes to mind for my example: #handmadejewellery
This indirect use of hashtags to attract and engage can take time and consistency to work so pick a hashtag you have in common with your audience. You will need to show up in that hashtag with relevant content to build a connection with people.
Tip #2
Using the hashtag to describe your caption and content. We know the hashtags need to be relevant to the post they attach too but when your adding hashtags in this way remember Tip 1! Think of what your followers will search for not what you think of it as. This is especially important if like me you’re a service provider. If I use a hashtag like #virtualassistantuk all I attract is attention of other VA’s as opposed to #smallbusinessadmintips would have a much better response.
Using demographic hashtags work well too as it picks up another point you have in common with your potential ideal client so again in my online world #ukvirtualassistant is OK but #bristolbusinesssupport speaks more directly to my audience and as a smaller niche hashtag it’s easier to stand out and get noticed.
A location image to tie in the location hashtag, image from Photo by Martyna Bober on Unsplash
Tip #3
Like most situations, variety is the spice of life!
I know I was talking about consistency earlier but trust me you can, and you need to achieve both with hashtags, stay with me.
Sticking with Instagram for a minute. You can use up to 30 hashtags per post on your feed. That’s a lot of options for search points for your ideal client to find you. Your very unlikely to use the same 30 on every post because each post is different, they wouldn’t all be relevant so here is where the variety comes in. My #handmadejewellery wouldn’t be used with an image where I wasn’t wearing it so then I replace it with a relevant one to the image I am using. This brings in the variety and catches the eye of someone who may not use #handmadejewellery. Therefore, getting your content in front of a different potential client who shares a different interest with you.
I think of it a bit like a math problem at this point. If you had 200 hashtags in your #bank you have an enormous number of different combinations of 30 you can use (I checked the math it was a lot of 0’s). There will some overlaps obviously, and each overlap is building consistency, but each difference adds variety. The benefit is you know you are reaching more than just your already loyal fan base who know you already.
If you feel like your engagement is always coming from a similar crowd you probably want to expand your hashtags; why not join my brainstorming session on 3rd July and let me and the rest of the group help you!