Considering Instagram’s changes in 2018 resulted in an overall decrease in engagement, it is especially important to refine your hashtag strategy and ensure you’re doing everything possible to increase engagement.
Yooreka Social thoroughly tested various hashtag processes to determine what works best when it comes to hashtag placement and quantities. The results have shifted some of our initial best practices.
Placement - Caption or Comment?
We’ve always preached placing your hashtags in the comment below your caption . . . and we stand by that. Posts with hashtags in the comments received a higher percentage of Likes, Comments, Post Saves, Profile Visits and Reach than posts with hashtags included in the caption. This was a relief to know that this was the case. . . when hashtags are added to captions it can look so cluttered and spammy, whereas placing them in the comments hides them from viewers (unless they click to view the comments). Just remember, add your hashtags to the comment immediately after posting, the more you prolong adding them the more your post will be pushed down to the bottom of user feeds.