Businesses and brands want to make the most out of most holidays on Social Media. They are absolutely great opportunities to build relationships, get conversions and sales…but some holidays need to be treated with respect and care. Just as you need to be careful with Social Media on Memorial Day, you need to think about the tone of voice you use on Martin Luther King Day. These aren’t your regular celebratory holidays. These are historic moments, political moments that can be polarizing…and as much as you may benefit from marketing on a day like MLK day, you run the risk of offending your audience and causing massive damage to your brand. Today, we’ll discuss MLK Day hashtags and the best way to use them on Instagram. Before we get to the discussion, take a few seconds to click copy on the list of hashtags below so you can use them on Instagram throughout the years to come.
Ok, let’s get down to business. The day that we remember one of the most revered civil rights leader is not the day you want to push sales. Just don’t. You want to tie your message into one of inclusion, peace and unity. Here are a few examples that we particularly liked.
The Ellen Show: This is a perfect post to remember and honor MLK.This message works for Ellen’s brand because it reminds her audience that it is a day to be of service, to do good for the world. It also resonates since Ellen is always speaking of equality for all on her show.
MOMA: The Museum of Modern Art crafted a post that is perfect for the audience. This historic photo shows King after winning the Nobel Peace Prize. It is a lovely way to remember him and his work, and highlights the arts at the same time.
CRAYOLA: This was not an Instagram post, it was a tweet, but it worked perfectly with the Crayola brand. It is short, sweet, and fits the spirit of their brand.
If you’re not 100% absolutely sure that your brand or business can push out a respectful MLK post on Instagram, skip the holiday. You’re better off staying quiet for a day than offending your audience, causing a stink and damaging your reputation and ROI.
How to Manage & Grow Your Instagram Account
You can’t expect to post only on major holidays and get a return on your investment. With Instagram, you need to be consistent in posting and engaging. That means you need a tool to help you and your team with the daily tasks that are required for Instagram success.
With Socialdraft you can:
Schedule Instagram Posts
Have multiple people work on various accounts
Search for posts in a particular industry and schedule reposts to your connected social networks
Socialdraft is more than an Instagram tool. It is an all-in-one Social Media Dashboard. It is the most robust and simple tool for agencies and teams to effectively handle social media. With Socialdraft you can:
Schedule posts to Facebook pages, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn Business Pages, and Pinterest Boards
Schedule posts individually, as recurring posts, or bulk upload them as CSV
Easily re-schedule with a drag & drop action
Schedule GIFs to Facebook and Twitter
Download content calendars as PDF
Engage on Twitter, Facebook, and Linkedin
Download Facebook and Twitter reports
and tons more…
If you are curious about Socialdraft and any of its features, open up a chat and ask. If you’re ready to take us for your risk-free trial, simply click here to find the perfect plan for you.
If you have ever lived in the US, you know that everyone eagerly awaits the mos famous weather man on February 2nd. His name is Punxsutawney Phil (there’s also Staten Island Chuck and Malverne Mel) and each year, this woodchuck sneaks out of his resting place. If he sees his shadow, it is said that winter will last 6 more weeks. If he does not, then Spring and warmer weather is predicted to come early. If you aren’t familiar with the holiday, I suggest you add the Bill Murray film to your Netflix queue. This alone can give you some incredible ideas for marketing during the holiday…but before you do, take a few seconds to click the copy button below the Groundhog Day Hashtags below. These are here to get you started on your Instagram marketing strategy for this so very strange holiday.
I’m not a fan of winter, so I’m not a fan of this holiday, but if you play it smart you can get a lot out of your Instagram posts. Let’s give you a brief look into the film – that may inspire a little inspiration in you.
Groundhog Day The Movie
Meteorologist Phil Connors (Bill Murray) goes to cover Groundhog Day. He gets stuck in a loop end ends up waking up to Groundhog Day – every day. Everyone repeats the same activities, but Connors is able to do whatever he wants. SPOILERS: He hates it at first, but then begins to use this time to learn tons of cool things and win the heart of Rita Hanson (played by Andie MacDowell).
Groundhog Day Hashtags & Ideas on How to Use Them
Posts About Shadows
This very simple post got more than 8,000 likes and plenty of comments. You can take inspiration from Fossil and craft a post around shadows. This would work well for almost any tangible good, but also for hairdressers, lawyers, and more. The post highlights the product but cleverly ties into the holiday. This is a win!
Bring on The Cuteness
This post works because it is simply about the holiday. Target is selling nothing but giving their audience a super cute (and very impactful) image to engage with.
Promote Your Stuff
This was a no brainer for Benjamin Moore Paints. They offer a paint color called Groundhog Day. Maybe you’re not this lucky, but there are possibilities…If you sell anything that can be related to the holiday, this is your chance? Got a clock like the one on the movie cover? Maybe you sell top hats? How about Bill Murray Tee-Shirts. Take a look through your inventory and see what you can push.
PRO TIP: “If you are a local business, make sure you incorporate geo-targeted hashtags into your Groundhog Day Instagram post so that you can be found by your local audience”
Promote YourWeather Related Products
This is a smart post and one that personalities and shops can easily be inspired by. Imagine you’re a bathing suit shop (great opportunity to push your bikinis)…or a travel agency (sell your tropical locations if he predicts more cold – and even if he doesn’t you can promote an escape until the good weather arrives…or even a restaurant (promote your warmest comfort dish if Phil predicts cold, or something super refreshing if he goes with warm weather). In this case, supplement your hashtags with industry related tags. In this case, I may have included #bikini #swimsuit and other related hashtags.
Play on the Weather
We touched on this a bit, but Groundhog Day is a perfect opportunity to promote travel and activities. Whether you push Spring or Winter is up to Phil. Check out this great post from Fort Worth Texas. They’re using it to build excitement around the Spring and sports activities for the season. Take note that they also included geo-targeted hashtags here such as #seefortworth and #fortworth.
Tips to get the most out of your Groundhog Day Hashtags for Instagram
Post Daily (or as consistently as possible)
Now that you have your Groundhog Day Hashtags, you need to start thinking strategy. You can’t expect to post only during holidays such as Groundhog Day and for that to have an effect on your business. With Instagram, it’s a consistent schedule, engagement, and love that will get you where you need to be. You can use a social media tool such as Socialdraft to schedule your Instagram posts for multiple accounts. Socialdraft also has the capability to let you assign different people to schedule these Instagram posts and to publish them when the time comes.
There is even an Instagram hashtag search. It brings up the latest pieces of content for that hashtag. From there you can schedule reposts to all your connected social networks (not just Instagram, and you can engage your community.
How to Manage Your Instagram Accounts
Socialdraft is an all-in-one Social Media Dashboard that helps you manage Instagram. It is the most robust and simple tool for agencies and teams to effectively handle social media. With Socialdraft you can:
Schedule posts to Facebook pages, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn Business Pages
Schedule posts individually, as recurring posts, or bulk upload them as CSV
Easily re-schedule with a drag & drop action
Schedule GIFs to Facebook and Twitter
Download content calendars as PDF
Find content on Instagram and easily schedule reposts not just to Instagram but to all other social networks
Engage on Twitter, Facebook, and Linkedin
Download Facebook and Twitter reports
and tons more…
If you are curious about Socialdraft, take it for a risk-free trial. You’ll get to try out all the features and decide if Socialdraft is right for you.
St. Patrick’s day may have started off as a celebration of one of the most favored Saint, but now it has become a huge marketing opportunity for all types of businesses including bars, restaurants, breweries, and – of course – any retailer that sells green apparel. Today we’ll discuss how to market your Instagram posts so they get the most organic views from the right audience, but before we get to that, take a few seconds to copy the St. Patrick’s Day Hashtags below and to save them into your smart phone so you can use them before, during, and after the holiday.
How to Use Your St. Patrick’s Day Hashtags for Instagram
Everyone’s Irish on St. Patrick’s day (March 17). You’ll see crowds of revelers dressed in green, sporting beads, and hats ready to celebrate this holiday not just in Ireland, but all over the world: Britain, United States, Canada, New Zealand, Argentina, and Australia. This is why it is important that you mix the St. Patrick’s day hashtags we gave you above with all other types of tags. The ones above are general to the holiday. These will help you get seen by tons of people and give you a chance to get into “Top Posts”. But, your business has needs and special goals. This means that the tags above are just a starting point. You need to mix those with other types of hashtags in order to actually see an ROI out of your Instagram efforts. Starting today, I want you to think of Instagram as a mini search engine and hashtags as your keywords to get found.
PRO TIP “Ignore anyone who tells you using too many hashtags is bad. Use all 30 hashtags that are allowed by Instagram so that you have more chances to be found”
Tips to get the most out of your St. Patrick’s Day Hashtags for Instagram
Before you go ahead and learn about the different hashtag combinations you need to use, we need to touch base on one thing. You can’t expect to post to Instagram only the day before St. Patrick’s day and for your business to be filled with people. Instagram requires commitment. If you expect to get a return on investment on your Instagram posts, you MUST schedule daily Instagram posts consistently, and engage and grow your audience. The Socialdraft social media calendar tool is the perfect thing to help you with this. With Socialdraft you can
schedule Instagram posts to multiple accounts
search for content by hashtag
schedule reposts of those images to Instagram and all your other social networks
AND manage your other social media accounts: Facebook pages, Pinterest boards, LinkedIn business pages, and Twitter accounts
First, you need to Post Daily
You’re busy, but you won’t be for long if your competition steals your clients. Posting to Instagram takes just a few seconds, and if you schedule your posts ahead on our social media calendar tool, you’ll never forget to post.
Engage your audience
After you publish, make a little time to engage your audience. Use the Socialdraft hashtag search tool to check out posts from people in your city, neighborhood, and state; as well as people who are engaging your competitors. Like their posts, follow them and comment on their posts. This is the best way you can earn their attention in order to convert them.
Use a Mix General Industry & St. Patrick’s Day Hashtags
When you post to Instagram you want to ascertain that you are seen by the right people, this means you need to use industry-specific hashtags. Take this example from the Black Thorn Pub. First, they are posting a post to get people prepped way ahead of time. This is incredibly smart. Then, they include industry hashtags to reach people who may actually be interested in going to the event #djtoro #gabrielwizard #pub #nightclub #nightlife #party #fun #goodtimes #dj #djlife #producer
Mix Location & St. Patrick’s Day Hashtags
Local businesses and services (such as bakers, restaurants, relailers or even doctors) need to be found by local audiences. These are the people who can convert into clients. This is why you need to add location hashtags to your St. Patrick’s Day posts. Hawaii’s Best Kitchens features eateries and restaurants in Hawaii. Sure, this post is scrumptious, but their audience is located mainly in Hawaii. Notice their use of #chocoleahawaii #manoa #madeinhawaii #mint #hawaiisbestkitchens to attract their ideal set of eyes.
