01. IDENTITY
More than just a logo, your brand includes your voice and your style. Everything your customers see and interact with should tell your story.
Branding
Development of a full Brand Identity includes not only your logo, but your colors, fonts, voice, and supporting marks and icons.
Graphic Design
Building Signage. Posters. Vehicle Wraps. Business Cards. Coasters. Tap Handles. Everything your customers see and interact with should tell your story.
Brand REFRESH
Elements of your brand may no longer represent you well, or serve your purposes as they once did. A brand refresh will update without fundamentally changing your identity.
02. WEB
Whether you need something clean and simple, or an advanced e-commerce site, your site will be hi-tech, SEO ready, and beautiful on any size screen or device.
Responsive Websites
Whether you need something built from the ground up, or just and update to an existing site, something clean and simple, or an advanced e-commerce site, your Sweet Tea website will be fast, hi-tech, SEO ready, and beautiful on any size screen or device.
Business websites are far more than the online billboards of the 90s. This tool has the ability to revolutionize your business. However, before we embark on any web development project, we will do a detailed Discovery Session where we will analyze your goals and resources and help determine the best use of one of your most valuable business resources — your website.
Staff Training Videos
You already have a trusted team in place. Why not let them handle image changes and content updates to your site instead of paying a developer?
We will provide custom screen recordings tailored to your specific needs and skill level. These recordings are yours to keep, so even as staff turns over, replacements can be quickly brought up to speed.
Website Health
Keep your website running smooth and speedy. Prevent malicious attacks and identify vulnerabilities before they become emergencies.
Website Hosting
Let me guess…servers aren’t your thing? Us geeks can’t help ourselves. We love ’em. We will configure and manage your hosting account with exactly the right tech for your needs.
03. Traffic
Sweet Tea will connect you with your target market to promote your unique offerings, build brand loyalty, and most importantly, convert them into paying customers!
Marketing Audit
Let’s do a deep dive on your mission and vision, your marketing goals and objectives, and the marketing strategies that are currently being implemented to establish if existing strategies are effectively achieving current company goals in a cost effective manner.
We will provide a detailed report of our findings, along with actionable steps to take to improve ROI on your marketing efforts.
Search engine optimization
Google Analytics. Google My Business. Search Console. Keyword research. Meta tags. Backlinks…
SEO can seem like a daunting endeavor. Confusing code, ever-changing algorithms (what the heck is an algorithm, anyway??), and secretive Google holding all the keys. We can demystify it for you and start out at a level appropriate for your budget and goals.
Don’t fly blind. Before you embark on any SEO tactics, we can perform a detailed SEO Audit of your existing online properties. This will show us what’s working and what’s not, and also provide valuable benchmark statistics for tracking improvement.
Email marketing
Stay front of mind with your customers by sending beautiful branded messages right to their inbox. Promote events or promotions, send teasers for blog posts, and more.
Whether you use Mailchimp, Aweber, Constant Contact, Active Campaign (like us!), or one of the dozens of other email marketing applications out there, we can help format messages that build brand loyalty and keep you front of mind with your customers.
Social Media Management
Sweet Tea connects your customers to conversations that are targeted, timely, and topical. We focus on business goals, not popularity. Use these powerful tools when and how it’s advantageous – not just because “everyone else is doing it.”
Paid ad campaigns
Organic traffic is the holy grail, but sometimes paid advertising is the best way to target your ideal client. Our experts will setup and manage your Facebook Ads and/or Google Ad campaigns.
Content Marketing
Give your customers the content they are searching for and they will recognize you for the expert you are. Who else would they want to work with?? Regardless of your personal feelings about blogging, regularly adding new, relevant content to your site is one of
Video Production
Did you know? Videos out-perform static images on social media by an average of 300%. Organically.
Have you been wanting to take advantage of the booming popularity of video in your marketing, but don’t know where to begin? Don’t worry. We can get your biz camera ready and help you maximize benefits from this lucrative channel.
Schedule A Free Consultation
Let’s discuss your specific needs and see if Sweet Tea is the right fit for your growing business.
You’ll need to add us as user to your WordPress site so we can get started on all the awesome stuff we have ahead.
- Log into your WordPress website.
