LinkedIn Signal
LinkedIn actually had hashtags as early as Sep 2010, they were called ‘Signal’ (not Signals) and were retired in July 2013 because apparently not enough people used them. LinkedIn was a very different platform back then, non-influencers couldn’t write articles or posts (until 2014), there was no content algorithm, no followers, users hung out in groups, remember them? Hashtags got a new lease of life on LinkedIn in Feb 2017, initially mobile app only and then they became available for desktop use last summer (July 2018). As with so many other newly added features (messaging, native video, live video and most recently reactions) LinkedIn is playing catch up and taking its cue from other social channels.
Brute Force
In April 2018 LinkedIn conducted a small ‘test’ which forced users to use hashtags. Some perturbed users were unable to post without adding a hashtag.
Crazy, right?
Rudimentary
Weirdly, not a lot is known or perhaps, meant to be known about hashtags on LinkedIn. I say this because the information shared with LinkedIn users is fairly rudimentary, to say the least. For example, when hashtags appeared, there were no guidelines on best practices. Some LinkedIn users assumed the more the merrier. A lot of people are turned off by posts that are dipped in hashtag soup. Spammy. Thankfully Pete Davies, Senior Director Of Product Management recently advised that we should all use no more than 3 hashtags per post and all of the sensible LinkedIn denizens nodded, sighed in relief. The folks that were guilty of hashtag stuffing their posts Instagram style, complained, obviously.
You Follow?
Pete also suggested that hashtags can help a post get a higher ranking in someone’s feed depending on the hashtags they follow: “If a connection uses a hashtag you also happen to follow, it gets an extra boost”. All well and good – but how do you know if someone else follows the same hashtag? And here comes the rub, you don’t. I mean you could ask them but that’s just not feasible. Besides, asking everyone what hashtags they follow sounds like something an engagement pod would do.
Made Up
Also, should we be using our own made up hashtags or just use the popular ones followed by lots of people? How do we know whether a hashtag is truly popular? No one seems to have a conclusive answer. I suppose if we have a choice of 3, it may make sense to use 1 for our own branding purposes and the other 2 for popular hashtags that are 100% relevant for the content.
Trending
Wouldn’t it be fabulous if we knew which hashtags were being searched, used or clicked on the most? Of course we don’t have that data either. Although we do have ‘Hashtags trending in your network’, which you can find by clicking on ‘My Network’ and clicking on ‘See all’ in the Hashtag section. Not very insightful though, still doesn’t help us with targeting.
Phantom
And then there’s the phantom trending notification. Why phantom? When you click on the hashtag feed (‘View hashtag’), it certainly doesn’t seem like it’s trending. But did you notice? None of the content in ‘Top’ below your post is trending, that’s for sure and when you refresh the url, you’re not at the top anymore. Very confusing LinkedIn. Are we doing well. Or just doing?
So What Hashtag Data DO We Have?
LinkedIn shows us total follower stats for every hashtag used on LinkedIn. That’s it. One more thing, LinkedIn makes it incredibly difficult to find out which hashtags have the most followers. You have to conduct search, after search, after search. Painful.
It’s almost as if LinkedIn doesn’t want you to have this data. LinkedIn provides it begrudgingly in piecemeal fashion. Maybe they’re doing this because they don’t want you to focus on the most followed hashtags? They did the same thing with LinkedIn groups years ago, stopped ranking them by size.
So What’s A LinkedIn User Supposed To Do?
Luckily for you, I’ve compiled the ‘HOT 100 LINKEDIN HASHTAGS’ list.
This data was recorded on July 14th 2019.