Associated Brand & St. Patrick’s Day Hashtags
A great way to grow your audience is to appeal to the audience of associated brands. Gather & Gown has a gorgeous hashtag strategy. They are using a combination of hashtags that are associated to the holiday #stpatricksday #stpattysday (for those wives who are looking for a St. Patrick’s Day wedding), industry hashtags #bridesmaids #bridesmaid dress #wedding #jewelry #accessorize, and hashtags for an associated brand #sayyestothedress, a popular show that showcases women looking for a perfect wedding dress. That means that ladies who are surfing the hashtag have a chance to see this gorgeous dress.
Unique Branded Hashtags
Baileys Irish Cream is synonymous with St. Patrick’s day. For this post featuring a cocktail recipe, they go beyond using just St. Patrick’s Day hashtags. Note the hashtag #betterwithbaileys. This is their custom branded hashtag. When you click over to their hashtag, you can see that other people are creating content using their product and using their custom hashtag. This serves two purposes. First, it is proof that Social Media is pushing sales; second, it is converting that person into a brand advocate.
Socialdraft is an all-in-one Social Media Dashboard that helps you manage Instagram. It is the most robust and simple tool for agencies and teams to effectively handle social media. With Socialdraft you can:
Schedule posts to Facebook pages, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn Business Pages, and Pinterest Boards
Schedule posts individually, as recurring posts, or bulk upload them as CSV
Easily re-schedule with a drag & drop action
Schedule GIFs to Facebook and Twitter
Download content calendars as PDF
Find content on Instagram and easily schedule reposts not just to Instagram but to all other social networks
Engage on Twitter, Facebook, and Linkedin
Download Facebook and Twitter reports
and tons more…
If you are curious about Socialdraft, take it for a risk-free trial. You’ll get to try out all the features and decide if Socialdraft is right for you.
As you and million other brands and businesses are aware, the Super Bowl is a huge marketing opportunity. Today we’ll discuss your Super Bowl Hashtags for Instagram and how to use them, but before we do, you need to click thru and read why you need to be careful when marketing on Social Media during the Super Bowl. In short, the NFL has some pretty strict rules on how businesses and brands use the term “Super Bowl” and other associated terms that can land you in legal hot water. After you’ve read that article and worked out a legal Super Bowl Instagram strategy, go ahead and click “copy” to copy these hashtags and store them on your smartphone so you can use them as needed during the time before the big game. Then, read on for some great ideas on how to use these hashtags to market your business during the big football game that happens each year, the first Sunday in February (Feb 3).
Optimized Super Bowl Hashtags for Instagram and How to Use Them
The hashtags you copied above are generalized hashtags for the game. When you post, you need to supplement these with other hashtags that will help you get visibility from the audience that is related to your brand or business. The reason for this is that hashtags are to Instagram what keywords are to Google. Hashtags will help you get found, so – for example, if you are a restaurant pushing a wing deal for the event and you skip out on geo-targeted hashtags, you may get a lot of likes, but not from people who may actually come to your restaurant.
PRO TIP “Some sites and blogs will tell you to use just few hashtags. We disagree 100%. Instagram allows you to use 30 hashtags. USE THEM! They are what will help you get found.
Combine Industry Specific & General Hashtags
As briefly mentioned above, the hashtags we gave you are optimized, but they are general. You want to utilize these so that your Instagram posts are tied to the Super Bowl, but you need to narrow things down.
This example from Temblor Brewing is perfect. They’re selling beer, so although they used hashtags related to the Super Bowl, they included very specific beer related hashtags to make sure the right people are led to their posts on Instagram search: #craftbeer #crowler #beer #beerme #beergeek #beernerd #beerlife #craftbeernotcrapbeer #craftbeernerd #craftbeerlife #craftbeergeek #bier #biere #cerveza #cerveja #piwo #pivo #drinkcraft #hops #instabeer #ilovebeer #untappd
A few other examples:
If you’re in the field of sports, begin with the teams that will be playing in the game. Not just their names, but the names of their cities, games, etc. For example #CarolinaPanthers #Panthers #Broncos #DenverBroncos #PanthersVsBroncos
If you’re in arts & entertainment, then you need to include the half time act and hashtags related to them. #Gaga #Beyonce #HalfTimeShow
If you sell football Jerseys, then you should use #Jerseys #FootballJersey #FootballJerseys
Geo-Targeted Hashtags
This is especially important if you are a local business such as a bar or restaurant, a sports shop, or even a taxi service (huge opportunities here if you run promotions to deter drunk driving). If you were a local business in say Hoboken, NJ, you should incorporate hashtags such as #Hoboken #NJ (your city & state) as well as nicknames for the city #TheMileSquareCity, and cities nearby #JerseyCity. On top of this, make sure you geo-tag your post so you come up on location search as well.
Product Hashtags
There must be other brands or businesses that are related to yours. If their brand is good, you can piggyback off their reputation (and reach their audience). Take the example above. This donut shop in Toronto used Great Lakes Beer in their donut recipe. They didn’t just tag the picture with the associated brand (#greatlakesbrewery #greatlakesbrewing), they @tagged the brand. This meant that if they had not already made the brewery aware of the post, they would get a notification. If they have a smart community manager, the brewery would like and comment on the post (creating engagement and helping the Donut shop come up higher on search), and if the brewery was really smart, they would repost you giving The Rolling Pin even more exposure.
Tips to get the most out of your Super Bowl Hashtags for Instagram
You’re prepared now. We’ve given you a list of optimized Super Bowl hashtags, we’ve explained how you need to use them and what other hashtags to combine them with (and you’ve discussed what you can and cannot do with your legal team)…but it takes more than just the right hashtags to achieve an Instagram touchdown.
If you’re posting your Super Bowl post, but you haven’t been consistently posting, you won’t have an audience to attract, this means that you’ll just be hoping that the Instagram hashtags do all the work for you. This is not a smart strategy. Here are a few things you need to do daily (and Socialdraft can help you with this – just click play on the video above).
Post Daily
If you can’t post daily, try to post at least 3-4 times per week. Multiple studies have shown that if you aren’t consistent on Instagram your audience will forget about you. On top of that, Instagram has implemented a Facebook-like algorithm. If you’re not active and you’re not getting engagement, your chances of coming up higher on the feed drop. Use an Instagram scheduling tool like the Socialdraft social media calendar tool to schedule your posts so you don’t miss a beat.
Engage your targeted audience
On a daily basis, spend a minimum of 15 minutes engaging people. Start by liking and commenting on posts of those who liked your content, then click through to your industry hashtags and engage the people creating content around your industry. Lastly, follow people who create content about your hashtags. They will most likely follow you back, giving you a chance to engage and convert them.
How to Manage Your Instagram Accounts
Socialdraft is an all-in-one Social Media Dashboard that helps you manage Instagram. It is the most robust and simple tool for agencies and teams to effectively handle social media. With Socialdraft you can:
Schedule posts to Facebook pages, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn Business Pages, and Pinterest Boards
Schedule posts individually, as recurring posts, or bulk upload them as CSV
Easily re-schedule with a drag & drop action
Schedule GIFs to Facebook and Twitter
Download content calendars as PDF
Find content on Instagram and easily schedule reposts not just to Instagram but to all other social networks
Engage on Twitter, Facebook, and Linkedin
Download Facebook and Twitter reports
and tons more…
If you are curious about Socialdraft, take it for a risk-free trial. You’ll get to try out all the features and decide if Socialdraft is right for you.
Valentine’s Day is a big day for business. As a matter of fact, the average annual consumer spending on this day of love is 19.7 billion dollars on average. This means that 54.8% of consumers will spend an average of $146 on just flowers, candy, and apparel. Needless to say you NEED to market yourself during the holiday. The question is, how do you make yourself stand out. If you are on Instagram, this means a consistent strategy (you can’t expect to push out one picture on Valentine’s Day and have hoards of people come to your store), beautiful images, an impactful write up, but perhaps the most important thing to your entire strategy is having the right Valentine’s Day Hashtags for Instagram so that your posts are seen. Today, we’ll be showing you examples of how you can maximize exposure for your Instagram posts, but before you get started, take a few seconds to copy these hashtags and store them on your phone so you can use them on all your Valentine’s Day posts.
How to Use Your Valentine’s Day Hashtags for Instagram
The hashtags that we prepared for you above are general to the Valentine’s Day holiday. Thing is, your brand or business is unique. So, when you do post to Instagram, you need to combine these general Valentine’s Day Hashtags with other hashtags that are related to your business and will help you reach the right audience so they can convert. I want you to think of Instagram as a mini search engine just like Google. You post on Instagram so you can be found by your audience in order to convert them. Hashtags are to Instagram what keywords are to Google. Hashtags are your Instagram SEO.
PRO TIP “Like, comment, and follow those who are creating content around your brand or business to get more followers and potential customers.
Use a Mix Industry Specific & General Hashtags
As briefly mentioned above, the hashtags we gave you are optimized, but they are general. You want to utilize these so that your Instagram posts are tied to the Super Bowl, but you need to narrow things down. Irene Chan, a designer and Illustrator designed a gorgeous Valentine’s Day card that will be sold at Trader Joe’s. Notice that while she used Valentine’s Day hashtags such as #lovequotes #love and #ValentinesDay, she also incorporated those that are specific to her brand and industry like #valentinescard #illustration and #handlettering. Something tells me she will get many more likes on this post and sell plenty of these beautiful cards.
Geo-Targeted Hashtags
If you are a local business or brand, you should always be using geo-targeted location hashtags on your Instagram posts. This is especially so on Valentine’s Day. Why? Because if you only use generic Valentine’s Day hashtags like #ValentinesDay you can’t ascertain that you’re being found by your local audience. Istoria, a flower and gift service in New Zealand, understands this and frequently uses location tags. Take the post above, they combined generic holiday tags such as #valentines & #valentinesdaygift with industry specific hashtags (as seen in tip #1) #floral #macarons #delivery AND they utilized location tags to reach a local audience #auckland #newzealand #istorianz. This is as close to perfect as you can get when it comes to Instagram marketing for the Valentine holiday.
Associated Product & Brand Hashtags
We could have used a more obvious example here, like a retailer using the hashtags for a perfume brand on their Valentine’s day post, but this was too smart not to share. The Pig & The Lady is a family run restaurant in Hawaii. In promoting their Valentine’s Day offerings, they did two things we love: use a unique branded hashtag and they “piggy backed” off other trusted brands. Let’s break it down a bit:
Associated Brand Hashtags:
This very smart marketing team goes beyond this to include hashtags for brands that are trusted by their clients. What do we mean? Take a look. The restaurant uses #tripadvisor #bonappetit #foodandwine #eater #chefsfeed #hawaiisbestkitchens and #yelphawaii. By using these they are telling their audience that they aren’t afraid of review sites, they are sending a gentle reminder to their customers to leave a review, AND they come up on search when people search #yelphawaii. This is smart marketing AND smart SEO.