- Go to Users.
- Click Add New
- Enter “sweettea” as the username.
- Enter “info@enjoysweettea.com” as the email.
- The first name, last name, and website fields can be left black or have Stephanie’s information. It’s up to you.
- The default password can be left alone since it will be changed immediately.
- Leave the box next to Send User Notification checked.
- Update role drop-down box to Administrator.
- Click Add New User.
When you have a developer or web designer working on your website, they may need access to your domain and DNS records. Instead of sharing sensitive login details for your registrar account, you may be able to delegate access to them. GoDaddy allows this access and it’s super easy to set up. Just check out the video or skip to the 5 steps.
- Go to your GoDaddy Account Settings. If you’re not already logged in, you’ll be prompted to log in.
- Select Delegate Access.
3. In the People who can access my account section, select Invite to Access.
4. Enter Sweet Tea as the Name and stephanie@enjoysweettea.com as the Email address.
5. Click Invite.
Psh! Rules are meant to be broken, aren’t they? Well, yeah…except when they could bring some hefty fines.
To be clear, the U.S. federal government has not laid down specific laws requiring you to have a privacy policy on your website, although it has set down laws governing privacy policies for specific situations, like the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). COPPA basically says if you collect personal data on kids, you have to have a privacy policy.
BUT…States have the freedom to create their own laws. California, for example, has a pretty strict privacy policy law that extends way out of CA state lines. It’s called CalOPPA (California Online Privacy Protection Act). CalOPPA’s main thing is that any website collecting personal data from California residents has a privacy policy on it.
Yeah, well, I don’t live in Cali. If you live in New York but someone from California clicks on your website and you collect their “personally identifiable information,” it applies to you. And by the way, CalOPPA says “personally identifiable information” is:
- First and last names
- Physical addresses
- Email addresses
- Phone numbers
- Social Security numbers
- Any other contact information shared with a business (online or physically)
- Birthdates
- Details of physical appearance (height, hair color, weight)
- Any other information stored online that may identify an individual
If you use cookies on your site, you definitely want a privacy policy AND you want to ask permission from each site visitor.
Google’s stand on Privacy Policies and Terms & Conditions Pages
Google has been really pushing for all websites to have Privacy Policies and Terms and Conditions. In the good news department, there are no laws requiring you to have a Terms and Conditions on your site. So technically, you could get away with it (legally, that is). But you may want to think twice about that, because Terms and Conditions are how you make the rules. With a Terms and Conditions page publicly accessible on your site, you call the shots.
What Is a Terms & Conditions Page?
A Terms & Conditions page tells your website visitors how they are and aren’t allowed to use your website. Whether or not they actually read it, is out of your control, but if you ever get dragged to court over something (and believe me, this is not as far-fetched as it might seem), you can point right back to your Terms and Conditions to help keep you from being liable. This document can also help protect the content you put on your website from being used in ways you disapprove of. Plus, Facebook now refuses to let you display your events or feeds on your business page if you don’t have a valid link to both a Privacy Policy and a Terms & Conditions page.
GDPR – important even if you’re not in the EU
If you live in the European Union, you must include GDPR as well. But GDPR can be interpreted to include companies who aren’t in the EU. According to a PwC survey, “92 percent of U.S. companies consider GDPR a top data protection priority.”
What is GDPR?
The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is a legal framework that sets guidelines for the collection and processing of personal information from individuals who live in the European Union (EU).
According to CSO Online, GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) “is a regulation that requires businesses to protect the personal data and privacy of EU citizens for transactions that occur within EU member states.”
Unfortunately, GDPR isn’t crystal-clear on what it requires. For example, it says that companies must give a “reasonable” amount of protection to personal data, but it never tells us exactly what “reasonable” is (or isn’t).
However, it does say that the following is considered personal data that must be protected by companies:
- Basic ID info, like names and addresses
- Race and ethnicity
- Political opinions
- Web data, such as the data cookies gather, IP address, and RFID tags
- Health and genetic data
- Biometric data
- Sexual orientation
It also calls out companies who absolutely must comply with GDPR:
- Companies with a presence in an EU country
- Companies who process personal data of European residents, even if they don’t have a presence in the EU
- Companies with over 250 employees
- Companies with less than 250 employees, but whose “data-processing impacts the rights and freedoms of data subjects, is not occasional, or includes certain types of sensitive personal data.”
