“Happy Easter!” You proudly proclaim in your latest social media post, complete with the hashtags #easter2020 and #happyeaster. You wait for the likes to roll in, but they never really do. In fact, Instagram hasn’t even shown the post to most of your followers. The followers who saw your post just shrugged and kept scrolling. Maybe a couple of them gave it a like, but that’s about it.
The Truth
We all assumed when we started out on social media, that just giving a nod to a holiday was enough to produce and have hundreds of posts squared away. We didn’t need to dream up content for these days, simply tossing out a “Happy 4th of July” or a “Merry Christmas” was enough.
Sike!
It’s not enough.
Why?
Because everyone and their dog is posting about said holiday in the same manner.
Instagram may also be calling you out if you’re using the same hashtags as everyone else. The AI isn’t quite smart enough to know that 1M people posting with the hashtag #easter2020 on the same day are not, in fact, spamming. They’re being entirely relevant. This reason alone can cause Instagram to show your holiday post to fewer people than it normally would.
How to Be Festive and Beat the Algorithm
So, how can you keep from posting holiday wishes that people care about and that the algorithm won’t restrict?
You can tell a personal anecdote about the day, or about Christmas past. You can post a quote that relates to the spirit of the holiday and write something meaningful below. Meaning is the key. Meaning is how you’ll get people to care enough about the post to interact with it, driving your engagement up (or at least not nosediving it).
Search on sites like hashtastic to make sure that you’re not using any banned hashtags, then just add hashtags that relate specifically to your story, anecdote or message. This will once again help your post reach relevant audiences and lower your chances of looking like a scammer to the algorithm.
If you’d like to get some personalized ideas for how to rock your content and engagement, especially with holiday posts, check out my strategy sessions.
