I want to start this episode by pointing out the biggest misconceptions people have around hashtags. 

When you hear the word hashtag, a lot of people have an opinion.

One of the biggest mistakes that most people make on Instagram is that they think that hashtags guarantee engagement.

*Just because you use a hashtag on your post, that doesn’t mean someone will engage with your content.*

Think of hashtags like the icing on the cake. They add extra flavor to your post. They make it tastier.  It’s discoverable. People are interested in it.

The purpose of Instagram Hashtags is to make sure your content is searchable. That’s it.

When you add hashtags to your posts, they can appear when people are searching for that hashtag. This will increase your discoverability with different audiences.

Here’s another mistake: Most people spend a lot of time trying to figure out the right hashtags for their posts. 

Let me tell you something: there’s no such thing as the right hashtags.

I do recommend, though, to avoid using hashtags that are too big, have over 1M posts (#entrepreneur)

The chances of your post being discovered on this hashtags page are really low. I’d still use one big hashtag, but I recommend the rest of the hashtags to be smaller. 

Here’s a perspective shift: There are things in life that you can control and other things in life that you cannot control. 

In this case, you can control the content that you produce, but you cannot control which hashtags will work out the best. So, spend most of your time on the things that you can control.  Instead of trying to figure out the right hashtag.

I want you to spend most of your time testing out various hashtags that are relevant to the content you’re posting and, of course, make sure that the content you share is engagement-worthy. 

Now that we know the purpose of hashtags and a perspective shift, it’s time to uncover the 3 types of hashtags you should be using.

Hashtags on Instagram has given us an opportunity to show our content in front of our ideal customer… and that is the key here!

Once you clearly understand who your ideal customer is, their behavior, and where they might be hanging around, you’ll have a better understanding of what type of hashtags they’re using or searching for on Instagram.

This is what we talk in the Instagram Academy course, this is my brand-new Instagram course that helps busy business owners build a personal brand on Instagram so that they can turn their followers into paying customers.

If you’re looking for a step-by-step program to help you get more followers, create conversations on Instagram, and turn your audience into customers, then the Instagram Academy is for you. 

Enrollment closes on the 31st of May 2021 at midnight. Head to stevendecuba.com/enroll for more information.

3 types of hashtags every entrepreneur should use.

Searchable hashtags 

This is the type of hashtag your ideal customer is using to search the content they want to see. Of course, this is different for everyone and every industry, however, the best way to find terms to use is to put yourself in the shoes of your ideal customers. 

For example: if you’re a family photographer, your ideal customer may search for photo inspiration like #beachfamilyphotos #sunsetfamilyphotos #beachphotographer

These hashtags could also be keywords related to what’s in the picture. 

For example: #coffee #morningcoffee #yogamat #beachtowel 

Location-based Hashtags

Location-based has two different sides to it. First, these hashtags can be like the city, state, or general area where your ideal customer is hanging around. Secondly, this can be used as a way to cover specific locations in your city, state, or general area.

For example: if you’re a baker in Amsterdam, you can use different hashtags like #bakersofamsterdam #amsterdambakery #amsterdam #damamsterdam 

Industry / Community hashtags

These types of hashtags are specifically related to your industry or a community you’re part of. Be mindful that this works both ways, you can use these hashtags to connect with your ideal customer, but you can also use it as a way to connect with fellow business owners. 

When it comes to hashtags, size does matter. I encourage you to use different sizes of hashtags. For example, I like to do a mix of big hashtags with more than 1 million posts and really specific hashtags with less than 500,000 posts. 

See, if you only use big hashtags like #entrepreneur, your posts are going to be pushed down really fast, and you won’t be able to really leverage that hashtag. At the same time, don’t use overcomplicated hashtags like #stevendecubalikespinacolada – no one is going to search for that.

When you search for a hashtag, you can see how many times it has been used. Combine hashtags with different levels of popularity so you can reach different audiences. For instance, you can reach a very broad audience with #foodtrucks, a narrower group of people with #dcfoodtrucks, and a very specific group of people with #koreanbbqfoodtruck.

How many hashtags should you use on Instagram?

At this point, Instagram let you use 30 hashtags in feed posts and 10 in stories. You can go and maximize it. However, I believe that quality over quantity wins every day. It’s way better to have 10 hashtags that are related to the post, than having 30 with hashtags that doesn’t make any sense.

The Instagram Academy

The Instagram Academy is the most comprehensive personal branding course for business owners to sell more programs, services, or products – without spending the whole day on your phone.

I’ve taken everything I’ve learned for the past 9 years of growing my business on Instagram and put it together in this program for you. 

🔥7 different videos (easy to watch)

🔥Canva templates to make it easy for you to show up online

🔥10 Freebie ideas to turn your followers into paying customers

🔥25 Post ideas so you can plan your next month of content.

🔥Social media calendar so you can plan all of your posts

🔥A workbook to make it easy to follow.

…and so much more.

The doors are closing on the 31st of May 2021 at midnight.

Will I see you there? stevendecuba.com/enroll