The most popular hashtags for promotion – why affiliate needs it

Mar 19, 2024 15 min read

While some people are thinking about how to live and not work, others are looking for new ways to make money quickly and painlessly by promoting social media accounts and affiliate links. In this article, we’ll talk about how hashtags can help boost the popularity of social media accounts and content, and how to identify popular hashtags for promotion. We’ll also show you how to use hashtags to promote affiliate offers to maximize reach and conversion. Be sure to read to the end.

What is a hashtag?

A hashtag is a tag below a post that is relevant to its topic. It consists of one or more keywords without spaces, preceded by a # sign. Literally, “hashtag” means “grid” and “tag”.

Twitter was the first social network to begin using hashtags. The tool quickly became popular on all social networks and blogs – from Instagram and Facebook to Odnoklassniki and VKontakte.

Top hashtags are a popular way to engage your audience and promote user-generated and promoted content. Today, more than 500 million tweets and more than 100 million photos are uploaded to Instagram every day. Studies show that tweets with hashtags get 100% more retweets and Instagram posts with hashtags get 70% more reactions. Therefore, it is unwise to ignore hashtags in 2024.

What are hashtags and why do you need them

The most trending hashtags help SEO and SMM professionals to quickly increase website traffic, users to find the information they need, bloggers and brands to structure content and increase their reach, and affiliates to find their target audience and promote affiliate offers.

The role of hashtags is to:

Organize content by topic, unify posts and identify headings;
Emphasize the essence of the publication;
Label the channel;
Introduce publications to interested audiences;
Help audiences find content more efficiently;
Run challenges and contests;
Attract new audiences.

Just like in SEO, only pages that are open for indexing are ranked for key queries, hashtags only work if the account is open. And they are categorized in the same way.

High-frequency hashtags

These have 100,000 or more publications. These are the most popular hashtags and are often used to collect mutual likes, comments and subscriptions. Many bot accounts automatically subscribe to high-frequency tags such as #goodmorning, #happiness, #love. Therefore, the effect of implementing hashtags with a frequency of 100,000+ can be the opposite. If you are going to use high frequency hashtags, limit yourself to at least two.

Medium Frequency Hashtags

Use for over 50,000 publications. To attract the attention of a targeted and warm audience, to find new customers for local businesses helps this hashtag, an example is: #laserepilation, #airtouchblond.

Low Frequency Hashtags

These are tags that appear in less than 50,000 publications. They are usually tailored to the subject matter of the account. Such hashtags include a specific query and have a long “tail”’, for example #rentalplatievallmattresses, #aeroshootcanwedding.

Hashtags are also categorized to conditionally divide by purpose:

thematic or niche – are needed to explain, the essence of the topic of the publication, business direction #rumtour, #fitness, #diving;
geolocation tags – contain a mention of a country, street or neighborhood, they are essential for promoting local business;
commercial – tags related to sales that include commercial words such as: #buy a kitten or #orderclothesonline;
brand (corporate) hashtags consist of the name of the brand, they raise recognition, familiarize the audience with the company and product;
trending hashtags refer to current events and holidays #valentinesday, #blackfriday, #new year, they can be used to increase activity;
hype (event) tags are used in sweepstakes, challenges and contests to identify participants and winners, for example #photoshoot as a gift or #rafflephone;
spammy (mass or viral) – these are hashtags for subscriptions, comments and likes such as #reciprocallik, #followme, #likeme, #wanttorecommend. Top hashtags for subscriptions include the following: #subscribe, #like, #subscribe, #reciprocalsubscribe, #follow, #followme, #instagram.

You can add your unique tags for navigation and identification, but hashtags to attract followers from your target audience need to be searched, selected, analyzed, collected, distributed, combined and updated.

Rules for writing hashtags in 2024

The rules for using hashtags in 2024 are not very different for various social networks. The only difference is the limit that is set by the platform itself. For example, Twitter, the founder of hashtags, limits the description of a post, including tags, to 280 characters. On Instagram you can use up to 30 tags in a post, on VK up to 10, and on Pinterest, Youtube and TikTok there are no restrictions on the use of hashtags.