Unique Branded Hashtags:
When you look at this post, you will notice the hashtag #pigandthelady. This hashtag is unique to the business and helps them to brand themselves. The restaurant has only created 1,500 pieces of content, but the hashtag has been used over 5,000 times. This means that their clientele is invested in their brand and that the restaurant has trained their loyal customers to share pictures of their meals using their hashtags. In other words, their customers are their marketing team. How awesome is that!
Tips to get the most out of your Valentine’s Day Hashtags for Instagram
You’re ready for Valentine’s Day. You have your optimized Valentine’s Day hashtags for Instagram. You know how to use them and how to integrate them into your posts. But it as mentioned in the beginning of the post, you can’t expect to only post on major holidays and get a return on investment. Instagram takes commitment. Socialdraft can help you with this – just click play on the video above to see what you can do on our dash to help you save time on Instagram while growing a targeted audience that converts. What do you need to do:
Post Daily: I know you’re busy, maybe you can’t post daily, if you can’t then try to post 3-4 times weekly. Almost every studiy out there shows that if you aren’t posting on a consistent basis on Instagram your audience will unfollow you. Instagram also has implemented a Facebook-like algorithm. This means that if you’re not on the platform consistently, and you’re not getting engagement on your posts, your chances of coming up higher on the feed drop. Use an Instagram scheduler like the Socialdraft social media calendar tool to schedule your posts so you don’t miss out on the great opportunities from Instagram.
Engage your targeted audience
On a daily basis, spend at least 10 minutes to an hour engaging people. Like and comment on posts of those who liked your content, those who created content similar to yours, and engage the people creating content around your industry. Then spend some time engaging those who engaged your competitors.
How to Manage Your Instagram Accounts
Socialdraft is an all-in-one Social Media Dashboard that helps you manage Instagram. It is the most robust and simple tool for agencies and teams to effectively handle social media. With Socialdraft you can:
Schedule posts to Facebook pages, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn Business Pages (and one LinkedIn account) and Pinterest Boards
Schedule posts individually, as recurring posts, or bulk upload them as CSV
Easily re-schedule with a drag & drop action
Schedule GIFs to Facebook and Twitter
Download content calendars as PDF
Find content on Instagram and easily schedule reposts not just to Instagram but to all other social networks
Engage on Twitter, Facebook, and Linkedin
Download Facebook and Twitter reports
and tons more…
If you are curious about Socialdraft, take it for a risk-free trial. You’ll get to try out all the features and decide if Socialdraft is right for you.
Nestled between Thanksgiving, Black Friday, and Christmas is Hanukkah. While it’s not as commercialized as the rest of the winter holidays, you should be creating engaging Instagram posts for the holiday in order to capture the Jewish audience. You will probably create special discounts, promotions, and sales; but how do you get targeted eyes on those Instagram posts so that the people who see them convert? Start off with gorgeous images, a short and effective write up that includes a call to action, and then use the perfect mix of optimized Hanukkah Hashtags for Instagram so you can get the perfect eyes on your posts. Before we begin to discuss the way to use these hashtags so you can get the most ROI from your Hanukkah posts, click the copy button below the Hanukkah hashtags on your iPhone, Android, iPad or PC and save them to your keyboard so you can use them whenever you post to Instagram.
First, you need to stop thinking of Instagram as a social network. I am not telling you to stop engaging your audience, just that for this part of your Instagram strategy, you need to begin thinking of Instagram as a mini search engine…a mini Google of sorts. Instagram uses hashtags as their SEO tools, each hashtag you use increases your chances of being found. When someone searches a hashtag like #Hanukkah, they’re just looking for general information. But, say you sell menorahs, then you should be using the hashtag #menorah so that people can find you. If your images aren’t properly hashtagged, you’re not going to be found by the right people.
PRO TIP “Don’t listen to sites that say to use a few or even zero hashtags. This only works if you are already a brand. If you are looking to get more views on your post, take advantage of all 30 hashtags Instagram allows you to use”.
Use a Mix of Industry Specific & General Hanukkah Hashtags
This goes along with what we said above. The hashtags we gave you are general Hanukkah hashtags. You need these to categorize your posts, but if you have a specific product or service to sell, or if you are trying to send traffic to a particular type of website – you need to research your hashtags so you can get the perfect audience. Say you’re selling chocolate Dreidels as in the sponsored post above. They combine general hashtags (#Hanukkah) with industry specific hashtags such as #chocolate and #eatingnyc.
Geo-targeted Hanukkah Hashtags
If you are a local service or business, you can’t neglect location hashtags. If you are a restaurant in Chicago, it does you no good if you put out a gorgeous post and you get 500 likes from other states. The Chicago Diner was very smart in this post. They used Jewish & Hanukkah specific hashtags (#Hanukkah, #Seitan, #Tempeh) and complimented these with Geo-targeted hashtags (#Chicago #ChicagoDiner). I would have gone a step further to include the neighborhood and some of its nicknames as well (#WindyCity #Chi-Town #SecondCity #CityofBigShoulders).
Trending Hashtags
If something is trending on Facebook or Twitter, most likely it will also trend on Instagram. Keep a look out for trending topics and think of how you can use them in your posts. Then use hashtags related to that topic in order to help you come up on Instagram search.
Branded Hashtags
Instagram is a great branding opportunity. You should spend some time to come up with a custom hashtag for your brand. An easy one would be the name of your business, but this is not your only option. It could be your slogan, your top product…just make sure that you check Instagram to see if it is being used and, if so, that your chosen branded hashtag does not have a negative connotation. Note how Crazy Jewish Mom uses her name as a hashtag #CrazyJewishMom. While she has created only around 2,000 posts, there are over 6,000 posts using her hashtag. These are reposts and posts by fans mentioning her brand. When you do use a custom hashtag, it is a good idea to include it in your profile and to instruct your audience on how to use it. Product Hashtags
The brands that are associated with your brand or business probably have already been working on their audience. It makes sense to use their hashtags when speaking about them. It will draw their audience to you. If you do create a post that features an associated brand or business, don’t stop at just using their hashtag, make sure that you at tag them (@brand). When you do this, the account will get notification which increases your chances that they will like and comment on the post. Lightner liquor did things right by tagging Shmaltz Brewing (although the brewery is missing a huge opportunity to capture the liquor store’s audience by not commenting on that post).
Tips to get the most out of your Hanukkah Hashtags for Instagram
Post Daily
It is known that if you don’t post consistently not only will your engagement drop, your follow count will suffer. Use a dashboard like Socialdraft to schedule your Instagram posts for multiple accounts. With Socialdraft, you can also assign different people to schedule these posts and to publish them when the time comes.
There is even an Instagram search that will allow you to identify people creating content on Instagram about your brand, industry (or even your competitors) so that you can engage them and follow them. This is a HUGE help when growing a targeted audience.
Socialdraft is an all-in-one Social Media Dashboard that helps you manage Instagram. It is the most robust and simple tool for agencies and teams to effectively handle social media. With Socialdraft you can:
Schedule posts to Facebook pages, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn Business Pages (and one LinkedIn account) and Pinterest Boards
Schedule posts individually, as recurring posts, or bulk upload them as CSV
Easily re-schedule with a drag & drop action
Schedule GIFs to Facebook and Twitter
Download content calendars as PDF
Find content on Instagram and easily schedule reposts not just to Instagram but to all other social networks
Engage on Twitter, Facebook, and Linkedin
Download Facebook and Twitter reports
and tons more…
If you are curious about Socialdraft, take it for a risk-free trial. You’ll get to try out all the features and decide if Socialdraft is right for you.
Black Friday is the start of the big retail season. In truth, the season starts way before that, and if you are a retailer or small business marketing for Black Friday you need to start thinking about your strategy way before that. Today we’ll discuss how to use Black Friday hashtags on Social Media (particularly Instagram) to build excitement and get people to buy your products. But, before we get to that, take a few seconds to copy and save the following Black Friday hashtags. They are optimized to get you the most eyeballs on your Instagram posts.
Let’s discuss how to use your hashtags, then we can get into some really cool ideas for you to use along with your Black Friday hashtags on your Instagram posts.
Sure, you’re going to use more general hashtags like the ones listed above (#BlackFriday), but you want to be a sniper. Why? Because you want to aim to get the attention of the people who are really going to come into your shop or log onto your website to buy your stuff. Also, Black Friday is a great time to brand yourself. You may not be Kohls, but you can learn from their social strategy after the holiday. About 8 months ago (Dec & Jan), Kohls announced a sweepstakes that became a complete social media success. They announced that people who retweeted their favorite Kohl’s ite, using the hashtags #KohlsSweepstakes or #BlackFriday could win small prizes such as tickets to the Star Wars movie, but that there would be a grand prize, a chance to win all the 30 featured gifts from their Black Friday Guide. This promotion earned them over 112,000 tweets just in the first three days. Maybe your shop can’t give away items, but you could ask customers to share their favorite item from your shop (using your branded hashtag #StoreNameSweepstakes) to either Twitter or Instagram for a discount. This helps you in two ways. First, these people will be a marketing army sharing your merchandise to their local circle. Second, they will be getting a discount, so that’s pretty much a guaranteed sale. Branded Hashtags
Maybe you’re not running a promotion like the one above, and you just need to spread the word that you have the hottest item in stock. Make sure to use that branded hashtag so that you come up on the feed when people search. Otherwise, you’re not giving yourself a chance. Competitor Hashtags This one is a bit sneaky, but…all is fair in love & business. Your customers may be shopping your competition. This means they may also be searching for your competition on Instagram and Twitter. Go ahead and drop their hashtag on your image. For example, Hollister was the number one brand on Instagram last year during Black Friday. If you sell a similar product, drop the #Hollister hashtag on your images to drive more eyes towards your products. BLACK FRIDAY INSTAGRAM POST IDEASUpdate Consumers & Get Them Excited
This is a basic for social media, but something worth a reminder. Make sure you use your social networks to let potential buyers know about deals, hours, etc. Go a step further. Tease your followers a bit. Macy’s did this in 2014. They started revealing one of their best deals on a daily basis on Instagram. Great way to get your customers to come back to your account, engage them, and re-market them. In this case, Macy’s kept things simple with one single hashtag, #BlackFriday.
Create a Deal Flipbook
Use an app like PicFlow, Flipagram, or Slidemaker to create a video flipboook of the items that are on deal, something like a 10 for $10 with the discount code at the end so that you can get your customers excited about those #blackfriday deals.
Offer Instagram Exclusive Deals
Tell your customers to follow you on Instagram and DM you for special deals and coupons for the Black Friday holiday.
