What is Hashtag Tracking and Why is it Important? [5 Tools You Must Use in 2024]

Setting up social media marketing is just the beginning in a world flooded with information. It involves continuous monitoring of your audience’s needs, and adjusting strategies accordingly. Hashtag tracking is a game-changer, making performance reporting accurate and efficient.

Without hashtags, monitoring efforts would be like finding a needle in a haystack without knowing what a needle looks like – a daunting task. Posts with at least one hashtag receive 29% more interactions than accounts with fewer than 1,000 followers. Fortunately, hashtag analytics tools exist to simplify this process, making it remarkably easy. In this article, we’ll explore free hashtag tracking tools designed to enhance your social media efforts. But first, let’s understand why these tools are important.

What is Hashtag Tracking?

Hashtag tracking involves gathering metrics and data related to hashtags on social media platforms like Instagram, YouTube, and X [formerly known as Twitter]. This subset of social media analytics provides brands with insights to inform their strategies and decision-making processes.

Significance of Hashtag

Hashtags play a pivotal role in social media marketing and communication, serving as potent tools for content organization, engagement boost, and expanding reach. Strategically employed, hashtags enable businesses to effectively communicate with their existing followers, attract new customers, and bolster brand awareness. They facilitate content discovery on specific topics, promoting targeted and relevant content consumption.

Additionally, hashtags foster community engagement through participation in discussions and events like Twitter Chats. It’s crucial to note that optimal hashtag use varies across platforms, requiring research, thoughtful selection, and result analysis for maximum impact. Effectively leveraging hashtags empowers businesses to amplify their social media presence, stimulate conversations, and achieve marketing objectives.

How Can You Benefit From Hashtag Analytics Tools?

Hashtag analytics tools offer invaluable insights into the performance metrics of your hashtags and audience reactions. Real-time monitoring allows you to uncover industry best practices, enabling adjustments to your content for enhanced appeal to your target audience and, subsequently, improved results.

The essential applications of hashtag tracking include:

• Discovering Industry Trends: Keep abreast of current trends in your industry for strategic alignment.
• Campaign Monitoring and Audience Analysis: Track the performance of your hashtag campaigns and analyze audience engagement for informed decision-making.
• Sentiment Analysis: Monitor positive and negative mentions associated with your hashtags to gauge audience sentiment and respond accordingly.
• Brand Awareness Insights: Gain a deep understanding of your current brand awareness levels in the digital landscape. Today, 7 out of 10 hashtags on Instagram are categorized as branded.
• Influencer Identification: Identify influencers relevant to your business, potentially turning them into brand ambassadors.

While most hashtag tracking tools provide these fundamental insights, selecting a tool tailored to your specific needs is crucial for optimal results in your unique case.

Also Read: How To Master Brand Mentions: 5 Tools For Getting It Right

5 Best Hashtag Tracking Tools in 2024

Explore these five essential tools for effective hashtag tracking in your social media strategy:

• Brand24
• RiteTag
• Keyhole
• Hashtagify
• Twubs

Now let’s understand each in detail.

Brand24

Brand24 provides real-time hashtag monitoring across various platforms, including:

• Twitter
• Instagram
• Twitch
• Quora
• TikTok
• Telegram
• YouTube

Beyond simple monitoring, Brand24 offers an in-depth analysis of hashtag performance and more through its Analysis tab. The tool enables users to track engagement metrics generated by hashtag mentions, such as comments, likes, and shares.

While Brand24 is a paid tool starting at $79, it does offer a free 14-day trial period for users to explore its features.

RiteTag

RiteTag, an impressive hashtag tracking tool, seamlessly monitors hashtag performance and is part of the RiteKit suite. Particularly effective for tracking trending hashtags on Twitter and Instagram, RiteTag offers an array of valuable data.

Key features include Estimated Hourly Statistics, Daily Averages, insights into popular accounts utilizing a specific hashtag, and more. RiteTag’s advanced capabilities extend to suggesting trending hashtags for enhanced discoverability, revealing the visibility trends of hashtags over time, and identifying hashtags experiencing declining popularity. This comprehensive approach makes RiteTag a powerful and detailed hashtag tracker.

While the free version of RiteTag has some limitations, the annual subscription, priced at $49, unlocks a broader range of options for users.

Keyhole

Keyhole stands out as a comprehensive social media analytics tool designed to monitor hashtag performance and analytics specifically on Twitter and Instagram. The tool delivers abundant data, encompassing reach, post count, user insights, impressions, and more.

In addition to hashtag-focused analytics, Keyhole provides account-level analytics and an Optimization feature for assessing the hashtag performance of specific accounts. This feature proves valuable in determining the effectiveness of relevant hashtags in terms of engagement. It offers a free trial period and subscription plans start at $132 per month when billed annually.

Hashtagify

Hashtagify is a free hashtag tracking tool that displays data on hashtag popularity, correlation, and trends in various modes, including Basic, Advanced, and Table, with a subscription starting at $9.99.

Twubs

Twubs proves to be a valuable tool for monitoring hashtag performance, especially in the context of Twitter chats. It facilitates tracking hashtags and active participation in Twitter chats.

Twubs boasts directories that aggregate hashtags related to specific topics, such as business, conferences, events, and more. Additionally, users can register their hashtags and create dedicated landing pages showcasing conversations from Twitter chats.

The best part? It is entirely free to use!

Winding Up

The list of hashtag tracking tools is extensive, offering similar features but with varying price tags. For individuals seeking to increase their reach, free hashtag analytics tools are recommended. However, for businesses, a basic tool is not sufficient. To improve performance, optimize offerings, and enhance customer communication, a tool with more features and detailed reports is necessary. The cost of such a tool is insignificant compared to the value gathered insights bring to the business. Therefore, it is essential to choose the right tool for your specific needs and goals.