If you want to add working hashtags to your post, you need to write them using the following rules:

All words are written in one word or undelined.
You can use emoji and numbers, but not special characters – dots, ampersand, dollar sign, percent, etc.
The choice of tag language depends on the local language of the target audience. You can write tags in Russian or in English, but note that in the second case the competition will be much higher, as English is used by 1.5 billion people in the world.
Hashtags should be readable and understandable, despite the lack of spaces – especially for low-frequency terms. Users don’t type sentences into the search bar, so there’s no point in promoting posts with hashtags that last a lifetime;)
You should not repeat someone else’s branded and unique hashtags, otherwise you can get lost among your competitors.
It is necessary to change hashtags. If, for example, you use more than 10 tags in Instagram and do not change them in any way in publications, you can cause trouble in the form of a shadow ban, because for the algorithms of the platform it has signs of spam.
The relevance of hashtags is probably the most important thing. Tags should be chosen to match the context and topic of the publication, the geo and theme of the account or the business in general. Irrelevant, high-frequency tags will not only negatively impact the promotion of the account, but will actually harm it.
Do not use prohibited hashtags – with obscene words, insults, propaganda of violence, related to the topic of fraud, as well as spam tags.

Once again, we remind you that in order for hashtags to work for the promotion of publications and posts, the account must be publicly available!

By the way, as practice shows, the use of hashtags inside the description text annoys the public, so in 2024 you should not do so.

How hashtags work in 2024

A working hashtag looks like a link. If a user clicks on a hashtag with a grid, it will take them to all publications or accounts that contain that tag. On Instagram, hashtags can be used in the profile header, added to posts and comments, to stories and reels.

How to make your hashtags work?

Getting to the top on hashtags is as difficult as getting into TikTok trends.

Firstly, you need to identify the best tags that will promote your content and account. We recommend combining different types of tags and settling on 10-15 pieces.
Then assess the level of competition for the selected tags – when the posts with them were published and how many reactions were collected. If there are few likes, it may be worth choosing a hashtag that is not the most popular.
Find out what time your target audience is most active. If you want to effectively and quickly promote accounts for affiliate marketing or other purposes, you need to know the best time to post on TikTok and other platforms. Use account statistics or special services to analyze user activity and publish posts with hashtags at the most convenient time of day.

Be aware that the competition in Instagram Stories is lower than in the publication feed. Therefore, do not limit yourself to promotional posts. It’s best to duplicate the post in the Stories – this way, you’re definitely going to be noticed by both Story and publication viewers..

How can hashtags help an affiliate?

Affiliates use popular tags to attract subscribers when promoting accounts and promoted posts. Hashtags are an effective way to increase the reach of publications that advertise affiliate offers. If they are chosen correctly and reflect the essence of the offer, users subscribed to the same tags will see the posts and accounts being promoted by them.

Hashtags that are directly related to a product or brand are an element of advertising. For example, people interested in online casinos may notice the account and sign up.

If an affiliate creates an account under a popular brand to promote an offer, branded hashtags can be used. For a particular community or a specific product for a narrow audience, unique hashtags are more suitable.

How to recognise popular hashtags and use them correctly for promotion

You can find out which hashtags are popular in Google.Analytics and Yandex.Wordstat. When selecting tags that are suitable for your account, pay attention not only to direct keys, but also to related ones. In SEO they are called LSI, i.e. words that indicate the topic.

We recommend that you use about the same number of high, medium and low frequency hashtags and add unique, branded and geolocation tags. The tags need to be updated from time to time so as not to arouse the suspicions of the algorithms.

Top tags are useful because they help you promote your account more effectively. By promoting your content, they significantly increase the reach and chances of getting recommendations. However, the most popular hashtags have disadvantages: your posts can be “eaten” by competitors. Furthermore, non-targeted followers who use mass following to promote their own account may come through them.

In parallel with the manual method of selection, popular hashtags on Vk, Fb, Instagram, X and other social platforms are searched using special services to find top hashtags. For example:

hashtags.org is an English-language service, but it is convenient to work with Russian hashtags too. Here, you can not only collect tags, but also get detailed analysis.
mytager.com is a tag generating service that can be installed on a smartphone. It allows you to select multiple hashtags, copy and paste them into your post. There are no statistics or analytical information on the platform; simply type in a key and the service will give you all the hashtags associated with it.
@ihash_bot is a Telegram bot that collects popular hashtags for posts on Instagram and other social networks. You just need to upload a photo and the bot will select the best hashtags.

Services for selecting hashtags have existed for a long time, and there are many of them. It is difficult to select the objectively best one. It is much more relevant to use artificial intelligence nowadays to generate working hashtags. The most common AI networks – ChatGPT, Gemini, Writesonic, Airuco – generate a list of content-relevant hashtags in seconds, taking into account trends and user interests. How are AI services better than the old tried-and-true generators? Firstly, ChatGPT analyses the context of the post, key points, topics and identifies the target audience, and then offers a list of hashtags that includes niche, general and trending tags. Secondly, an important advantage of AI services for content creation and hashtags is that they take into account updates to social platforms’ algorithms, adapt to trends, select effective and relevant tags – in other words, they think for you and do everything to get your post to the top.