Create an @tag Referral Program
Ask followers to tag a friend to get a DM with a special discount code. This will make it so their friends come in and tag their friends allowing you to capture more leads.
Ask your community to post a photo the week before Black Friday and to add your custom Black Friday Hashtag to it. Then you can pick one or multiple winners from the submissions. Make the prize something exciting and worthwhile so you get good participation. Each picture is a proof of purchase & a free piece of advertising.
THINGS TO DO ON INSTAGRAM BEFORE, DURING & AFTER BLACK FRIDAY
Now that you have your Black Friday Hashtags, you need to take care of a few more things. Instagram recently implemented an algorithm that penalizes accounts that aren’t consistent and don’t get too much engagement. Socialdraft is an Instagram tool you can use to help you with getting an ROI from your Instagram account.
Engage Your Customers
This may sound counter intuitive, but some brands and businesses will be able to pull this off. There tends to be some fatigue around Black Friday. People do get tired of all commercialized nature of the Black Friday holiday. Businesses who take the time to listen to their community and engage them in real-time chat have a lot to gain in the long run. This is something you should do on a regular basis. Just search a hashtag that is related to your business and like the posts & follow the content creator. This acts as a reverse link. They’ll want to check out who you are and follow you.
Monitor Your Brand
You need to listen. It is probably the most important skill of Social Media. So take a few minutes per day to check out what is being said about your business on Social Media. These opportunities could not come around again, so you want to be especially vigilant around the holiday. You can use a tool like Socialdraft to stay abreast of your business mentions.
If someone mentions you or the products you are selling, make sure to take time to like, comment, and engage. You show that your brand is human and that it cares.
How to Manage Your Instagram Accounts
Socialdraft is an all-in-one Social Media Dashboard that helps you manage Instagram. It is the most robust and simple tool for agencies and teams to effectively handle social media. With Socialdraft you can:
Schedule posts to Facebook pages, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn Business Pages (and one LinkedIn account) and Pinterest Boards
Schedule posts individually, as recurring posts, or bulk upload them as CSV
Easily re-schedule with a drag & drop action
Schedule GIFs to Facebook and Twitter
Download content calendars as PDF
Find content on Instagram and easily schedule reposts not just to Instagram but to all other social networks
Engage on Twitter, Facebook, and Linkedin
Download Facebook and Twitter reports
and tons more…
If you are curious about Socialdraft, take it for a risk-free trial. You’ll get to try out all the features and decide if Socialdraft is right for you.
Makeup and beauty make sense on Instagram, it is, after all a social network focused on the visual. This is both a blessing and a curse. While it is the perfect social network for make up artists, shops, and vloggers to promote themselves, there are tons of people on there who are competing against you and working to steal your audience. You don’t have to fret. Today, we’ll discuss the top Instagram Makeup and Beauty Hashtags to use and how to incorporate them into your Instagram strategy so you don’t just gain followers, but make money. Before you read on, take a few seconds to copy the Makeup and Beauty Hashtags below (just click the “copy” button) and then save them into your phone. These will be the building blocks of your Instagram strategy.
How to Use Makeup and Beauty Hashtags for Instagram
Think of Instagram as a miniature Google that is growing by the millisecond. Just like Google uses keywords for SEO, Instagram has its own version: hashtags. When you use hashtags, you need to think like an SEO. Is this hashtag going to get me found, and who is it going to get me found by. If the hashtag is not relevant (#followforfollow) or not targeted, the answer is no. Think about it, when someone hops on Instagram and searches #lipstick, they are probably looking for new ideas for a purchase.
That’s a pretty good person to attract. If you sell or promote lipstick and you are not using that hashtag, you won’t be found. The only people who can get away with not using hashtags, or only using one or two hashtags are celebs like the Kardashians. This is not the time to worry about looking cool. Know what’s cool…making money…and you know how you’re going to make money, by being found. So use all 30 hashtags that Instagram allows you to use. Now that you have the basics on how to use makeup and beauty hashtags, let’s get down to business.
Industry Specific Versus General Makeup and Beauty Hashtags
The hashtags you copied above aren’t going to get you where you need to go. Why? These are general hashtags. They are used quite often. This means that you won’t stay on top of the feed because of the number of posts that utilize these hashtags. That being said, you want to give yourself a chance to reach the millions of people who are searching this type of content on Instagram, so you still want to use them. What you need to do is mix these with more focused hashtags. So, while you will want to keep #lipstick (13 million posts as of today) as part of your hashtag kit, you will also want to add more specific hashtags to draw an audience that is interested in exactly what you are offering. Think #MatteLipstick. This hashtag currently has 463K posts attached to it. This is a perfect hashtag for you. It has enough visibility to get you a decent number of eyes, but it is not too large that you get lost. It also gets you a more targeted audience. These people aren’t just looking for lipstick, they are looking for matte lipstick. You’ve just upped your chances of engagement and of making a sale. If you keep your targeted hashtags between 100k-600k you will be giving yourself the best chance at being seen by the right people.
These are extremely important if you are a makeup artist, salon, or local shop. While it is nice to get likes, you want to get likes that convert. That means you need likes from people who can either hire you or drop by your place of business. Say you’re a makeup artist in New York City. You want to attract people in New York. You will want to use geo-targeted hashtags to give yourself a chance of being found when people search by location tags. You would want to use hashtags like #NYCmakeupArtist #NY #NYC #Manhattan #NewYork #NewYorkCity #BigApple #EastSide #MurrayHill #MidtownEast. Notice we’ve covered general location, location nicknames, and neighborhoods. These will change according to your location, of course. Love that K used location and actually tagged the location on the post. That is smart Instagramming. Trending Hashtags
Say #AriannaGrande is trending. This is when you want to create content utilizing her shades of Viva Glam. Make sure that you tag it #AriannaGrande #VivaGlam #MACcosmetics so that you can take advantage of this trending item. You can do the same with events such as the Oscars, Mother’s Day and lots more.
A photo posted by Samuel Harrison (@samuelharrisonart) on
Instagram is the place to brand yourself. You need to come up with a branded hashtag and then educate your clients and audience to use that hashtag to help you grow your brand. Take Pat McGrath who uses the tag #makeupbypatmcgrath. Pat has created 1,900 pieces of content, yet the hashtag has been used 6,000 times. That means that around 4,000 people have become Pat’s personal marketing army. And Pat’s army includes professionals like Samuel Harrison who has a following of 34k. What does this tell you? Start to collaborate with others in your industry, help each other out. It’s an easy way to grow your following and credibility.
Once you’ve got a hand on this, you can run a regram campaign. Change your profile so that it states that those who use your hashtag have a chance to be featured on your account. This will help you with content creation and engagement. Monitor the hashtags, and use a system like Socialdraft to repost those posts. With our dashboard, you can repost to not just Instagram, but also Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Pinterest. Product Hashtags
Using a well-recognized name helps. Just like you would talk about the products you use when you’re working with a customer, you will want to start the exact same conversation on Instagram. Check out how Mario Dedivanovic has used #anastasiabeverlyhills as a hashtag. It is his way to communicate that he uses their products and to connect with their fans. Go beyond a hashtag. If you are using and promoting someone’s products in this way, make sure you @tag them as well. This way they will receive a notification and hopefully (if they are smart Instagram marketers), they will like, comment on and share your post.
Post Daily, engage and reshare content.
If you’re not posting daily (or at least consistently) on Instagram, you’re going to lose followers. It is also possible that since each day off is equivalent to fewer interactions that the algorithm will kick in and you’ll drop in the feed. This means that you should be using an Instagram scheduling tool like Socialdraft to schedule to Instagram on a daily basis. This will keep you consistent and growing on a consistent basis.
Now that you have your starter list of Makeup and Beauty Hashtags for Instagram and an entire technique on how to use them, it’s time for you to get out there and slay.
How to Manage your Instagram Account
Socialdraft is an all-in-one Social Media Dashboard that helps you manage Instagram. It is the most robust and simple tool for agencies and teams to effectively handle social media. With Socialdraft you can:
Schedule posts to Facebook pages, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn Business Pages (and one LinkedIn account) and Pinterest Boards
Schedule posts individually, as recurring posts, or bulk upload them as CSV
Easily re-schedule with a drag & drop action
Schedule GIFs to Facebook and Twitter
Download content calendars as PDF
Keep an eye on your online reputation and easily share the good news to social
Find content on Instagram and easily schedule reposts not just to Instagram but to all other social networks
Engage on Twitter, Facebook, and Linkedin
Download Facebook and Twitter reports
and tons more…
If you are curious about Socialdraft and any of its features, just click this link. If you’re ready to take us for your risk-free trial, simply click here to find the perfect plan for you.
I love Instagram for business. In fact, I use it to get leads and to get people to sign up for Socialdraft. What I love about Instagram is that it gives you direct access to your potential customers, and…if you do things right…that you can be seen by potential customers. If you’re new to Instagram and only have a few followers, or if you’ve been stagnant…don’t worry. We’ll show you some tips on getting more Instagram followers and how to encourage them to leave Likes and Comments.
Instagram Tips To Land More Followers
1) As with other platforms such as Twitter and Facebook, leaving Comments and “Likes” on photos from other Instagram accounts is one of the simplest ways to get followers of your own.
2) Use hashtags in your image captions. This groups the photo with other photos of similar themes. Use up the maximum amount of hashtags. This is how a budding account will be found, so don’t be shy. Especially if you’re just starting out.
3) Only post gorgeous images. It helps if you take a good picture in the first place. If your picture came out badly, click the LUX button to enhance your images (the one that looks like a sun). This is especially useful with underexposed pictures. The feature is best on landscapes, but it is worth trying on other sorts of images as well. It’s also worth noting that lighter photos get more “Likes” than darker photos, as do images with faces. You can also watch the video above for a more in-depth tutorial on how to edit your images.
4) Yes, people do check profiles, so make sure your bio is up-to-date. Plus, bio sections are the perfect place to leave a link back to your webpage or blog. Make sure to include keywords, your website link, and a clear call to action.
5) Update! Update! Update! Post often. Minimum once a day, maximum 3 times a day (some can have success with more – but it takes a lot of energy) And this applies to all of your social media accounts. The fresher and more frequently you post new material, the higher your engagement rate will be. When you update frequently, it’s like leaving on an inviting night light. You can easily do this with the Socialdraft calendar. It lets you schedule to multiple Instagram accounts AND assign different people to manage them.
6) Engage with your followers on a regular basis by liking photos, and making astute and/or lighthearted comments. People love it when you shine a light on their posts, which they often take great care in creating. You can also spend some valuable time finding hopeful new prospects to follow.
7) Use Socialdraft’s Instagram photo search. Let our Instagram photo search help you find the people who are talking about your brand so you can engage them, amplify their content, and build brand advocates. You can also monitor your competition and their fans to try and convert them.
