An understanding of the behavior of Muslim consumers on social media platforms is vital to successfully market your brand or business. However, success is also dependent on a marketeer’s understanding of the tools that make social media marketing more efficient and effective.
In the article “How to Leverage Muslim Consumer Behavior Online with Social Media Marketing” we explained how to leverage social media marketing for Muslims based on ‘Muslim user behavior’.
This article will explain how to effectively use hashtags for Muslim social media marketing.
In order to use hashtags effectively, let’s go back to basics and learn a bit more about what they are and how they work.
Muslim Hashtag Basics
Hashtags are words or phrases preceded by the pound symbol: “#”; for example #IslamicBusiness.
They serve as an indication for users and algorithms that your post relates to a specific topic or belongs to a category.
Hashtags, therefore, make it easier for social media platforms to categorize your posts making them more visible in on-site searches. So if you add #MuslimConsumers on an Instagram post, your post will appear to Instagram users following Muslim-consumer-related posts.
Here are some basics you need to know when using hashtags to engage with Muslim audiences on social media:
- Hashtags are all one word with no spaces. So it’s #AdvertisingToMuslims and not #Advertising to Muslims.
- Hashtags should be used in moderation for best results. Familiarize yourself with platform-specific guidelines. Using too many hashtags is jarring to the point of being unreadable.
- Keep your hashtags short and sweet. This is a hashtag that’s easy to comprehend: “#MarkettoMuslims”; this one isn’t: #MarketToMuslimsFromAllOverTheWorld”.
- Don’t use any characters such as apostrophes, as part of your hashtag. If you hashtag #AMuslim’sChoice for example, the social media platform will only hashtag #AMuslim.
- If you want your hashtags to be more readable, capitalize the first letter of each word. This is especially important with longer hashtags. As you can see, #MuslimMarketingPrinciples is easier on the eye than #Muslimmarketingprinciples.
- Keep a balance between overly generic and way too specific. For example, #finance will get lost in a sea of other posts – including those that talk about interest, which is forbidden in Islam. But #IslamicMortgages is a specific type of Islamic Finance product that caters to Muslim audiences looking to buy a house.
- Make sure your accounts are public. If not, the hashtagged post you write won’t be seen by any non-followers.
Before we move further, make sure you download The Ultimate Guide to Understanding and Marketing to the Muslim Consumer. Your brand’s guide on breaking into one of the fastest-growing untapped consumer markets in the world.
Why Use Hashtags for Your Muslim Social Media Marketing
When used strategically, hashtags can provide your business or organization with a ton of benefits. Here are some of the most common benefits of using hashtags when posting to your Muslim audiences:
Increase Engagement with Your Followers
When you include hashtags in your posts, you are effectively taking part in a conversation happening on that social media platform. And most importantly, the hashtag you use makes your posts relevant and visible in that conversation.
This usually leads to greater engagement, boosting your business or organization’s social media engagement through likes, shares, comments, and new followers.
Build Brand Awareness with Branded Hashtags
Using branded hashtags can be an effective way to market your business and drive engagement.
Create branded hashtags specifically to group content in an easily discoverable and digestible way. These can be as simple as #CompanyName like Meezan Bank in the example below or more creative, memorable taglines and slogans that are unique to your brand.
Stand for Something – Support Social Issues
In our article, “Purpose Will Make or Break Your Halal Brand”, we mentioned that:
Today, we can confidently say that purpose and standing for something are the most important elements of your halal brand.
Using a hashtag that’s connected to a social issue you stand for can mobilize Muslim users to start following your brand and amplifying your message through resharing.
With pressure on brands to speak up for social justice mounting, using such hashtags is a necessity, not a luxury.
Contextualize Your Social Media Posts
You don’t always want to write long content on your social media platforms. On some social media platforms like Twitter, you have only 280 characters at your disposal.
Use hashtags to contextualize what your post is about without using up valuable characters or writing repetitive captions.
Hashtag Tips for Specific Social Media Platforms
Hashtags should play a big part in your Instagram marketing for Muslim users. Since there’s no easy method to share someone else’s post on Instagram, hashtags are an essential way of reaching a new audience.
- Use the search box to check which hashtags your Muslim audience, competitors, and top industry minds are using. Check out the number of posts for that hashtag and the level of engagement that hashtag receives.
- The more relevant hashtags you use, the more engagement your post will receive. This is a great way to engage Muslim users who are not following you, especially when you are just starting out.
It would be disingenuous of us if we did not tell you that some marketers don’t recommend using hashtags on Facebook. Their reasoning is as follows:
- Facebook has other tools that do what hashtags do,
- hashtags are not the primary way users search or navigate on Facebook, and
- most hashtags that appear on Facebook are the result of brands posting the same thing to multiple platforms at once.
However, many other marketers argue that using hashtags on Facebook help increase organic traffic since the start of 2021.
If you choose to use hashtags on Facebook remember to follow some recommended guidelines:
- Limit hashtags to the bottom of your post. Facebook users are not accustomed to seeing hashtags in the middle of Facebook posts yet.
- Make sure your posts are public so that their viewership is not limited to your Facebook friends.
Twitter is the home of hashtags since it was the first social media platform to use them. On this platform, in particular, hashtags tend to focus on a conversation topic or a group of people you might find worth engaging.
For the best results:
- Find recommended hashtags for your new Twitter post by entering the ‘#’ symbol and start typing. Twitter will recommend a few hashtags for your post. You may pick one or use one you are familiar with already.
- Use 2-3 hashtags per post. Any more than that and you might experience a huge drop in engagement according to Buffer.
- Unlike with Facebook, you may use hashtags in the middle of a tweet or at the end of one.
Hashtags are relatively new on LinkedIn, having started in 2018. There is some uncertainty around how to use them.
It is, therefore, an opportunity for your business or organization to be one of the first to use them properly and establish yourself under generic hashtags concerning your industry.
Keep the following in mind:
- Make sure you space out hashtags in your post, and when possible, keep them away from the important information.
- You can type a hashtagged word or phrase in the homepage search bar to find relevant content for your brand or organization.
- Use a public account so that your Muslim target audience can find your content with your hashtag.
If you made it all the way to the end of this article, you are definitely interested in reaching and engaging with Muslim consumers. If that’s the case, let us help you achieve that objective in the most efficient manner. Feel free to contact Muslim Ad Network for any questions you may have.
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