Hashtag Strategy: How do I decide which hashtags to use? Look at the engagement on your own media posts. Look at the engagement of the top few posts in a hashtag you want to use. Are you likely to hit that number of likes in about 24h? (1/13)
If so, this is a competitive hashtag for you, and you are likely to hit the top few posts. When you are at the top of the "Top" page for a hashtag, this is when you have the highest chance of benefitting from that hashtag. Highest non-follower view potential (2/13)
Can't get to that level of likes yet? No problem. Find a few hashtags where the top posts are about equal to your usual level of engagement. How? (3/13)
You can find a lot of similar hashtags if you add or subtract an s to make it plural, or if you switch the order of a couple words, or use a different similar term quick examples: #egirl #egirls #nsfwsky #nsfwbsky #realGirl #realGirl #boobs #tits #18+ #+18 #realNSFW #NSFWreal #goon #gooner (4/13)
You should also be able to find similar hashtags just by looking at what other hashtags the top posts are using. (5/13)
To give yourself the best chance all around, ideally you want to use 1. a couple hashtags where the top posts engagement is similar to yours 2. a couple hashtags where you could easily surpass the top posts 3. a couple hashtags where you likely will not hit top post (6/13)
This equates to 1. good balance between high potential views and likelihood of getting seen 2. basically guaranteed views to a small audience 3. low likelihood of getting seen at all, but if you happen to perform extra well in all other tags you may have a chance to get very high views (7/13)
Few other notes: - avoid using the same hashtags over and over without varying - avoid becoming ALL the top posts in a hashtag... most of the traffic in the tag will likely already be your own audience and it just wont do much for you - consider if you fit the theme of top posts (8/13)
Avoid using irrelevant hashtags or you will likely end up muted and/or blocked and/or blocked from feeds more than followed. Don't stress too much about this, just avoid using tags that are obviously wrong. Don't try to spam just for the views. (9/13)
Consider which hashtags may be commonly muted and vary your hashtag use if not for this reason alone. If you happen to always use a hashtag someone has muted, they will never be able to see you. (10/13)
Is your engagement really high? Eventually you will reach a point where your personal engagement is higher than the engagement you will see at the top of most hashtags. At this point it become extra helpful to keep seeking out new and trending tags to find new eyes (11/13)
Keep in mind hashtag usage changes heavily and fast here The hashtags that are big this week are not guaranteed to be the same ones that are big next week. If there's a high engagement post using a certain hashtag, more people are likely to try it, and more people are likely to click it. (12/13)
Want to break past the top engagement of all of these tags? Want 10k+ likes instead of >1k? Don't use any NSFW hashtags - do this on a media post that will not get labeled. NSFW content is pushed out of your close network on Discover and as for now is much less likely to go "viral" (13/13)
Oh, last thing Best practice is to hide as many hashtags as possible This is a feature of bsky that hasn't been fully integrated, but some 3rd party apps will let you use hidden hashtags. With deck.blue you can use up to 8 hidden hashtags by clicking the # under the text box

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You might find better engagement and more reposts if you try to hide as many hashtags as possible.