(That last point basically means nearly every company.)
So even if you’re a two-person agency in the American midwest, including GDPR in your privacy policy and terms and conditions is something you should seriously consider.
How To (And How NOT TO) Write Privacy and Terms Pages
Fortunately, it’s ok to leave the “legal speak” behind and keep it in plain English. Make it easy for people to understand what you’re saying. Check out how Apple did this in their Terms and Conditions:
“Our Services may allow you to submit materials such as comments, pictures, videos, and podcasts (including associated metadata and artwork). Your use of such features must comply with the Submissions Guidelines below, which may be updated from time to time. If you see materials that do not comply with the Submissions Guidelines, please use the Report a Concern feature. You hereby grant Apple a worldwide, royalty-free, perpetual, nonexclusive license to use the materials you submit within the Services and related marketing, and Apple internal purposes. Apple may monitor and decide to remove or edit any submitted material.
Submissions Guidelines: You may not use the Services to:
-
- post any materials that you do not have permission, right or license to use;
- post objectionable, offensive, unlawful, deceptive or harmful content;
- post personal, private or confidential information belonging to others;
- request personal information from a minor;
- impersonate or misrepresent your affiliation with another person, or entity;
- post or transmit spam, including but not limited to unsolicited or unauthorized advertising, promotional materials, or informational announcements;
- plan or engage in any illegal, fraudulent, or manipulative activity.”
TIP: Use a table of contents at the beginning of your privacy policy and terms and conditions so they’re easy to navigate. And make good use of bullet points and white space so it’s even easier to read.
This is what a section of Spotify’s privacy policy looks like (notice how the language is easy to understand):
“3. Your rights and your preferences: Giving you choice and control
You may be aware that a new European Union law, called the General Data Protection Regulation or “GDPR” gives certain rights to individuals in relation to their personal data. Accordingly, we have implemented additional transparency and access controls in our Privacy Center and Privacy Settings to help users take advantage of those rights. As available and except as limited under applicable law, the rights afforded to individuals are:
-
- Right of Access – the right to be informed of and request access to the personal data we process about you;
- Right to Rectification – the right to request that we amend or update your personal data where it is inaccurate or incomplete;
- Right to Erasure – the right to request that we delete your personal data;
- Right to Restrict – the right to request that we temporarily or permanently stop processing all or some of your personal data;
- Right to Object –
- the right, at any time, to object to us processing your personal data on grounds relating to your particular situation;
- the right to object to your personal data being processed for direct marketing purposes;
- Right to Data Portability – the right to request a copy of your personal data in electronic format and the right to transmit that personal data for use in another party’s service; and
- Right not to be subject to Automated Decision-making – the right to not be subject to a decision based solely on automated decision making, including profiling, where the decision would have a legal effect on you or produce a similarly significant effect.
In order to enable you to exercise these rights with ease and to record your preferences in relation to how Spotify uses your personal data, we provide you with access to the following settings via your Account Settings page:
-
- Privacy Settings – allows you to control some of the categories of personal data we process about you, enables you to access your personal data via a ‘Download my Data’ button, and includes a link to the Privacy Center on spotify.com where you can find out more information about how Spotify uses your personal data and what your rights are; and,
- Notification Settings – allows you to choose which communications you receive from Spotify, manage your publicly available personal data, and set your sharing preferences.”
Online Privacy Policy and Terms & Conditions Generators
Who wants to build a Terms & Conditions or Privacy Policy from scratch? There’s no need to recreate the wheel. Get one delivered to your inbox instead with these dead simple resources.
- TermsAndConditionsTemplate.com will help you generate a template based Privacy Policy or Terms & Conditions page for free. Just follow the prompts and punch in your business’ details.
- PrivacyPolicies.com helps you create your own privacy policy without getting lost in a bunch of legal jargon. They have simple step-by-step questions and options they walk you through, so they know what to include in your customized template. While most of it is free, they do charge one-time fees to include certain things if you want an international privacy policy.