And although this does not apply directly to Instagram now, Socialdraft’s “Drag & Drop” calendar makes it easy for you to schedule posts to Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn with just a few simple clicks, making re-scheduling and editing a breeze.
8) Remember to share your Instagram account with your email subscribers, as well as on your other social media accounts and profiles.
9) By following your Facebook friends on Instagram, you’re sure to earn a few quick and easy return followers.
10) Hold an Instagram contest. Contests require a lot of planning so be sure to do some specific research on Instagram contests. For example, the prize you will be offering may be the deciding element in attracting participants and should dovetail with your strategy for marketing your unique brand.
11) Never miss content from leads. Turn on notifications for any leads you are trying to close a sale on. This way you always remember to engage them.
Simply go to their profile, click the three dots, click on “Turn on Post Notifications”
12) Check on the activity of those you follow. To see what the people you follow are up to, click on the heart on the bottom of the screen, then toggle to “Following”
13) Save Posts for later. Saw something interesting but don’t have the time to check it out. Save it to your PRIVATE collections! Tap the ribbon and then select the collection.
14) Hide Your Story From Particular People. Go to the person’s profile, tap the three dots in the top right-hand corner and click “Hide my Story”.
15) Find People in Your Area. This is fantastic for local businesses. Simply click on the search icon, type in the name of the city or place you are looking to explore and then click “Places” on the top right-hand corner. This will pull your place. Click on the location icon and explore away.
16) See the People Who Viewed Your Story. It’s easy and a great way to see the people who are truly invested in your brand. Click on your story icon. Click on the user icons on the bottom where it says “Seen by +number”. You will go into analytics. Click on the eye icon followed by a number. That’s it!
17) Clear Your Search History. This is where we get a bit naughty. Lost a client and don’t want them to figure out your strategy? Clear the search history. Simply clear the gear icon and then click “Clear Search History” all the way at the bottom of the post.
How to Manage Your Instagram Account
Now that you have all these tips, you will need a great tool to help you manage your Instagram accounts. Socialdraft is that tool and more.
Socialdraft is an all-in-one Social Media Dashboard. It is the most robust and simple tool for agencies and teams to effectively handle social media. With Socialdraft you can:
Schedule posts to Facebook pages, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn Business Pages and Pinterest Boards
Schedule posts individually, as recurring posts, or bulk upload them as CSV
Easily re-schedule with a drag & drop action
Schedule GIFs to Facebook and Twitter
Download content calendars as PDF
Keep an eye on your online reputation and easily share the good news to social
Find content on Instagram and easily schedule reposts not just to Instagram but to all other social networks
Engage on Twitter, Facebook, and Linkedin
Download Facebook and Twitter reports & tons more.
If you are curious about Socialdraft and any of its features, just click this link. If you’re ready to take us for your risk-free trial, simply click here to find the perfect plan for you.
Hashtags have become mainstream. They’re on tee-shirts, home decor and…of course on Social Media. Hashtags are to Twitter and Instagram what keywords are to Google. Hashtags are great tools for being found on social media. If you begin to think of hashtags with an SEO’s eyes, you will become a much more powerful marketer. Let’s discuss the proper use of hashtags in today’s social media environment.
Social Media Tips on How And Where to Use Hashtags
Hashtags are powerful.
Tweets with hashtags get two times more engagement than tweets without. And Twitter’s research suggests individuals can see a 100 percent increase in engagement by using hashtags, while brands can see a 50 percent increase in engagement.
Engagement includes clicks, retweets, favorites, and replies. Tweets with one or more hashtag are 55 percent more likely to be retweeted.
PRO TIP Don’t use hashtags on Facebook. Facebook posts without a hashtag do better than those with a hashtag.
How to Find the Best Hashtags
Competitor Research
What hashtags are influencers using? What hashtags are your competitors using? Check these out and begin to test them out on your own posts.
Use Relevant Hashtags
You may be tempted to use those #like4likes hashtags that seem to get so much engagement. Don’t. That engagement is a waste. That’s engagement from accounts that won’t convert. The name of the game is ROI, not vanity metrics, so concentrate on getting in front of the right eyes. We’ve put together tutorials and lists of hashtags for many industries and subjects on our hashtag directory, so check there before you begin to use them.
Be Mindful of Numbers
Which hashtags are the best to use? You may think that hashtags with over a million posts attached to them are best, but stop and think about this. In platforms like Twitter and Instagram, where content is constantly being uploaded, does it benefit you to use hashtags that are used so often? Nope. These hashtags will make it so you drop out of the feed quickly. Try to use hashtags that have been used between 5000 and 500,000 times. This will put you at a good place for both being seen and getting enough engagement.
Check Hashtags for Context
Could your chosen hashtags mean something else entirely? Before using a hashtags search it. Make sure there’s no nefarious association with it.
How to Manage Social Media With Socialdraft
Now that you understand how to use hashtags properly, you will need a tool to help you implement your strategy. Socialdraft is an all-in-one Social Media tool for teams. With Socialdraft, you can:
Schedule to Facebook business pages, and one personal account
Schedule to Twitter
Schedule to Instagram
Schedule pins to Pinterest
Schedule to LinkedIn Business pages & one personal account
Schedule in bulk w/ a CSV (great for holidays, specials and sharing good reviews)
Schedule recurring posts (fantastic for specials and recurring promotions)
Download your content calendar (if you want to discuss with your team)
Allow others to schedule content, but with different constraints and permissions
Assign tasks to team members
Engage your community on the feed
Schedule reposts from Instagram to all your connected networks
Put in your business or brand name as well as that of your principals and track what is being said online (and share the good stuff with a few clicks)
NOTE: Due to the Instagram API changes of April 2018, our current Instagram implementation is limited. You can currently schedule to multiple Instagram accounts, have various people publish the content, search hashtags for content, and repost that content to all your social networks. We are keeping an eye on Instagram for an update on the API. For more information, click here.
For those that manage multiple Instagram accounts, the choices are limited. You can switch back and forth between 5 accounts or use multiple devices but this still does not fix the issues of:
Scheduling posts for later publishing
Engaging on a tiny phone type pad
Liking and following people on a larger screen in a targeted manner.
Since Instagram is pretty restrictive with apps on offering multiple account management, the best option – for now – is to use an Instagram management tool like Socialdraft. What can you do with Socialdraft to manage multiple Instagram accounts? Let’s break it down for you:
Manage Multiple Instagram Accounts With Socialdraft
Manage multiple Instagram accounts
Set up different team members to create and schedule Instagram content
Set up different team members to publish to one or multiple Instagram accounts
Search for hashtags on Instagram
Repost Instagram images to Instagram, Facebook Pages, Facebook Groups, Pinterest Boards, Twitter accounts, and even LinkedIn Business pages.
The best part is that you can do all of this from your smartphone, tablet, or computer. So, if you have big clumsy fingers like I do, you can type away on your laptop and never worry about silly spelling mistakes.
How To Manage Multiple Instagram Accounts with Socialdraft
Associate each of the Instagram accounts with either one or multiple smartphone numbers
Assign team members to create content to one or multiple accounts
Schedule your posts
Once the time for your scheduled posts comes around, the mobile number assigned to the account will receive an SMS with the image and write up for the account.
Save the image to your phone, copy the write-up, open up Instagram and post away.
Search for hashtags.
Click “share” to repost to all your connected social networks
Pretty cool, right?
The best part – you can manage as many accounts as you want! Yup. And you can assign your team members to both create content AND publish the posts!
What are some of the Benefits of Using Socialdraft
* The ability to schedule tons of content ahead of time (you can even schedule via CSV) not just on Instagram, but on Facebook pages, Twitter, LinkedIn business pages, and Pinterest.
* You can schedule recurring posts (daily, weekly, or monthly)
* You can group social media accounts together into campaigns & schedule to them all at once.
* Being able to schedule from multiple accounts. Many Instagram users have more than one account.
* You can post from a smartphone, tablet, desktop, or laptop to Instagram using this tool
* You can search for Inspiration when you’ve got Instagram block
* Our repost feature makes it super easy to run a repost campaign
* You can easily repost to other social networks. This is great when someone creates content about your brand
* You can use TrueTime to figure out the best time for you to post
* Multiple people can collaborate on one or many accounts
* Socialdraft also schedules to other Social Networks – so it’s not a unitasker like many of the other Instagram schedulers out there
Isn’t it amazing how social media has evolved? It started what seems like ages ago with Geocities in 1994. Then, Friendster hit the waves followed by the ever-famous MySpace. Today, we’ve seen the rise and fall of Google+, Vevo and so many more…but there are a few social networks that have outlasted the rest: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Pinterest seem to have the strongest staying power. IF you are just jumping on board and need to quickly build your Social Media following, read on. We’ll give you some tried and true techniques so you can not just grow a following, but grow a following that is targeted and converts.
24 Tips to Quickly Build Your Social Media Following
Social Media is the New ”World of Mouth”
You had to know things were changing when Beyonce skipped traditional press to launch her new album on social media. She skipped the middle man and went directly to her fans and followers…and she killed it! How much did she slay? Let’s take a look:
* It sold 828,773 copies in 3 days
* Twitter reported 1.2 million Tweets in 12 hours
* It was the largest single week ever in the Apple iTunes store
* It was iTunes fastest selling album worldwide
But Social Media Takes Time & Consistency
Those who expect to go on a social media site and become an overnight success should expect to be disappointed.
Success on social media requires strategy, consistency, and persistence. It also requires diversification. Relying on only one network can really be risky. Snapchat’s fans recently rebelled. What would happen if that was your only marketing channel?
Facebook Growth Tactics
Hate to confirm what you already know, but growing organically on Facebook is a more difficult task by the day. It is evolving into a pay-to-play dashboard, but that does not mean that you can’t win on Facebook.
You’re going to have to get creative. Let’s look at some ideas to help you game engagement and reach that ever elusive targeted audience:
Run contests
Contests are exciting ways to bring engagement to your Facebook page. Just remember that people have content fatigue, so that fee piece of pie at the end of a meal is not going to get people excited. Make your prize truly amazing. Collaborate with other related businesses to make the prize something to get really excited about.
Provide premium content
This means creating content outside of regular Facebook posts. Think about creating a free e-book, a really cool video, or some sort of content to provide a value to your audience.
Activate a Facebook Plugin on your blog or website
Blogging and website platforms like WordPress have a range of Facebook like plugins. Activate these plugins to launch once someone has been on your site for about 30 seconds to a minute. If they are there that long, it means they are interested in your content. Launching them too early will probably make them click off page and hurt your time on page. When executing this tactic, always remember to keep a balance between capturing that like so you can retarget & keeping people on the page.
Create Inspiring Content
Test to see what content will drive “likes.” Oftentimes this can be inspirational content. Back in the day, images of Inspirational quotes would do, but these are trite now. Create a powerful video and upload it directly to Facebook to get the most engagement and shares possible.
