TikTok has become a real disease since its inception — everyone around is using this social network, shooting various content, spending hours on, and watching short videos one after another. Because of this huge popularity, the trends of this platform are also changing — literally every day there is a new trending music, dance, or video sequence on TikTok that everyone enjoys. It can be hard to keep up with such changes, isn’t it? For you to keep up with all the latest trends and become fluent in trending hashtags, we decided to write this guide, especially for those achieving explosive growth on TikTok.
The Power of the Hashtag: Myth or Magic?
For most users, hashtags on TikTok are nothing more than just a fancy option that doesn’t have a significant meaning. Even marketers and webmasters who don’t fully understand how TikTok’s algorithms work don’t pay as much attention to hashtags as they should. However, the reality is that hashtags play a crucial role in video promotion — if you choose the right trending hashtags, your video will magically appear in the recommendations and get a huge number of views. To debunk the myth that they are useless, let’s take a detailed look at how they work and what functions they fulfil.
- Content Classification. Hashtags help the TikTok algorithm classify videos by topic. This means your video will be shown to users who are already interested in similar content;
- Increased visibility. Using popular and trending hashtags increases the chances that more people will see your video. This is especially important if you want to increase the number of subscribers;
- Increasing engagement. The right hashtags can increase engagement as they will show your video to an audience that is more likely to like, comment, or share it;
- Target Audience. Hashtags help you attract your target audience who are interested in your content.
We’ve learnt that hashtags are not useless at all. But it’s important to realise that simply adding a bunch of hashtags to a video won’t do anything, even if they are trending. You need to use hashtags with a certain strategic approach, and only then will they be truly effective. Here are the steps that should go into your hashtag strategy:
- The first thing to do is to research the latest TikTok trends. This way you can find out which hashtags are in demand right now, which hashtags on TikTok make it into recommendations, and generally become more aware of the latest trends on the platform, highlighting a few ideas for your videos;
- The next step is to find the perfect balance between trending and niche hashtags. As we said above, just adding a lot of trending hashtags under your videos won’t work, as such hashtags have a lot of competition and you won’t attract your target audience. It is important to use niche hashtags as well, which will attract your target audience with less competition;
- Another important nuance that should not be ignored in any way is creating your own, unique hashtags. It may not seem like it will get you anywhere, but if your video gets into the recommendations and gains a lot of views, the hashtag will also become popular, which will increase your profile or brand awareness. It’s best to create your own hashtags using the name of the brand or something related to it;
- The last step of using hashtags strategically is to analyse their effectiveness. This way you can understand which hashtags are effectively bringing in views and which ones are not. You can use internal analytics tools as well as third-party services to do this.
So we’ve taught you how to use hashtags correctly, but now the question is how to choose the best ones. This is key, as the right hashtags will determine the effectiveness of your TikTok promotion. Here are some working methods for finding the best hashtags for your videos:
Trending hashtags can be quickly viewed in two ways: through the Discover section and by using the feed of popular hashtags. In the first case, you can view various popular videos under which you can explore trending hashtags. In the second case, you can simply browse your own feed and select popular videos by familiarising yourself with the hashtags used in them. An important nuance in choosing the best hashtags is their relevance and target audience. If a hashtag is popular but doesn’t fit your niche or context, it’s best not to use it.
Hashtag generators
There are online services that allow you to browse and find the best hashtags to integrate into your TikTok videos. Among such tools are the All Hashtag, TikTok Hashtags Generator, or Display Purposes services. They automatically analyse the platform’s latest trends and allow you to choose the best hashtags.
Competitor Analysis
Competitors, just like you, strive to match their videos with the most relevant and effective hashtags. So you can follow your competitors and see what hashtags they use under their videos. If they fit your niche and your competitors’ videos are gaining a lot of views, you can also use these hashtags in your content. It’s also a good idea to compare the hashtags of two or more competitors and choose the best ones.
Developing a winning hashtag strategy
When you have chosen which hashtags you will use in your content, you can start developing a strategy for their use. This is a very important element of your promotional strategy, as you need to find the optimal number of hashtags, use a mix of them, consider their type, and add them to your video correctly. Let’s look at each of these aspects separately so that you can create your own effective hashtag strategy.
There is a delicate balance between using enough hashtags and being overwhelmed by them. Too many hashtags can make a video caption unwieldy and make it difficult to see, which will affect engagement and just look ugly. It’s best to use three to five hashtags. This is the optimal number that allows the video to remain relevant and visible without overloading it with hashtags.
Proper hashtag placement
Hashtags should also be placed correctly, look organic and natural: do not distract attention from the main caption, and do not affect the perception of the video. Remember that they are needed primarily for ranking algorithms. To add hashtags correctly, it’s best to insert them at the beginning and at the end of the video caption to increase their visibility without losing the engagement rate. Another rule for posting hashtags effectively is to separate them with text. Separate hashtags with text to increase the readability of the video caption. You can also combine hashtags with each other or with other caption elements, such as mentions of other users or calls to action.
Hashtags are divided into three different types, each of which you need to use in your content to effectively promote your account. Let’s look at each type of hashtag separately:
- Popular hashtags. These hashtags maximise visibility and reach a wider audience. They help your video get into recommendations to multiply views. However, be careful not to use hashtags that are too generic, which can get lost among millions of other videos or attract an irrelevant audience;
- Niche hashtags. Niche hashtags are aimed at a narrower audience. They help your videos appear to those users who are actually interested in your content. This helps attract more engaged and targeted audience;
- Branded hashtags. Branded hashtags are unique hashtags related to your brand or company. They improve your brand awareness and encourage users to create content related to your brand. Branded hashtags also help track mentions and interactions with your brand on the platform.