- GetTerms.io will generate a basic Terms of Service and Privacy Policy for free. A custom document is $5 and a comprehensive one that’s “GDPR ready” is $15. After a few simple questions to determine what you need and want, they tell you how much yours will cost.
- Termageddon.com is different from the first three. With the others, you pay a one-time fee for a Privacy Policy or Terms and Conditions. If you need to make changes to it after that, you have to do it manually. With Termageddon, you purchase a monthly subscription that automatically updates your privacy policy or terms and conditions as the laws change. As a super cool bonus, if you are an agency who helps clients with things like Privacy Policies, you can apply to get a free Termageddon install on your site. The process is painless (and the welcome email has a flaming gif!).
Fun Fact: Our FocusWP Privacy Policy is generated and automagically updated by Termageddon. It took about 15 minutes max to generate and publish on our site, and that was with the learning curve of never having used their service before.
Your Next Steps
You now know that you need to put a Privacy Policy and Terms & Conditions page on your website if you want to help keep your business out of legal trouble, get the most out of your Facebook account, and keep The Mighty Google satisfied.
Here’s Your Privacy and Terms To-Do List
- Use an online service to generate and customize your Terms and Policy. (Be sure it’s easy to read and understand!)
- Run it by a legal professional to make sure you worded it correctly and included everything necessary.
- Put it up on your website in an easy-to-spot-and-access place.
6 Simple Steps to Speed Up Your WordPress Website
Hands on time: 30 min
Total time: ~60 min (allowing for image optimization time)
Expertise: Basic WordPress skills.
There are plenty of reasons to want a faster website. You are most likely here because you want to speed up your site for better Google rankings, or you want to provide a better user experience for your visitors (aka potential clients). We will help you with both of those goals! Ok…if any blog post should get right into it quickly, it’s this one. Today we are all about SPEED.
As a bit of a disclaimer: There are many, MANY ways you can optimize a website. Each one of the steps below could be done slightly differently, or replaced with other tools all together. This isn’t the only way to speed up your site, but is is one way that I found to work. Just remember to check your site as you go, and above all else – backup your site first!
This method will speed up most WordPress sites. The websites I have optimized using this recipe are using the most current version of WordPress, the fabulous Divi framework, and are hosted with Siteground.
What if I’m not very tech savvy?
Sometimes technical website stuff can seem overwhelming. But if you know how to log into your WordPress site and install a plugin – You can do this! I have broken it down into simple steps with screenshots showing you exactly what everything should look like. And remember, if something goes wrong, we’ve got your back. Just drop us a line on Facebook, email, call, send a postcard, whatever. Ok, let’s go…
Before You Begin
Run Benchmark Tests
If you don’t know where you are going, how will you know if you get there?
We are going to use 4 different tests to check the performance of your wordpress site before and after we optimize it. Trust me, it is so satisfying to see your numbers drop ⤵️ and your grades go up ⤴️ after just following the 6 steps below!
Visit these free speed check sites, put your website in, and run the tests. You will get slightly different results from each, that’s why I like to do multiple tests.
- GTMetrix Website Performance Report
- Pingdom Website Speed Test
- Google PageSpeed Insights
- WebPageTest Performance Test
Tip: Don’t close the browser after you’ve run the tests. Take a quick screenshot of the results like you see above. If you don’t know how to take a screenshot, no problem — just pull out your phone and snap a pic!
BACKUP BACKUP BACKUP
This should always be the first step before making modifications to your site. Diving in to this list without a backup is like driving down the freeway without a seatbelt: Hopefully you won’t need it, but if you DO, man will you be glad it’s there!
Disable Cacheing
PLUGINS: Go to the Plugins page of your WordPress Dashboard. Click 
in the vertical menu on the left side of the screen. If there are any cacheing plugins installed, click “Deactivate.” If you aren’t sure, look for plugins that use the word Cache in their name.
DIVI: If you are using the Divi Theme, hover over 
and click “Theme Options,” then the “Builder” tab. Make sure Static CSS File Generation is set to “Disabled” as shown here:
Clean Up Plugins & Themes
PLUGINS: Go to the Plugins page of your WordPress Dashboard. Click 
in the vertical menu on the left side of the screen. If there are plugins installed, but not activated, click “Delete.”