I recently UPDATED the ‘HOT 100’ LinkedIn Hashtags, you can find the latest list (as of APRIL 2021) HERE: New ‘Hot 100’ LinkedIn Hashtags (2021 Edition)
| #india | 63,936,244 |
| #innovation | 37,500,623 |
| #management | 34,968,654 |
| #humanresources | 32,981,652 |
| #digitalmarketing | 27,231,226 |
| #creativity | 25,312,445 |
| #technology | 25,060,242 |
| #future | 24,792,781 |
| #futurism | 23,872,579 |
| #markets | 22,596,066 |
| #entrepreneurship | 22,082,696 |
| #startups | 20,860,020 |
| #careers | 19,577,195 |
| #venturecapital | 19,566,437 |
| #socialmedia | 19,486,917 |
| #socialnetworking | 19,319,169 |
| #leanstartups | 19,282,198 |
| #economy | 18,910,898 |
| #marketing | 18,884,304 |
| #economics | 18,322,393 |
| #professionalwomen | 18,104,864 |
| #branding | 18,022,702 |
| #advertisingandmarketing | 17,441,142 |
| #gender | 16,925,430 |
| #womeninscience | 16,830,209 |
| #feminism | 16,553,989 |
| #investing | 14,497,719 |
| #money | 14,342,403 |
| #jobinterviews | 13,779,568 |
| #personaldevelopment | 13,599,275 |
| #motivation | 13,527,780 |
| #alternativeenergy | 12,939,510 |
| #sustainability | 12,860,854 |
| #personalbranding | 10,558,834 |
| #hiringandpromotion | 10,097,071 |
| #healthcare | 9,282,161 |
| #education | 9,134,266 |
| #customerrelations | 8,726,016 |
| #teachersandschoolemployees | 8,450,951 |
| #educationpolicy | 8,439,423 |
| #educationreform | 8,387,992 |
| #whatinspiresme | 8,194,459 |
| #medicine | 8,146,959 |
| #productivity | 8,081,230 |
| #healthcarereform | 7,838,020 |
| #bestadvice | 7,765,260 |
| #managedcare | 7,570,958 |
| #airtravel | 7,501,045 |
| #travel | 6,951,595 |
| #bigdata | 6,994,419 |
| #gettingthingsdone | 6,936,857 |
| #businessintelligence | 6,900,426 |
| #businesstravel | 6,896,100 |
| #softwareengineering | 6,553,656 |
| #programming | 6,419,250 |
| #analytics | 6,327,772 |
| #softwaredesign | 6,288,906 |
| #datamining | 6,226,236 |
| #agilesoftwaredevelopment | 6,203,512 |
| #data | 6,050,825 |
| #socialentrepreneurship | 5,900,867 |
| #fundraising | 5,817,459 |
| #streamingmedia | 5,779,647 |
| #law | 5,511,485 |
| #legalissues | 5,372,307 |
| #sales | 5,363,667 |
| #design | 5,234,702 |
| #ecommerce | 5,219,149 |
| #restaurants | 4,983,018 |
| #graphicdesign | 4,924,796 |
| #strategy | 4,885,155 |
| #visualdesign | 4,852,102 |
| #industrialdesign | 4,747,015 |
| #retailing | 4,731,753 |
| #finances | 4,702,567 |
| #projectmanagement | 4,670,699 |
| #userexperience | 4,669,896 |
| #accountingandaccountants | 4,546,771 |
| #journalism | 4,518,859 |
| #mobiletechnology | 4,461,981 |
| #shoppingandtheretailindustry | 4,457,013 |
| #onlineshopping | 4,439,167 |
| #music | 4,382,092 |
| #commerce | 4,372,594 |
| #mobilemarketing | 4,362,213 |
| #newspapers | 4,237,351 |
| #culture | 4,225,760 |
| #managementconsulting | 4,159,146 |
| #construction | 4,159,055 |
| #fashion | 4,146,172 |
| #mobileapplications | 4,094,527 |
| #mobileadvertising | 4,086,031 |
| #automotiveindustry | 4,052,812 |
| #realestate | 4,004,635 |
| #operationsmanagement | 3,999,719 |
| #consultants | 3,924,226 |
| #energy | 3,847,529 |
| #cloudcomputing | 3,826,932 |
| #publicrelations | 3,751,857 |
| #oilgas | 3,704,895 |
Do you need more data? I’m offering my own personal research tool, the “1,500 HOT LINKEDIN HASHTAGS Master List” on sale now for 50% off the usual price.
You can DOWNLOAD my 1,500 HOT LINKEDIN HASHTAGS Master List (Excel tracker) for only $50.00*
(*Sale Price for only a limited period of time – usual price is $100.00).
You’ll receive my Master List (Excel) spreadsheet already populated with juicy data for not 100, not 350, but an unheard of = 1,500 popular LinkedIn hashtags, with columns for:
(1) NAME of HASHTAG
(2) TOTAL FOLLOWER COUNT* (actual and % change)
(3) CLICKABLE URL LINK which will take you directly to the hashtag you’re interested in (a HUGE time saver!)
(4) HASHTAG THRESHOLD = 10,000 followers and above – up to 69 million followers
(5) OFFICIAL column (indicates those hashtags which have pictures and were created by LinkedIn)
*The Tracker was last updated on April 18th 2021, has LinkedIn hashtag follower data points recorded on:
01/15/2020
04/15/2020
04/26/2020
09/16/2020
02/12/2021
04/18/2021
This is not an e-book where you have to copy and paste each hashtag, padded with free info you can get anywhere on the web, this is an essential business/research tool. The threshold for my tracker is that all hashtags in my spreadsheet have a minimum of 10,000 followers or more, the excel is populated with all of the popular (most followed) hashtags I’ve found during my exhaustive and painstaking research over the last 3 months. Think of being able to quickly access all of that industry/sector/interests/topics/current affairs information, data and content in seconds! This is THE ONLY business research tool of its kind on the web, and it can be yours for the price of a nice restaurant steak (and shrimp starter).
