Week 8 Part B: Your Instagram Hashtag Use

     In my posts, I tried to change up some of the hashtags that I thought I could improve. Every post had some hashtags changed to see what would work best and what didn't. I also changed some of them depending on what the post was. The hashtags I used include: #clothing #clothingbrand #oceansideclothing #sandiegoclothing #californiaclothing #streetwear #streetwearstyle #vintagestreetwear #oldschoolstreetwear #classicstreetwear #fashionadvice and #fashiontips.

    I found these hashtags by thinking of the type of hashtags that would bring people that my brand appeals to. I also found some by seeing other clothing brands using them. I also looked at the amount of posts in each hashtag to make sure I would use different-sized hashtags. I also tried to use more broad hashtags, hashtags there were less broad, and hashtags that are local to bring in some people who want to support local brands. 

    I didn't use/create hashtags that were specific to my business, although I will start to do so because I think it can help people find my business and my posts if other people use the hashtag as well. I see the positive things it can bring to my business and it wouldn't hurt to try, so in my future posts, I will start to use them. Even though I didn't use hashtags specific to only my business, I made sure to use hashtags that were very narrow and that describe my business very well. Some of these hashtags are #classicstreetwear and #oldschoolstreetwear.

    I didn't post any of the posts at the same time. I posted one at 5:00pm another at 7:00pm and another at 9:00pm. I did this to see which time would work best. I chose later times because my thought process was that more people who are into clothing would see the posts after work, during dinnertime, or before they sleep. I didn't think people would see my posts and want to buy anything early in the morning or while they were on their lunch break because they might be in a hurry to get ready for work or they might be in too much of a hurry to finish their lunch to take their time to see and buy anything. I wanted to test out which time that I thought might be good would work the best. In my experience, my posts get more engagement during the weekend, but it's not really too much of a difference. I feel that Saturdays would work the best probably at 5:00pm because that is what I have seen work best for my account throughout my Instagram account's history.

    From this exercise, I was able to learn the best times and days to post on Instagram. I didn't really think it made much of a difference before this exercise, but I have seen Saturdays at 5:00pm work the best for me. I was also able to test out what hashtags could work the best. I have also learned to start using hashtags specific to my business to hopefully see a change in the amount of people seeing my posts in the future.

I commented on the following people's blogs:

Alexis Morgan

Maximiliano Hidalgo Solano

Towa Mizuno 

(Towa isn't in my group but only two people had completed the assignment by the time I am writing this, but his business is similar to mine, so I thought it would be beneficial to see what he had learned.)