If there are active plugins that you know you don’t need, click “Deactivate,” then “Delete.” (Only do this if you know what you are doing!)
THEMES: Next, click 
in the dashboard menu, then “Themes.” There is no need to have a bunch of inactive themes taking up space on your site. To delete a theme, hover over it, click “Theme Details,” then click the red “Delete” text in the bottom right corner. Note: Use caution! If your active theme is a child theme, the parent theme MUST remain installed. If you are unsure, do NOT delete any themes.
Ok, now that we have all of the prep work out of the way…
Let’s Speed Up Your Site!
Each of the 6 steps below involve installing and configuring a plugin. To install a plugin, hover over in the WordPress dashboard menu and click “Add New.” On the Add Plugins screen, you can type the name of each plugin into the search box. When it appears, click “Install,” then “Activate.”
Quick Tip: Click on any image to enlarge it.
I. Imagify
- Install the Imagify plugin.
- If you see a warning about a conflicting plugin, deactivate that plugin before continuing.
- Click the blue “Sign up, It’s FREE!” button. Enter your email address, then click link in email to confirm.
- Copy API from email and paste in step 2 of the prompts (see image above).
- Click “Go to settings” (If you closed the window and need to find this screen again, go to
Imagify in the WordPress Dashboard menu) - Set settings as seen in this screenshot. Use the suggested largest size in the “Resize larger images” field.
- Click “Save and go to Bulk Optimizer.”
- Choose “Aggressive” as shown in the image below, then click the “Imagif’em all!” button.
If you have a LOT of images that need optimized, you may hit the limit of the free Imagify account. You can sign up for a one-time block of optimization which should cost you $10 or less. Totally worth it. Otherwise you will have to wait a month to be able to optimize the rest of your images. If you add images to your site frequently and don’t optimize them prior to uploading, I highly recommend a monthly plan. The “Lite” plan will cover 1GB of images for 5 bucks a month. (I’m not affiliated, btw. Just a fan!)
II. WP Fastest Cache
- Install the WP Fastest Cache plugin.
- Click
in the vertical WordPress menu on the left side of the dashboard. This will open the “Settings” tab of the WP Fastest Cache Options area. See screenshots for recommended settings. Additional boxes will pop-up for four of the options as you proceed. Screenshots of their settings are included below, as well.
- After all of these settings have been saved, open up your website in a new tab and make sure everything appears to be functioning correctly. If images are missing, or the layout looks wonky, go back and uncheck the following one at a time to see if they are causing the issue: Combine CSS, Minify CSS, Minify HTML, and Combine Js, if you enabled it in Step #2. When you discover the culprit, simply leave that option unchecked.If that troubleshooting doesn’t work, go to your page and disable WP Fastest Cache. If your site returns to normal with WPFC disabled, you have a conflict with this plugin and should delete it and move on to the next step.
III. Autoptimize
- Install the Autoptimize plugin.
- Go to -> Autoptimize. Click the “Show Advanced Settings” button.
- Under the “Main” tab, set all settings as shown here:
- Click the blue “Save Changes and Empty Cache” button.
- Select the gray “Extra” tab at the top of the screen and configure the settings according to this screenshot:
- Click the blue “Save Changes” button.
- Hover over the WP Fastest Cache menu in the top black bar and click “Delete Cache and Minified CSS/JS,” open/refresh your website in a new tab and make sure everything looks A-OK.
IV. Antispam Bee
- Install the Antispam Bee plugin.
- That’s it! The default settings should work just fine. Hover over the WP Fastest Cache menu in the top black bar and click “Delete Cache and Minified CSS/JS,” open/refresh your website in a new tab and make sure everything looks A-OK.
V. Rocket Lazy Load
- Install Rocket Lazy Load plugin.
- Select the elements you want to Lazy Load.
- That’s it! The default settings should work just fine. Hover over the WP Fastest Cache menu in the top black bar and click “Delete Cache and Minified CSS/JS,” open/refresh your website in a new tab and make sure everything looks A-OK.
VI. WP-Optimize
- Install the WP-Optimize plugin.
- Configure the settings as seen here:
- Hover over the WP Fastest Cache menu in the top black bar and click “Delete Cache and Minified CSS/JS,” open/refresh your website in a new tab and make sure everything looks A-OK.