Engage Your Audience
If there is anything you can do (outside of paid reach) to grow your audience is to engage. Respond to comments, but don’t stop there. Get out to pages that cater to your audience and comment and like their posts. Each comment is like Facebook link building, it gives people another way to reach your page.
Mobile optimization
Include like buttons on your mobile app and website so that when people they are using your app or perusing your website they can like your Facebook page
Pay
Run ad campaigns and promote posts. Facebook has some of the best targeting options (outside of Google), so if you target properly you can grow an audience that converts.
Use Pop-Ups
Especially after videos on your site. Once people have watched a video, prompt them to like your Facebook page. It’s a great way to get more likes.
Twitter Growth Strategies
Twitter plays by its own rules. It recently discarded its 140 character limit and has become a political battleground. Many poo-poo Twitter and say it’s over. We love it and we convert lots of users on the dashboard. It gives you a direct way to reach your audience, so if you’ve been ignoring the network, perhaps it is time you give it another try. Let’s discuss how to grow a targeted following on your Twitter account:
Optimize Your Bio
Take time to make sure your profile and “Bio” are to the point. Use keywords to attract followers in your niche.
Tweet, Tweet A Lot
Tweet more often. The timeline is always moving and your audience will be on at all different times. This is one network where more is more. We tweet around 10-15 times per day.
Use Hashtags
Hashtags are Twitter SEO tools. They are a great way to get found and to expand your tweet visibility.
Use a Scheduling Tool Like Socialdraft
Schedule and automate tweets. We recommend 80% lead & influencer content followed by 20% of your content split between evergreen & promotional. Spend the rest of your time engaging.
Share Plenty Of Influencer Content
Make lists of influencers. Share their content via scheduled posts and retweets. Always include an @mention so they get a notification whenever you share. This is a great way to start up a conversation.
Take Part in Twitter Chats
Twitter chats are a fantastic way to reach your target audience. Join some, or start one of your own.
Find New Followers
Twitter will suggest followers according to those you follow and engage. This is an underused tool you should take advantage of.
Tweet Valuable Content
Don’t bore your audience by always tweeting about yourself. Think about their problems and craft your tweets so they are the answer to their problems. If you can provide a value to your Twitter audience, your account will grow.
Cross Promote
Promote your Twitter account everywhere. Make sure it’s visible on your website, business cards, and that you cross-promote on other social networks.
Instagram Growth Techniques
Who knew Instagram would become the fastest growing social network. Its simplicity (and the Facebook team’s strategy) have grown this network exponentially. However, this means that there’s a ridiculous amount of competition. You need to work smart and consistently to grow your Instagram account. Let’s dive in:
Use a Scheduling Tool
It’s easy to forget to post to Instagram, use an Instagram scheduler like Socialdraft to make sure you post consistently.
Engage
I cannot stress the importance of engagement. You can have gorgeous images, but if you don’t get out there and engage you’re not going to grow your Instagram account. Engage on hashtags, location, and on followers of your competition.
Run contests outside of Instagram
No matter what network, contests are a great way to gain followers. Run your contests on Instagram and promote them on all other social media. Think about running a repost campaign. This way your community creates the content and helps you share it to their audience. Socialdraft has a great repost tool on the dash to make this easier for you.
Display Instagram Your Site
There are fantastic plugins that allow you to display your Instagram feed on your site. It’s a fantastic visual tool to help you capture people who visit your site so you can remarket them later.
How to Manage & Build Your Social Media Following
Sure, you can do this all manually, but there are tools out there to make this easier for you. Socialdraft is an all-in-one Social Media tool for teams. With Socialdraft, you can:
Schedule posts to multiple Facebook pages, Facebook groups, Instagram & Twitter accounts, LinkedIn Business Pages, and Pinterest Boards
Schedule GIFs to Facebook and Twitter
Have multiple people create and post content w/ different permissions
Search Instagram hashtags, and repost to all connected social media.
Engage on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn via the feed
For those that manage more than five Instagram account, the choices are limited. That is as many as Instagram will allow you to toggle from your smartphone. You have to either work on multiple devices (5 on a smartphone, 5 on a tablet and so on) which can be super expensive and cumbersome. In this case, you’ll be creating secondary user profiles on your other smartphones, installing another copy of Instagram, and have another account signed in, or log in, upload a photo, and switch to the other smartphone when you need to publish to your other accounts. It gets tired – fast.
NOTE: Due to the Instagram API changes of April 2018 which affected all third party apps, our Instagram implementation is currently limited to scheduling posts, searching hashtags, and scheduling reposts. We are keeping a close eye for an update from Instagram.
How To Manage Multiple Instagram Accounts
Instagram is pretty tight on their API access, so that makes it even harder to manage your account with apps, but Socialdraft offers some great Instagram tools to make your life so much easier. We’ll break down all the features Socialdraft has to help you manage multiple Instagram accounts. This is really the easiest way to manage multiple Instagram accounts. But first, we’ll give you the breakdown on how to manage them directly on Instagram.
How to Manage Multiple Instagram Accounts Directly on Instagram
How to Connect Multiple Instagram accounts to your Mobile
Make sure you have the latest version of Instagram
Go to your profile page
Click the down arrow next to your profile name
Select +Add Account
Enter the username and password
Rinse and repeat with your other accounts (you can add 5 per mobile device)
How to Switch from One Instagram Account to Another
Go to your profile
Click the down arrow next to your name
Select the account you want to use
How to use Push Notifications
***Note: I have mine turned off.
Click on the gear icon on your profile
Scroll to push notification settings
Choose the push notifications you’d like to get
How to Remove an Instagram account
Note: This is not deleting an account, but merely removing it from your management area. Once you do this, you will not be able to manage this account.
Select the account you want to remove
Click the gear icon
Click on “Log out of +username”
Choose if you want the site to remember the password
Click “Log Out”
HOW TO MANAGE INSTAGRAM WITH SOCIALDRAFT
Socialdraft is an all-in-one social media tool that offers some incredibly robust Instagram management tools. Let’s break down all the things you can do with Socialdraft to effectively manage Instagram.
Can you manage multiple Instagram accounts with Socialdraft? YES
Can multiple people create content for one or multiple Instagram accounts with Socialdraft? YES
Can multiple people publish content for one or multiple Instagram accounts with Socialdraft? YES
Can multiple people use Socialdraft’s Instagram tools? YES. How you dole out the power is up to you.
Socialdraft Instagram Tools
With Socialdraft you can do tons on Instagram such as:
Schedule images to multiple accounts
Have various people create the content
Have various people publish the content
Search Instagram for hashtags
Like images
Follow content creators
Comment on Instagram posts
Unfollow those who don’t follow you
Connect Your Instagram Accounts to Socialdraft
Before you begin to manage Instagram with Socialdraft, you will need to connect your Instagram accounts and make sure that each account has one mobile number attached to it. Let’s break down the process:
Log into the Instagram account you want to connect
Log into Socialdraft & Click on “Settings”
Click “Connect Another Account” on the Instagram area
The account will automatically populate
Enter the mobile number of the person who will be in charge of posting
Click Done
Click Close
PRO TIP: If you are posting from a tablet, you can connect a phone number from a service such as Google Voice. Make sure the app is installed on your tablet.
Schedule to Instagram From the Socialdraft Calendar
When you log into the Socialdraft dashboard, you will be taken to the calendar.
Click on the date when you want the post to publish.
Enter your write up, hashtags, and link (the link won’t be clickable, but it will be shortened by bitly)
Add your image
Choose a campaign (optional)
Choose a category (optional)
Choose either one or multiple specific dates OR choose recurring
Follow the steps for each type of post
Click schedule & follow the steps for scheduling
Schedule to Instagram with Socialdraft Via CSV
Download your starter CSV from the Socialdraft dashboard by going to the calendar > Import CSV > Starter CSV.
This will have a sample post for each of your connected accounts.
You need to do a little one-time formatting here depending on how you plan to craft your CSVs.
Enter the write-up with hashtags, image link, and URL
From the calendar click on “Import CSV” tab
Click “Upload CSV Files – Select Files”
Select the CSV and click “Submit”
Review the posts and schedule
Schedule Reposts from Instagram with Socialdraft
Socialdraft is a special Instagram repost tool. Socialdraft allows you to search for Instagram hashtags and then repost those posts not just to Instagram, but to Facebook busines pages, Facebook groups, Twitter accounts, LinkedIn business pages, Pinterest boards, and…of course…Instagram. To schedule a regram from Socialdraft:
Search for a hashtag in the Instagram tool area
Hover over the image you want to repost
Click “Share”
When the modal box opens, edit the write up as needed
Keep the credit for the content creator (you should ask for permission before reposting)
Follow the steps to schedule a post.
Follow and Unfollow People on Instagram
It’s quite simple. To follow people, so a hashtag search and click the “follow” icon on the images you like. To unfollow those who don’t follow you back, go to the “Non-Followers” area and click “Unfollow” on the people you want to unfollow.
April Fools’ Day is an awesome holiday. April 1st means a lighthearted day of silly pranks and trying to outdo each other. It also means a HUGE marketing opportunity for brands and businesses who do things right. Today we’ll discuss how you can use April Fools’ Day Hashtags on Instagram. Before we do, take a few seconds to copy (and save) the hashtags below. Then read on for tips on reaching the right audience for your brand by using these tags.
How to Use Your April Fools’ Hashtags for Instagram
April Fools Day is an opportunity to show your customers (and potential customers) that you can have fun. Adventure Life Travel’s brilliant April Fools’ Day prank was picked up by Instagram and got them more than 800 likes. It also makes the brand seem fun, human, relatable. They were selling nothing and got much in return. This is a good example of the tone of voice during the holiday.
Tips to get the most out of your April Fools Day Hashtags for Instagram
Post Daily
You can’t expect to only post on holidays and drive millions of people to your website, blog or store. This means that if you want a good reaction to your April Fools post, you need to start posting on a consistent basis. Use a social media
Engage your audience
After publishing each post, take some time to engage your community. Search the hashtags in your posts and engage the last 10 people who engaged the top 10 posts for each hashtags. Like their posts and follow them. This will result in a reciprocal relationship – more likes on your post and more follows.
PRO TIP : Socialdraft has a great risk free trial. Take us for a trial and if we’re not the right fit, just cancel.
Use a Mix Industry Specific & April Fools’ Day Hashtags Hashtags
This post by ASOS was creative genius. You’d probably think that it would be impossible to sell Wedding dresses on April Fools’ Day. This proves you can sell anything if you’re creative. This shop posted that they had just launched a wedding service that would mean you’d get married on their catwalk. If you were to do a post like this one, you’d need to use industry hashtags in order to get seen. For ASOS, since they would be selling to brides, a sample of a good set of hashtags would include #wedding #customwedding #bridetobe #sayyestothedress.
