Using hashtags for hair and beauty businesses (with examples)

Do you use #hashtags on social media to promote your beauty, aesthetic or hair business?

Are you squeezing every last drop of marketing juice from them, or do you just randomly pop a handful in for good measure?

Used well hashtags will give you better targeted, more effective marketing campaigns for your salon, clinic or spa.

 

#1. What’s the best number of hashtags for Facebook and Instagram?

Facebook hashtags

Overusing hashtags on Facebook is irritating for followers, and won’t improve your Reach or engagement. On the contrary, too many hashtags makes people switch off to your brand and reach for the ‘Unlike’ button.

 

Instagram hashtags

Instagram has a limit of 30 hashtags per post, and if you try to add more it won’t let you post.

Always choose relevant hashtags for your Instagram posts because if a user follows a hashtag and sees a post they don’t think is relevant to that hashtag they can click the ‘Don’t Show for This Hashtag’ option.

If too many of your posts are flagged because of irrelevant or overused hashtags, Instagram can reduce, or even stop, your content being seen in searches.

To avoid this, and help your posts being seen by more users, always choose relevant hashtags that your target audience will relate to.

 

#2. Which hashtags are best for beauty, aesthetic and hair businesses?

Don’t worry. There are no right or wrong hashtags – feel free to dream up your own. That said, keep a close eye on which hashtags on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter are being used by:

• your local competitors
• your followers
• well-respected national aesthetic, beauty and hair businesses
• industry influencers such as Professional Beauty magazine, HJi or Aesthetic Medicine for example

and adopt the ones which appear to be most effective and popular.

And the best length for hashtags?

Marketing research on Facebook shows hashtags that are 6 characters long perform best. Hashtags that are 10 to 17 characters long also perform well on Facebook, but engagement starts to decrease for longer hashtags. TrackMaven https://trackmaven.com/

When choosing hashtags always ensure they are relevant and easily understood by your clients and followers. Keep them clear and easy to read by not stringing too many words together:

#hotautumnhairstyles is almost unreadable.

#hothairstyles is better.

#HotHair is best.

Are your hashtags easy to read?

And don’t be afraid to use uppercase/capitals. It makes longer hashtags so much easier to read.

Compare #salonmarketingtips with #SalonMarketingTips.

If you search for either version Facebook and Instagram will return the same results, so always opt for legibility.

 

#3. Your salon, clinic or spa brand hashtag

Create a hashtag for your business brand and use it consistently. It could be your spa, clinic or salon name, your tagline, or a unique feature of your business.

For example, we use #SalonMarketing #AestheticMarketing and #BeautyWebsites as they explain what we do.

By using these hashtags consistently across our social media we build brand recognition and awareness of our specialist agency and our blog. By the way, if you’re not following us on Facebook why not pop over and take a peek?

You can do the same with your beauty, aesthetic or hair business. Just keep your hashtag short and punchy by following my earlier tips.

Once you’ve developed your brand hashtag then use it to connect with local businesses, events and influencers. Look out for it being used by salon clients and friendly businesses so you can follow and then join in the conversation.

 

#4. Avoid these hashtag mistakes

If you see a hashtag being used on social media do check it out before diving in. It’s a tad embarrassing if it’s something you don’t want to be linked with, or is very specifically promoting a local competitor’s USP.

 

#5. Avoid these hashtags

No matter how popular they are, avoid hashtags that shamelessly ask for likes and followers: #followme, #like4like, #follow4follow, #tagsforlikes.

Not only do these attract bots and spammers they also make your brand look spammy to genuine followers and may put off your target audience.

 

#6. Boost your local brand profile with hashtags

If you’re promoting a new treatment or service, hosting an in-house event or running a social contest create a catchy hashtag for that marketing campaign. Now encourage people to use it on their social media channels. A strong hashtag will help spread the word, boost Likes and increase your organic (unpaid) audience.

 

#7. Are your hashtags working?

Finally, don’t forget to check your Facebook Insights and Instagram Insights to measure the response you’re getting.