Let's See How We Did!
Remember those benchmark rankings you took a little while ago? It’s time to run the speed tests again to see the fruits of your labor! Hop back over to the same four performance testing sites and run your website again.
- GTMetrix Website Performance Report
- Pingdom Website Speed Test
- Google PageSpeed Insights
- WebPageTest Performance Test
Don’t forget to take screenshots of your new super fast speeds! Post the before and after pics on the Sweet Tea Facebook page – we can’t wait to see the results!
Instagram Training Series: #Hashtags!
First things first, what the heck are these hashtags the kids are all talking about?? If you’ve been living under a rock for the past decade, you might recognize this schizophrenic character as a “number sign,” a “pound sign,” or if you are in the UK, you might call it a “hash.” Since 2007 you can also add “hashtag” to its list of identities. Resist all you want, the hashtag is here to stay.
Hashtags are basically a link you create on the fly. It is a way to categorize content. One of the easiest ways to understand how hashtags work is to use the example of a party or a wedding. Everyone at the wedding reception puts the same wedding hashtag (#bobandjane4ever or something like that) on their photo and when someone clicks it, they will be able to see all the photos that were posted and hashtagged from that event. (Important Note: If your account is private, only your followers will be able to see your posts, no matter what hashtags you use.)
Did you know?
A hashtag can be made up of letters, numbers, AND emoji!
(But no spaces or dashes.)
Instagram hashtags categorize content. Click on a hashtag and you’ll be able to browse posts that have been tagged with it. This helps Instagram users discover content they are interested in, and accounts to follow. The right hashtag (or combination of hashtags) will expose your brand to large and targeted audiences. By making yourself more discoverable on Instagram, you have a better chance of attracting new followers, getting more likes, and increasing engagement. Users can even follow hashtags just like they follow a friend’s account. This gives you a huge opportunity to show up in the feeds of prospective clients who are definitely interested in your product!
Throughout this article, I’ll use our buddies at Commoners Brewing Company as guinea pigs. Whether you are a brewery or not, these tips apply to just about any business trying to increase followers, likes, and engagement using hashtags. And if you are in the Charlotte area, I highly recommend you pop up to Concord, NC for a little “market research” at Commoners! 
Branded Hashtags
A branded hashtag is one that is specific to YOU. This could be your company name (#commonersbrewing), your slogan (“#becomepartofthestory“), or a campaign/contest (“#commonerssunsets“).
When To # And When To @
So, what’s the difference between using @commonersbrewing and #commonersbrewing?
Click and see! Using your “@” tag shows all of your posts. Note that this shows only what YOU have posted. On the other hand, clicking on your branded hashtag shows your posts AND any post hashtagged by your fans. The advantage of this “social proof” is huge. You can tell people how awesome you are all day long…but if their friends (or even strangers!) say great things about you, it carries a lot more weight.
Sweet Tea Tip
Encourage your clients, friends, and fans to use your HASHTAG instead of the @ tag when posting about your business. That way when their friends click on it, they will see all public posts with that hashtag, not just YOUR posts.
Don’t Reinvent The Wheel
Charlotte, NC is overflowing with amazing breweries like Commoners, and many of them are crushing it at the social game. Make a list of 4 or 5 of your favorites and watch what they do. Here’s a few of our faves:
@nodabrewing
@hiwirebrewing
@residentculture
@burialbeer
@freerangebrew
If you hit those links on a computer, you can hover over the posts and see how many likes, views, comments, etc they got. See one with a high number…ask WHY?
- Is it the photo? (Do beer fans like behind the brewing shots, food shots, venue shots, people, or do they like to see The Beer?)
- Is it the format? (Notice engagement on videos or galleries vs static posts.)
- Could it be the caption? (Are they funny, educational, informative, edgy?)
Lather, Rinse, Repeat!
When it comes to not reinventing the wheel, remember that YOU are awesome, too! If you’ve been at this for a while now, hit up your own profile and see what has been working, and what fizzled.
Switch Seats
Sweet Tea Tip
Pretend you are the customer.
