How to identify the most popular hashtags

May 5, 2020February 22, 2021

Hashtags are used on social media channels and are very important in your business, because if you don’t use them, you might lose something relevant.

But…

… if you use the wrong ones you will have to leave that path you have been leading for a long time; so let’s see how to find the most popular hashtags, but first let’s define what they are and why you should use them!

Table of Contents

What are hashtags?

A word that starts with the pound sign “#”
A way to categorize a content
A way to filter the contents (e.g. click on the hashtag to find all the updates on it)
A way to make your content a little more fun / interesting (e.g. #discover)
A way to let people know what you’re talking about (e.g. using the hashtag of an event or TV program)
One way to make yourself look stupid when you enter irrelevant hashtags

Why are hashtags useful?

Hashtags are a great way to group conversations linked together on social media channels. For example, if you are at a conference and there is a hashtag, you can follow everything without problems.

You can filter the conversation to interact with the people participating in that conference, promote your products / services using that hashtag and so on. However, if you use too many, or the wrong ones, they won’t help you earn that exposure you want to achieve.

Which platforms can you use hashtags?

Twitter – They are very popular on Twitter and it’s really worth using them, but not more than two per tweet and not too “wide” (e.g. #sport).
Instagram – In Ireland you would never leave home without your umbrella, just as you shouldn’t share content on Instagram without hashtags! This is where they are used the most.
Facebook – When you use them on this social network, you can click on the hashtag and see a filtered list of updates. However they are not used so often: recently I saw a post with a hashtag related to an event and when I clicked on it I saw many updates, which is useful, but since they are not considered so much on Facebook, you would capture a small percentage of conversation on this social.
Pinterest – Are clickable within the descriptions, but you can’t search for them.
Google+ – When you click on a hashtag you see a list of communities, people and posts relevant to that hashtag.

How to identify the relevant hashtags

The following tools will help you identify popular hashtags, but be careful, because the most renowned ones are not always the best to use, as there are many people sharing content on social media using that same hashtag, so it will be easy for some content to get lost in the fray when there are so many.

Therefore, you will not always have to choose the most popular hashtags number 1 on the list! Here are some tools and tactics to identify the most popular ones …

Ritetag

Ritetag analyzes hashtags on Twitter to find the most trendy and popular hashtags ones to automatically add them to tweets or Facebook updates, when you share them.

This automation will save you time in every post also because it has an extension on Chrome that makes everything much easier; it also integrates with Buffer, Hootsuite and Sendible as well as with Facebook and Twitter.

Hashtagify.me

With Hashtagify.me you can enter any hashtag that will give you a selection of those you can use in your updates. As you can see in the image below, those related to #MemorialDay can be displayed in a visual format and next to it there are tweets that used that hashtag.

You can use these tips to make sure you cover a specific hashtag range, not just the most popular ones.

Twitonomy

Twitonomy is a useful tool that analyzes a person’s account to see which hashtag you use most often: it’s an easier way to find the most relevant ones, so start finding someone important in your market niche that uses a lot of hashtags and use some.

Make a list of competitors or influencers and analyze their accounts with Twitonomy and you will see common hashtags appear.

Tagboard

Tagboard is a search tool for hashtags used on multiple platforms: insert one and Tagboard will show you a range of those contents that include it. It is very useful to see which other platforms use the popular hashtag you’ve shared, besides the fact that you can see the most popular content related to it.

Iconosquare

Iconosquare is an Instagram tool that allows you to search for hashtags on this social network and see how many times each has been used, which allows you to understand how popular they are on the site.

You can also click on “Top tags on Instagram” to find out which hashtags are popular and which you can then use, as long as they are relevant to your posts.