Implementing a comprehensive strategy
In order for your strategy to help effectively promote your TikTok account, you need a comprehensive approach to content creation. To do this, you need to always stay on trend, regularly analyse the effectiveness of hashtags and experiment with content. This way, you will be able to find new, effective approaches, and always stay aware of the latest trends and the effectiveness of your overall strategy.
If you want to maximise your audience reach and significantly increase views and subscribers, you need a specific, powerful approach to promote your videos.
For You Page (#FYP)
The For You Page (FYP) is where TikTok users discover new content picked up by the platform’s algorithms. Getting on the FYP greatly increases your video’s reach and chances of going viral. Hashtags play a key role in this process. To get on the FYP page, analyse hashtags and determine which category they belong to and use the hashtag #FYP. The thing is, FYP displays videos to users based on their interests, and their interests can range from common to very niche. So it’s worth finding out what category your hashtags belong to, and if they’re all very niche, replace them with hashtags with a wider reach while still belonging to your niche. You also can’t hit FYP without using popular and trending hashtags. These hashtags on TikTok are actively used and viewed by a large number of users, which increases the visibility of your content and increases the likelihood of your videos getting into FYP.
Sure, hashtags are mainly needed to improve the visibility of your videos, but who says users don’t care about them? With the help of hashtags, you can also increase user engagement as well by raising the likes, comments, and repost rates.
- Engaging your target audience. Since hashtags can be used to attract a targeted audience, increasing the number of such users will raise the engagement rate on your account. Targeted users will be more active in liking, commenting on your videos, and sending them to friends who can also become part of your subscribers. Seeing an increase in engagement, other subscribers will start to raise your metrics too;
- Community building. Using certain hashtags regularly can help you build a community around your content. Users who frequently see your videos under certain hashtags will begin to recognise your brand and actively engage with it. For this, it’s best to use unique hashtags that you create yourself, such as the name of your brand or the name of a challenge you’ve come up with, for example, we’d use #RateMeUp;
- Stimulating discussions. Hashtags can stimulate the start of discussions and encourage more comments under your videos. For example, by using hashtags related to current topics, you can pique users’ interest and encourage them to engage in discussions. In this case, we would use the hashtag #DigitalMarketing or #TrafficNews
To maximise success, it’s important to not only use hashtags but to constantly track their effectiveness and adjust your strategy to maximise reach as needed:
- Analytics and tools. Use TikTok’s analytics tools to track which hashtags are performing best. Pay attention to the number of views, likes, comments, and reposts for each hashtag;
- Experimentation and testing. Constantly experiment with new hashtags and combinations of hashtags. Try using different hashtags in different videos to determine which ones bring in the most followers;
- Adjusting your strategy. Make adjustments to your strategy based on your findings. If you notice that certain hashtags are not delivering the results you expected, change them to more effective hashtags.
One of the best ways to maximise the promotion of your videos and TikTok profile is to run a hashtag challenge. Hashtag Challenges encourage users to create content on a specific topic, which greatly increases the chances of your video going viral.
Effectiveness of hashtag challenges
Hashtag Challenges have the unique ability to capture the attention of a wide audience and generate mass engagement. They create a sense of community and make users feel like they are part of something big. When users see that there are a lot of participants in a hashtag challenge, they start to want to participate too, leading to an avalanche effect of spreading.
Finding and participating in hashtag challenges
To make the most of hashtag challenges, it’s important to be able to find the right hashtag challenge. To do this, regularly check your Discover page and feed of popular hashtags to stay up to date on current trends and challenges. Participating in popular Challenges greatly increases your chances of visibility and virality. It’s also important to only participate in shuttle challenges that will be of interest to your target audience. If your audience is interested in a certain topic, choose a challenge that matches their interests, otherwise, the reach will be too broad and you won’t be able to promote effectively. It’s not enough to just add the right hashtags and make a simple video for the challenge — you need creativity to stand out from the other participants in the challenge. Only with creativity can you make your video eye-catching and get a lot of views.
Creating engaging content for a hashtag challenge
To stand out within a hashtag challenge and maximise attention to your content and account, you should follow these simple tips:
A bright start. The first few seconds of your video should maximise your users’ attention so that they don’t just click through. To achieve this, it’s important to make the beginning of your video bright, interesting and engaging;
Uniqueness. Find an original way to perform the challenge you are taking part in. It can be a non-standard use of props, an unusual angle of shooting, or an unexpected turn of the plot. All this will make you stand out among other participants and the video will gain more views;
The quality of the footage. Make sure your video is well-shot and well-edited. A clear image and quality sound make the video more appealing to users’ perceptions;
Emotions and interactives. Evoke emotions in viewers and add interactive elements. The more emotion your video evokes, the more likely viewers will want to watch it to the end and share it with others.
Conclusion
Hashtags are positioned as an additional feature to increase the reach of your content, but in fact, they are the most important element for really effective promotion in TikTok. By neglecting to use them, you’ll simply waste your time, achieving scanty results while wasting a huge amount of time creating your videos. Properly use hashtags in your content to effectively attract your target audience, increasing their engagement and making your account more popular than your competitors.