Geo-Targeted Hashtags with Your April Fools’ Day Hashtags
Creating a great April Fools’ post is only the beginning. If you are a local business, brand, or service provider, it is not of great benefit to have 1,000 likes from people who can’t convert to customers. If they are 50 miles away, they probably won’t convert. Follow the lead from Gotham City Collision. Their post includes gorgeous location hashtags so they have a chance to be discovered by a local audience.
Use Both Associated Brand Hashtags & Custom Branded Hashtags
April Fool’s Day is a perfect time to get another brand’s eyes on your audience. On top of that, custom branded hashtags can help you turn your audience and customers into a marketing army. Just Check out what Bare Bones (a bone broth company) did. They took a trending topic associated to their culinary brand and created an awesome April Fool’s post out of it. They “created” a new product based on the very popular show Arrested Development. By using the hashtag #ArrestedDevelopment, they are opening themselves up to an audience that likes this show (a new possible customer demographic). The big key here is that the joke is relevant to their brand. It makes sense. They’ve also used #BareBones, this is their custom hashtag. If you look at the image above, you will see how the top posts aren’t just from the brand itself. Influencers are sharing their experience with the product and posting about it. This opens up a new audience to them. These are incredibly powerful tactics that can also work for you.
Landscape pictures can be great Instagram tools. They are used by travel bloggers, hiking enthusiasts, pastors, and…of course…landscape photographers – to name a few. In fact, landscapes are so popular on Instagram that the hashtag has been used over 81 million times. So…how are you to compete in the algorithm AND reach the people you want to convert? After your image, the next important thing is landscape hashtags. Hashtags are to Instagram what keywords are to Google. So, take a few seconds to copy the landscape hashtags below, and then read on. We’ll break down hashtag strategy and show you examples of successful landscape hashtag use.
The landscape hashtags above are your starting point to getting more reach on Instagram. These will give you a chance to be found by a general audience interested in landscapes. However, you must combine these hashtags with others in order to be seen by the right audience…an audience that converts. Let’s go through some examples from various industries.
Combine Industry and Landscape Hashtags
Think about the hashtags for your industry. Make sure to include these in your post so you can attract people who are not just interested in landscapes, but in your industry. Lauren Brandy is a painter who understands how to sell her art on Instagram. Her landscape paintings include a mix of various types of hashtags including industry and landscape hashtags. This makes it much easier for people who are both interested in painting and landscapes to discover her. By using a mix of hashtags she has increased the chances of being discovered by a larger audience.
Include Location Hashtags
These are especially important if you are a local business (like a hotel), a blogger dealing with location-based marketing, or if you are trying to reach an audience that is interested in a particular place. Natural Massachusetts understands this quite well. Because they are trying to reach both people in Massachusetts and people interested in the state, they make great use of location hashtags. If you are a local business (like a hotel) or even a local photographer, keep location hashtags in mind.
Include Your Brand’s Hashtag
Never forget to use your brand’s hashtag. This allows those who are searching specifically for your brand to easily find your account. It also teaches your community to use your hashtag when posting on Instagram about your brand. Château Lynch-Bages has only created 91 Instagram posts, but their community has used their brand hashtag over 6,000 times. They have created their own marketing army. This is a powerful tool. Keep your brand hashtag simple and as close to your brand name as possible.
Use Related Brand Hashtags
There are other brands and businesses you do business with. There are other brands that you use in your craft. When it is relevant, make sure to piggyback on their audience to open up your brand to them. Photographer Rudy Serrano is smart to know that people who are interested in photography and landscapes will also be interested in Nikon. It’s a great way to expand your audience.
PRO TIP – go beyond using related brand hashtags, make sure you tag their actual accounts. That will send them a notification and increase your chances of collaborations and shares.
How to Manage Your Instagram Accounts
You are now ready to start seeing targeted eyes reach your Instagram account. But, Instagram is a network that requires tools to save you time and help you plan your strategy. Socialdraft is an all-in-one Instagram management tool. Here are some of the things you can do with Socialdraft:
Schedule posts to multiple Instagram accounts
Have multiple people create and post content
Search hashtags
Repost images to all your connected social networks
Seems like Instagram is the place for food. Restaurants, food bloggers, chefs, and food suppliers rule supreme on the network. If you are planning to market your food brand on Instagram, you need to be smart about what you post, when you post it, and – most importantly – the hashtags you use to get the right people to look at your posts. Today, we’re going to start you off with some general food hashtags, Take a few seconds to copy them and save them. This will be the building block of your Instagram Food strategy. Then, read our guide below. We’ll teach you how to reach the right audience so you can convert them into customers, clicks, or purchases.
The hashtags above are there to get you started. However, because they all have been used more than 500,000 times, they will quickly drop in the Instagram feed. That is why it is imperative that you edit this list and combine it with other hashtags that will help you reach the right audience. Let’s explore a few examples on how you can use food hashtags on Instagram.
Use Location & Food Hashtags
If you are a local business, say a restaurant, cafe or supermarket, it is imperative that you use location hashtags. Note the example above. Gotham Grill used the #NYCEats hashtag to make it easier for them to be found by people in NYC. Begin by tagging your city, neighborhood and even state so that you can come up when people are exploring your location.
Use Your Brand’s Hashtag
What better way to teach your customers to use your tag than to use it yourself. Trader Joe’s includes their hashtag #traderjoes on their posts for a few reasons. First, it allows them to come up on search when people search their brand. Second, when people look at their posts, they will get a subconscious reminder to tag their brand when they post about them. TJ’s has only posted 267 images, yet their tag has been used over a million times. Pretty smart right?
PRO TIP: Include instructions on your profile with a call to action asking your followers to tag you and use your tag on their posts.
Use Related Food Hashtags
We bet no matter what kind of food business you are, you’re working with other brands. It’s smart to piggy-back on their brand when relevant. Whole Foods tagged #Allegrocoffee on their post. This is smart because it encourages them to engage. It also makes so that people who are interested in their brand now have a direct path to connect with your business.
Industry Hashtags
These are simple. For example, if you’re a lobster shack, use lobster related hashtags. Why? This will give you a broader reach on Instagram. That means more likes which will give you a better chance of staying up on the newsfeed. This is merely a numbers game to keep you in sight so you can reach a targeted audience.
How to Manage Your Instagram Accounts
Now that you have a solid starting place for your Instagram Food Hashtag strategy, you need a tool to help you with implementation. Socialdraft is your all-in-one Instagram management tool. With Socialdraft, you can:
Schedule posts to multiple Instagram accounts
Have multiple people create and post content
Search hashtags
Repost images to all your connected social networks
Hashtags are to Instagram what keywords are to Google. Hashtags are Instagram’s most powerful tools when it comes to being found organically. But, there are many brands and businesses out there who do not use Instagram hashtags the right way. Today, we will discuss the best practices for using Instagram hashtags to help you get more organic reach and to be seen by targeted eyes, by the people who can convert.
How To Use Instagram Hashtags
If your posts are set to public, you can add hashtags to your photos and videos.
1) Take a photo/video and choose a filter.
2) On the screen you see after choosing a filter, type your hashtags in the Caption field (ex: #flower).
3) If you want to tag a post you’ve already uploaded, edit the caption or include your #hashtag in a comment on your photo.
After you tag your post with a hashtag, you’ll be able to tap the hashtag to see a page that shows all photos and videos people have uploaded with that hashtag. We’ll use examples from companies currently using our dashboard to better explain each point.
Instagram Tips on Using Hashtags
Adding tags to your photos is a great way to find new followers and share your photos with more people. But hashtags can be tricky, we’ll discuss some tips and best practices to get you started.
Be Industry Specific
Choosing industry-specific tags will help you connect with other like-minded people on Instagram, specifically customers, and verticals. This post by Devocion makes great use of coffee hashtags.
Be Relevant
Make it easy for other like-minded Instagrammers to find you by making sure your tags describe your photo. Using very general tags like #photo or #wine might get you a few likes, but with over 700,000 photos tagged #photo, and 15,000,000 tagged #wine, it isn’t the best way to make your photos stand out and connect with the people most like you. Instead, use relevant tags to help you attract new followers who will take a genuine interest in your photos and continue liking and commenting on your photos over time. The Loire Valley is new to Instagram, but is already using great targeted hashtags including #urLoire #PouillySurLoire which will attract a very targeted audience.
Pay Attention
Pay attention to the other hashtags used on photos that use the same tag as yours. You may discover a popular hashtag you hadn’t thought of on your own. Instagram’s gives a great example of photos tagged #volkswagen. When you do a search for images with the #volkswagen tag, they noticed that Instagrammers use #vw to describe their Volkswagen photos more than twice as often as they use #volkswagen. Look for similar patterns for your Instagram brand.
Emoji Hashtags
Emoji hashtags promise to be tons of fun. A travel agency could begin to brand themselves with emoji hashtags of flags and planes, wineries could use their name and a glass of wine. The possibilities are endless and this will add a great personal touch to your brand.
Using Top Instagram Hashtags
We usually advise against using this type of Instagram hashtag. All those #f4f, #like4like and #followforfollow tags will put your post in front of eyes that have no value when it comes to conversions. The name of the game on Instagram is targeting and this is a certain way to make sure you lower your chances of seeing a return on investment on your Instagram efforts. Also, these hashtags are used a lot, so you’ll get buried by the sheer volume of content created around these tags.
Niche Hashtags
The more specific hashtags are, the more engagement they attract. And the people engaged are more robust and active in the Instagram community. These are an absolute yes. If you are looking for hashtags for your particular industry or a particular holiday, check out our Instagram hashtag directory.
Instagram’s Weekly Hashtag Project
Check out Instagram’s Weekend Hashtag Project where they feature chosen themes and hashtags by the Community Team at Instagram. The weekend project is announced every Friday and on Monday Instagram showcases some of their top-notch submissions.
How to Manage Multiple Instagram Accounts
Socialdraft is your all-in-one Instagram management tool. With Socialdraft, you can:
Schedule posts to multiple Instagram accounts
Have multiple people create and post content
Search hashtags
Repost images to all your connected social networks
We’re HUGE fans of Instagram. Yeah, all those “Buy 100,000 Instagram Follower” accounts are annoying, but overall it’s an awesome platform to connect with and convert your audience. Today’s post is all about the tools that we use in-house and absolutely LOVE for Instagram management. They are listed in alphabetical order cause we didn’t want any of them to get mad.
It should come as no surprise that we use Socialdraft. Our dashboard allows you to find content creators by hashtag. You can then schedule reposts of their content to all your social media sites. You can schedule posts to multiple accounts and repost Instagram content to other social networks including Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn with a few clicks.
Use this one to find posts that nobody has liked yet. Why would you do this? It’s an incredibly powerful way to get people to pay attention to you and to follow you.