We asked ChatGPT to generate hashtags for an Instagram post on the topic of crypto trading, and in response we received this list:

#CryptoTrading, #BitcoinTrading, #CryptocurrencyTrading, #CryptoInvesting, #CryptoProfits, #TradingCryptos, #CryptoMarket, #Cryptotrader, #AltcoinTrading, #CryptocurrencyTrader.

Gemini gave us more than we asked for, adding near-topic tags and a few more hashtag recommendations.

#crypto, #bitcoin, #ethereum, #blockchain, #btc, #eth, #cryptocurrency, #fintech, #investment, #money.

You can also use more specific hashtags related to your post, such as:

#cryptotrading, #cryptoinvestor, #cryptoanalysis, #cryptomemes, #tothemoon, #hodl, #rekt, #DYOR, #diamondhands, #paperhands.

And this is a response to the same prompt from Airuco:

#cryptotrading101, #cryptostrategy, #cryptoinvesting, #cryptotips, #cryptomarket #cryptocurrencytrader, #cryptoanalysis, #cryptotradingcommunity, #cryptoworld, #cryptocurrencyexchange.

Only God and Instagram’s statistics know which of them was more effective.

Trending hashtags – how to use hashtags on different social networks

According to statistics as of January 2024, TikTok is leading in terms of the number of views on hashtags. The most popular Tik Tok hashtags – #fyp (“page for you”) has collected almost 55.4 trillion views of publications with geolocation and the hashtag “for you” with 31.7 trillion views of short videos.

Hashtags on Twitter (aka X after rebranding)

Although Twitter was the first platform to use hashtags, they are no longer as popular today. To add popular hashtags to a post on Twitter, open the homepage and create a tweet in the ‘What’s new with you’ line. Use the ‘#’ symbol followed by the desired tag. If the hashtag already exists, the platform will suggest selecting it.

Facebook hashtags

Facebook doesn’t really welcome a lot of hashtags under posts. It is recommended to limit the use of hashtags to 3-5 popular ones in English and Russian to avoid violating the platform’s guidelines. For a column, one hashtag is sufficient.

Before publishing posts with hashtags on Facebook, it is important to set up privacy on the platform. You can choose to make your post available to everyone, all friends, all friends except certain people, a certain circle of friends, or only to yourself. Once you have adjusted your privacy settings, you can write your post, add a photo or video, and include hashtags after the text. Finally, publish your post. Hashtags on Facebook can help your post reach a wider audience and attract new followers. Facebook Insights can be used to track the effectiveness of hashtags.

It is important to note that unlike Twitter or Pinterest, users on Facebook cannot enter contests or challenges simply by clicking on an event hashtag. The hashtag only serves as a means to find the giveaway on social media.

Hashtags in TikTok

Bloggers on TikTok do not provide a clear answer to the question of how many hashtags it is better to add to posts. You can use from 2 to 12 tags, but not at the expense of quality. Additionally, it is important to consider that longer descriptions tend to cover more of the video’s content with text and hashtags, so we recommend not using the full 100-character limit and publishing videos at the best time of day.

Hashtags in Instagram

Before adding hashtags to your Instagram posts and sections, it is recommended to create a semantic core for your account. If you are creating an account for affiliate marketing and plan to publish promotional posts, collect the most popular hashtags on Instagram relevant to the vertical and promoted offers. The profile header usually includes a branded tag for recognition, and you can use the full limit (30 tags) as long as they fit within the 2200 character limit.

Usually a post has 10-12 tags. For optimal results on Instagram, it is recommended to use a ratio of 30% high-frequency, 30% medium-frequency, and 40% low-frequency hashtags. It is important to use not only the most popular hashtags, but also niche, viral, brand, and geolocation tags. To avoid being seen by the same users, we recommend updating your hashtags every two weeks.

Hashtags on Instagram can be separated from the text by using spaces and dots to make the description readable and legible.We don’t recommend using tags at the beginning of the text, and if you use tags in the description, they should fit the context exactly.The rest of the tags can be left in the comments – they are hidden hashtags, which are also ranked.

Conclusion

Today, hashtags are one of the most powerful tools for promoting publications. In the right hands, they can be a magic wand, helping to promote the account and content, bringing in potential leads and increasing activity on the page. And those who mindlessly use hashtags only to get to the top are unlikely to appreciate the benefits of using hashtags. The future of hashtags is hard to predict. And using hashtags just isn’t enough to get views today. Social networks are constantly updating their algorithms, and even a professional will not be able to tell you what will be trending tomorrow, and what will ‘go into the sunset’. Experiment, learn, gain experience and remember that LosPollos smartlinks are the easiest and most effective way to monetise mixed traffic, including social networks.

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