Here’s a little role playing example: For a moment, imagine that you are a 30-something professional who loves IPAs and lives in the Charlotte area. What would you click on? Just go play on Instagram a little and see where you end up. Take note of the hashtags you click on, what photos or graphics were used, what captions, etc. Did you find a new place you’d like to check out or a beer you’d like to try? Then their hashtags worked! Let’s imitate their methods!
How Many Is Too Many?
You are allowed up to 30 hashtags per post, and up to 10 on a Story. But…just because you CAN doesn’t mean you SHOULD. There are many varying opinions on this subject, but a general consensus seems to be using somewhere around 10-12 has the best result, without seeming too “spammy.”
Broad vs. Narrow
Notice the difference between #beer and #firstkissblondeale.
#beer has almost 50 million posts. Wow! You can be a part of that huge pack! Lots and lots of people will click on or search for that hashtag all over the place. But…will they find your brewery? It can be easy to get lost in a crowd that big.
If you go narrow with the name of a specific beer (or product) that only you serve (#firstkissblondeale, for example), it will have a LOT fewer posts and a lot less traffic, but the beer geeks who do click on it are much more qualified leads for your business – but will it be enough reach?
You will have to find the “sweet spot” between popular and targeted. This isn’t easy, and you won’t always get it right, but the more aware of it you are, the better you’ll become at generating those sweet perfect hashtags.
Get Local
If your business is a brick and mortar shop that customers visit (hello, breweries!) or that services a specific area, you want to consider utilizing some “geo” hashtags. To continue guinea pigging our buds at Commoners, there are some great options. As with many cities in the US right now, craft beer is booming, but for the vast majority it is truly a local business. So how do you rise to the top of #craftbeer and get the attention of beer drinkers in your town?
Again, don’t recreate the wheel. Check what your competitors or local heroes are using. In the case of Commoners, #ncbeer narrows things down from international or national to the state level. They also utilize #concordbeer or #cltbeer to bring it even more local.
You can likely find a number of Instagram accounts dedicated to events and happenings in your town. In Charlotte, #charlottesgotalot, #cltagenda, or #eatdrinkclt are go-to resources for finding something to do (or drink!) any day of the week.
Sweet Tea Tip
To find local resources, try typing a hashtag and the name or abbreviation of your city into the Instagram search box and see what suggestions pop up. Then click on a few posts and see what additional local hashtags they are using.
Logistics
Don’t make work for yourself. Invest a little time up front to establish your core hashtags (maybe 6 or so?) that you will use on most posts. Put them in the notes app on your phone. Maybe even make a couple different lists…One for a beer release, one for the Friday music announcement, one for background pics of the brewing process. You get the idea. Then you can just copy/paste them right into your post. Leave a little room to add one or two specific hashtags on each post, as well.
That being said…don’t be lazy either. 
Every couple posts, take a few minutes to click on your own hashtags. What do you find? If the results look similar to your own, you are in the zone! If you see a bunch of half naked Russian models lounging on the hoods of sports cars….you might want to rethink that one (Ask me how I know!!). Maybe it isn’t even as spammy as that, but do you think someone who clicks on #wedofunstuff is looking for beer in Charlotte, NC? Maybe. But, maybe not.
Like #wedofunstuff, sometimes a hashtag can be used as a witty or funny commentary on your post. As long as there isn’t anything damaging to your image (see previously mentioned Russian models), then it’s no big deal. But if #wedofunstuff is buried in a list of a dozen or more hashtags, will anyone get the joke? That space might be better used with a more appropriate hashtag or even just one less hashtag in the list.
You Got This!
Social Media Marketing is more of an art than an exact science. It can be frustrating at times, but just remember, there is another post just around the corner. Stay alert to what’s happening on your own feed, trends you notice, or what accounts you get sucked into.
Keep up the great work!
If you have any questions or suggestions for future social media tips — hit us up in the comments below.
The Instagram Six
How bout a FREE audit of your Instagram account? Pop your IG handle (the one with the @ before it) in the form below and we will email you the top 3 things you are doing right, as well as 3 free tips for how you can boost your follows, likes, and engagement. No strings attached!
We will never sell your contact info or spam you. Pinky promise! Check out our Privacy Policy for the details on how we handle personal information.