This app is super fun. It’s directly from Instagram and allows you to shoot long-term video and condense it into a short amount of time (like an old-school silent film). If you want some ideas on how to use Hyperlapse, click here.
Big fan of Lomotif. It lets you choose a video from your phone and add snippets of music to it. You can then share it on Instagram. It’s free, but to remove their watermark, you pay a small sum – totally worth it.
This one is my fave. You don’t need Photoshop if you have this handy app. There are tons of images you can choose from and you can add write-ups to them. It’s super easy to use too. Totally worth the $3.99.
The online photo sharing and social networking service Instagram, allows users to take pictures and videos, apply digital filters, and share them on other social networking services such as Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and Flickr. It’s a fantastic marketing tool for all types of businesses and really encourages your audience to engage with you by liking your images and leaving comments on there.
In 2014, Instagram had over 150 million users. In April of 2017, this number had grown to 700 million ACTIVE monthly users. Instagram has become the fastest growing social media platform. As part of an effort to maintain quality posts on Instagram, you should choose storylines that are authentic to your brand and are best conveyed through captivating imagery. Create posts that follow these themes. Include images and videos that are well-crafted, and take time to learn from other brands. Keep captions short and fresh and include hashtags. Lastly, make sure you manage your account. This means keeping an eye out for spam comments and deleting those when they happen.
How to Delete Comments on Instagram
Typos and Comment Spam
Comment spam sucks. It comes about mostly from those bots that leave generic comments such as “great pic” or “awesome” regardless of the content of the post. This is done by those trying to game the system to get more followers. Frankly, it stinks. This is not the way to grow an engaged following that can convert. It merely leads to vanity metrics that no brand should be interested in.
If your business account gets this type of comment, don’t just leave them there. You can delete them and keep your feed clean. It’s easy to delete comments on any picture or video you’ve posted. This includes any comment another user has left on your photo or any comment or caption you’ve added beneath your photo. You can also delete any comment you yourself have left on somebody else’s photo.
Delete Instagram Comments oniPhone
Swipe left on the comment
Tap the Garbage icon
”If somebody is using abusive language or harassing you, choose “Delete & Report Abuse.”
Delete Instagram Comments on Android
Tap the little speech bubble beneath the photo like you’re leaving a new comment.
Tap and hold on the comment YOU WANT TO DELETE.
Choose either Delete or Delete and Report Abuse.
Delete Instagram Comments on Desktop
Go to your Instagram page (it’s instagram.com/username) and log in.
Find the photo in question and hover the pointer over the filthy comment.
You’ll see a small [x] appear next to it. Click that and choose “Delete.”
How to Manage Your Instagram Account
Socialdraft is more than an Instagram management tool. Socialdraft is an all-in-one tool to help you manage your social media including Instagram. With Socialdraft you can:
Schedule posts to multiple Instagram accounts, Twitter accounts, Facebook pages, Pinterest boards, and LinkedIn pages
Schedule one-time posts, recurring posts, or duplicate posts
Schedule posts in bulk with a CSV
Engage your community on the feed
Be made aware whenever your brand or business is mentioned online
By now you know that Instagram gets more engagement than any other social network. If you are a local business who is just starting to use Instagram to try to get more people to come in, you’ll be playing catchup. That does not mean that you can’t succeed. Very often, small local businesses stop being “active” on Instagram within a month or so. They get discouraged because they see no results from just sharing a picture. I’m going to be honest here, Instagram takes strategy, consistency, and work. Today, we’ll give you the break down on how Instagram works; then we’ll give you 15 easy to implement Instagram Tips for Local Business.
How Instagram Works
Instagram is a social network that revolves around images – both photos and videos. When someone first logs onto Instagram, they see images taken by people they follow. Instagram users can also use the search feature to search the top posts for a particular term, people, hashtags and places.
How are Images Organized on Instagram
When you log onto Instagram and you see the images posted by people you follow, they are prioritized by how often you engage them. So, if you always like and comment on someone’s posts, it is most likely that you will see those first.
If you search people, those you follow will come up first, then those you engage most, then those that are active on the network.
If you search by hashtag or location, you will first be shown the top 9 performing posts, then you will be shown the latest images to be posted with that hashtag.
Why Should You Use Instagram to Market Your Small Business?
Instagram is an incredibly effective marketing tool for small businesses. As a business, you can grow followers and directly speak to them on the network. Because the site is focused on images, it makes it easy to tell the story of your business or brand. It is also one of the fastest growing social networks. As of September 2017, there were 500 MILLION active users. Those are some strong numbers.
Before we get to the tips to help you maximize your return on investment, let’s cover the basics.
How to Create a Solid Instagram Business Account
Create Your Username and Fill Out Your Profile
The above example is a good profile for a local business on Instagram. Why? The profile clearly and simply states what this account is and where it is located. There is no question that this is a French restaurant in New York City. Here are some tips on how to make your Instagram business account effective:
UseConsistent Handles
When choosing the name of your Instagram account, try as much as you can to be consistent with your username/handle. Sign up for an Instagram account with the same name as your Twitter & Facebook account. Madison Bistro has the same handles across Social Media, including Twitter. This makes them super easy to find across networks. If your desired username is taken up, keep the new version as simple as possible.
Connect to Facebook
Make sure to connect your account to Facebook. When eligible, switch to a business profile.
Take Care of Branding
Add a profile photo or brand logo. Bear in mind that your profile photo or brand logo will be cropped into a circle and appear as a 150 x 150-pixel image on most phones, so your logo or image needs to be legible on smartphones and mobile devices.
Link Out to Your Website
Add a link to your website. This is especially important because you can’t add links to Instagram posts. Your profile is the only spot where a link can push people towards your website, so make this a priority.
SEO Your Profile
Make sure to include call-to-action phrases and geo-location information so people know where your local business is located. In the example above we have “Traditional French Cuisine” and “Madison Avenue”. This gets the point across without being spammy.
Convert to a Business Account
You will hear from many that it is harder to get engagement as a business account. To these people, I say – analytics are key. What does engagement matter if the people who are following you are not your target audience? If you were the above restaurant in NYC and your following was in Spain, you’d want to know and re-work your strategy, right? The idea is not to have vanity metrics, but to have followers who can convert. If you don’t have access to analytics, you will have a much harder time getting people to convert.
Instagram Tips for Local Businesses
Start with Clear Goals
Consider how Instagram fits into your overall brand marketing strategy. Is your objective to increase awareness, shift perception, or reach a new audience? Pick a goal or two that can be achieved by connecting with Instagram’s highly visual and creative community. If you were this French restaurant in NYC, you could start with setting a goal to get 100 people in NYC to follow your account. This is clear, attainable, and measurable. Once this goal is set, then you can create more aggressive goals, like getting 50 people to click thru to your website to make reservations for an event. Again, the key here is that your goals are clear and attainable.
Choose Themes to Tell a Cohesive Story
Choose storylines that are authentic to your brand and are best conveyed through captivating imagery. Create posts that follow these themes for a diversity of content that also remains consistent over time. For example, pick a filter and stick with it. Make all your images black and white…you get the idea. The example above uses Tiffany’s iconic blue as the overall theme of their account.
A photo posted by Madison Bistro NY (@madisonbistrony) on
Create High-quality Content Work with your brand or creative team to produce images and videos that are well-crafted and feel at home on the platform. Or, if you’re a one-person shop, take some time to learn from other brands and popular Instagrammers and follow their lead.
Keep captions short and fresh. People online have a short attention span, so don’t give them a book to read.
Ask questions to engage people This will get them to comment on your post and increase your engagement. A few examples: What do you think our most popular dish is? Are you ready for Happy Hour/Friday/The Weekend? Are you Hungry?
Comment & Like Use hashtags, location, and photos of you to find others’ images of your brand. Engage with them by liking and commenting on their images. Since you are a local business, you will also want to engage those posting images of your city, state, and neighborhood. They’re nearby…you can convert them!
Geo-Tag your Posts
Include the location of your photo or video when it helps tell the story of the image. This will make it so your image comes up when people search by location, it’s a great way to be discovered especially now that people will be able to follow hashtags.
A photo posted by Le Bernardin (@lebernardinny) on
Tag Relevant People Use the Add People feature to tag accounts in your image when they will help you reach a broader audience. Note how Le Bernadin tags their Chef Eric Ripert.
Use Image Editing Apps Edit your images with filters and other tools available in the Instagram app. These effects give images that unmistakable “Instagram” look that people respond to. You can also use these to say add a logo to brand all your images. Highlight Your Brand’s Identity Post photos and videos of beautiful and unexpected moments that also feel authentic and immediate. Whether your subject is a person or an object, capture it in a context that gives a sense of your brand’s identity or point of view.
Hashtags are one of the keys to success on Instagram. Make sure to use relevant, popular (but not too popular) ones for your image content. Incorporate a mix of targeted and general hashtags (we recommend you use all 30). If you don’t know how to use Instagram hashtags, click here. But in the meantime, make sure you use location-specific hashtags.
Pay Attention To The Background
Sometimes the background in your photograph is more interesting than the person or image in the foreground. You don’t want someone to sneak in the background for a photobomb that can ruin your shot. Or maybe you do want things like that to happen. As long as it’s interesting it can get you and your brand attention.
A photo posted by Bellini Italian Restaurant (@bellininyc) on
There are a lot of photos on Instagram, as in billions of photos. You’ll know when you’re getting too much light in the frame and when you’re not getting enough. “There is a lot more you could do with light, but for quick ways to make your photos different try shooting from unique angles. Get real low and shoot up on things like buildings, walls, and people. These photos will stand out and will get you lots of attention.”
Promote Your Business on Both Facebook and Instagram
If you really want to maximize your efforts, then boost them with paid media. Chances are your competitors are not currently doing this which means you can get some amazing ad prices and tons of rewards.
Widen Your Exposure to Other Brands
Social Media Examiner advises small businesses to follow other brands on Instagram. It’s good to research, you can engage their followers, and you can stay fresh with ideas.
Balance Fun Images With Pictures From Your Business
Keep your Instagram feed fun. Don’t just push out promotional items, Instagram is all about lifestyle. Take pics of your staff, customers (always with permission) and get them involved in the process.
Post to Instagram daily
Studies show that if you don’t post consistently, your audience will leave and your reach will drop. It will also make it harder for you to come up on search. That’s why it is so important that you post daily on Instagram. You can schedule posts for multiple Instagram accounts using the all-in-one social media tool, Socialdraft.
Socialdraft is more than just an Instagram management tool. With Socialdraft, you can:
Schedule to multiple Instagram accounts, Twitter accounts, Facebook pages, Pinterest boards, and LinkedIn pages
Schedule one time, duplicate, or recurring posts
Schedule in bulk (perfect if you run recurring promotions, post reviews, and evergreen content).
Set up different people on your team with different permissions.
