How can you test the effectiveness of social media hashtags for your SMM career development?

Test, measure, test, measure. One important thing to note is going too broad or too niche won’t yield the results you are aiming to achieve. Try a mix of both.

A/B testing in social media marketing is the process of comparing two versions of an entire/element of a social media post to see which performs better. For example, comparing the performance of two social media posts where the only difference is the copy. Or they have the same copy but one post has a still image and the other has a video. This process can unlock valuable insights that you can use to adjust your social media marketing strategy, implementing the learnings to ensure that you are continually growing/moving closer towards your goals/objectives.

As mentioned previously, A/B testing allows you to analyse which elements perform best when considering your goal/objective. By A/B testing the use of different hashtags, you can quickly gain insights into the impact that they have in areas such as impressions, reach and engagement amongst other analytics. Consider these over the short/long-term to ensure that you are making adjustments to your editorial strategy so that you are always working towards your goal/objective.

If A/B testing via your organic strategy, try to keep as many elements as consistent as possible apart from the area you are testing. So try to post on the same day, at the same time, about the same topic. The only element you are changing is the hashtags that are selected (in this LinkedIn example). Do not change the asset, copy or any other element apart from the hashtags chosen. Compare the results at a later date and continually test this over the short-term to gain insights to consider in your editorial strategy moving forward.

A few best practices for a/b testing content for social hashtags are; -Use hashtags with different volumes of followers -Test non branded hashtags outside your industry -Gather hashtags from conversations not the search engine on platforms Hashtags can be a great tool, but without testing and allowing the audience to decide the hashtags you target will be a mistake that leads you without growth.

Using A/B testing in your social media content strategy you become an analytical creator. Not just a creative. Your decisions now have merit beyond the emotions that creativity requires. You have data! Using data to inform decisions, particularly creative decisions gives; -Confidence to leadership and the team -Ability to know which content works -Long term tracking and growth capabilities -Investment ROI (positions & resources)

Do not overuse hashtags in your posts - no matter how tempting. On platforms such as X and Instagram, the maximum you should be utilising is 3. Many would argue that on platforms such as Instagram and YouTube the implementation of hashtags has significantly lost its impact in recent years - however there is no harm in A/B testing to see what works best for your social media strategy.