Click on the yellow DONATE button (scroll back to the TOP RIGHT of this website, under my photo) pay $50.00 and I’ll send you my (xls spreadsheet) 1,500 HOT LINKEDIN HASHTAGS Master List. Please tell me which email you’d like me to send the Master List to. Thanks!
You can obviously update and add to the list, make stunning charts, data crunch etc. This is the most comprehensive list of most followed, global (international) LinkedIn hashtags available on the internet today. Do I guarantee that it has every popular (most followed) hashtag? No. I may have missed some, like I said, LinkedIn doesn’t make this easy.
READY TO GO DEEP ON THE LINKEDIN ALGORITHM?
I’ve written a comprehensive guide which will help you to understand how content is treated on LinkedIn. Publishing on LinkedIn without adequately knowing how the algorithm works, is like sitting in a Volkswagen Beetle on a starting grid flanked by Porsches. The objective of this article is to put you in a Porsche, maybe even a Tesla. Start your engines.
The LinkedIn Algorithm Explained In 25 Frequently Asked Questions
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Hi Andy, how about hashtags in LinkedIn groups, how does that work? Can they help boost the visibility of a LinkedIn Group?
Thank you Andy for providing valuable information and detail! #donated
Great info! thank you
You’re welcome Alejo!
Hi Andy, thanks for your article, it helps! But the kewords for electronics industry are few, how can I get the data of more hastags, and how to up to date on this list?
Thanks Andy, there’s no easy method to find industry specific HTs, it takes a lot of manual clicking, i’m afraid. The list I put together (200 HTs!) took weeks to compile….
This is super informative and very helpful. Thanks Andy for your beautiful post. Much appreciated.
You are very welcome Kingsley.
Fantastic list Andy, it has been very useful for us in determining hashtags for LinkedIn. And, it is helping us to get more views. Thank you!
Love to hear that – thanks Donna!
Hey there! This article and your list just saved me so much time trying to figure this out all on my own. Thanks a million.
What do you think are the other factors, other than hashtags is the reason certain posts hit those high views numbers compared to others?
I have been working on incorporating a personal branding strategy for the CEO of one of the companies I consult for. The focus was mainly LinkedIn from the beginning and we have been slowly increasing momentum. This includes writing personal articles, sharing various articles about the company, company culture, employees, industry news and general articles in tune with his beliefs, etc.. Normally, we get anywhere from 300 to 1500 to 3000 views on a post. Highest last year was a once-off 14 000 views but not much engagement. A week ago, we “shared” an article, I wrote a short paragraph to post with the article and used 2 hashtags, nothing different from the norm… but the stats are at 530 000 views, 1605 reactions, 70 comments, 270 reshares and still some activity after 1 week. I am totally baffled!
Thank you Delia. Other factors? – take a look at my (how the LinkedIn algorithm actually works post): https://www.linkedinsights.com/the-linkedin-algorithm-explained-in-25-frequently-asked-questions/
Hey Andy, what about hashtags in replies to posts on LI? I’ve tried those and I think they do not work….what’s your opinion?
Hey Ross. Currently hashtags in comments do ‘work’ – you can add them and click on them to get to the HT channel, but I don’t know how effective adding them in convo areas (comments) is.
This is awesome! I was looking for this info and it appeared on my feed. Thank you so much Andy!
Glad to hear it Ross, thanks!
These hashtags are useful. Great work
Thank you Smith. I feel like I’m being rude – so I’ll add Thank you Sam Smith 🙂
Great article Andy, very informative. Will share for my wider network. Many thanks for posting
Thank you anonymous reader/fan 🙂
Andy Foote, this is such an amazing tool! Why come up with and use a random hashtag that isn’t followed, when you can use one that’s followed by literally millions of people! I’m going to start using your tool right away!
Thanks Donna 🙂
Your button doesn’t seem to work, Andy.
Yes, unfortunately the PayPal Digital Good Order plugin decided to not play ball. Sorry about that.
Excellent post about using Hashtags on LinkedIn. I too often felt no more than 3 should be used as prpoer LinkedIn etiquette. LinkedIn is not Facebook, nor is it Instagram.
Hashtags extend your posts beyond your network which can be very beneficial in reaching new prospects as they becomes more widely used and accepted.
Thanks Jeff, the rule of 3 (or less) HTs does seem to make sense. It’s not like we can’t rotate/explore others per post. LinkedIn is not Facebook or Instagram? I know – but will you please tell those other gleefully social interlopers that?
Oh, I try. One of the first things I share in my SCORE workshops on LinkedIn is the type of conversations that take place here is like those at a trade shown or business convention.
Facebook conversations are like those at a backyard BBQ.
…and sometimes it’s hard to tell the kids and adults apart, based on the quality of conversations 🙁
Thanks Andy. Glad i was able to contribute to find some of the top hashtags for this list like India, Innovation, professional women etc..How come there is no Linkedin login option here for the comments?
My thanks to you Jayt – for assisting me with the search. I still need to figure out the LinkedIn login option 🙂