#Breaking: we can finally follow hashtags on Instagram too!

From now on it seems like we can not only follow our favourite blogs and celebrity pages (BreadfaceBlog, Sadtopographies, Tomharyholdingdogs) but an opportunity arose to follow and send hashtags (#glitternails #whyIamSingle #geeksneedlovetoo) too! This feature had been a long awaited one and kind of an obvious step on Instagram’s behalf. Up until now we only had two options to go after hashtags: No. 1 is to click through a hashtag in a post, or No.2 is you could search for a hashtag on the explore section of the app.

The new feature works like this:

When you find a hashtag you like, open the hashtag page and tap on the (new) follow button or send the hashtag result to any of your Insta friends. From the moment you follow a hashtag you’ll see relevant hashtags displayed in your search results along with related accounts and some of the latest stories in your stories bar. This way, you'll have a chance to convince the app to provide you with more images of your interest, you can also train the algorithm on what you do and don’t like: (not to mention the voluntary ad target info Instagram gets of you, pal). By “hearting” the image, Instagram will assume, you will want to see more of similar content, in the future OR click the menu button on the top right of the post, and you can downvote the offending image by asking Instagram not to show you similar content for that hashtag again.

Why is it useful?

Well we all have favourite topics of course we would prefer to pop up in our feed more, but working with clients you also want to stay on top of trends and this is what this feature allows you to do. Passively!

Let’s say you have a beer brand and you would like to see how and in what context people are mentioning beer: #craftbeer #beerlove #beerstagram #instabeer #wishyouwerebeer #bebamenosbebamelhor #instacerveja #sebebernaodirija #beerporn #cervejabrasil #craft #beer #bier #cerveja #birra #biere #breja #cerveza #pivo #cervejaartesanal #bar #love #lovebeer #instabeeroficial #drinkallthethings, etc. This way you’ll see all the public photos of people and brands posting beer related content, so, the next time your client asks about costumer behaviour, you’ll have just one more thing to refere to.

It is also hyper cool to not having to make hashtag hunt an activity, but Instagram provided us with a sort of passive way of consuming favourable content.

Expanding Influencers' toolkit!

When it comes to influencer communication it is very useful too! Someone may have just a few dozen followers, but by grouping their post through hashtags, they can get their images in front of thousands, even millions of potential viewers, all of whom tune in each day for hashtags about food, fashion, and warm knits. Instructing your influencers to use the relevant hashtag (and come up with hashtags consistently used in bard communication) have never been so important!

How we’re using hashtags:

When working on American Tourister, we adopted the internationally used #meandmyAT; while with HERZ, we come up with the super-cute #mutimitherzelsz, of which, the community was already using in a slightly different form. It was highly adaptable! Brand ambassadors have posted sandwiches with the hashtag, popularizing sandwich making and celebrating creativity! With other brands, it only made sense to do the same: take an already trending hashtag to use it for our brands favour: #Mutimiteszel #Mutihogyrazod in case of Sió bottleflip challenge. When introducing hohesC’s newest 0,25L bottled version, we created a campaign, with #viddelanyat (#takemomto) #futni (#running), #muzeum (#museum), etc. to encourage people care more about their Mom more, by taking her out. It was a popular inchoation, that resulted in lovely UGC’s, supported by hashtags. 

Be inventive with your hashtags and take immediate action when people start posting, and using something relevant for your brand.

Stalk for #

One more way to find hashtags you might like, is to check out the hashtags other people follow in their profiles. If you set your account to private, the hashtags you follow will only be visible to your followers. Another tip from me, because I like you, reader! Click on any brand that might be a competitor to your brand, and check out what hashtags they are #followowing. It is called #hashtagstalking. Very popular among members of generation Z. (just kidding).

Author: Zsuzsa Gulyas