You need these 3 things in your display name to get found
Handle and display name are not the same thing
Your handle is, for example, @sophia_ivy.art. Your display name is the bold line right below it, which many clients mistake for your "real name."
Instagram indexes the two separately. HubSpot describes it this way: username and display name are two distinct, searchable fields. The handle stays your brand and should be short and recognizable, without keyword stuffing. The display name, on the other hand, is the place for what people actually search for: profession, style and city.
Many artists optimize their bio down to the last detail, with styles, studios, booking link and carefully placed line breaks, and leave only "Sophia" or "Jacky" as the display name. Yet for search, Instagram reads the bio much more weakly than the name field. What only lives in your bio won't get you into the results for "fine line Lübeck."
What happens when the keywords are missing
Imagine someone types "fine line lübeck" into Instagram, so not your name and not your handle but a combination of style and location. Look at who shows up:
All visible profiles have fine line and Lübeck in the display name:
- "Teodora • fineline illustrative semi realism tattoo • Lübeck"
- "TATTOO HAMBURG & LÜBECK FINELINE | ELEA®"
- "Jacky · Fineline Tattoos | Eutin & Lübeck"
- "Sophia | Tattoo Artist | fineline | floral | Lübeck & Eutin"
That's no coincidence: Instagram matches search terms against indexed profile fields, and if the keywords aren't in your display name, you're missing from this list, no matter how good your portfolio is.
Sophia (@sophia_ivy.art) works in fine line and floral and is a resident artist in Lübeck and Eutin. Her bio was filled out cleanly, with styles, studios and a tatme.com link. But before the adjustment, her display name didn't say what she does and where, so she was invisible when someone searched for "fine line lübeck."
This is what her profile looks like after the update:
Sophia | Tattoo Artist | fineline | floral | Lübeck & Eutin
Now she appears in the same search results as artists with far more followers. That's not because the algorithm suddenly prefers her posts, but because her profile finally matches the search that clients actually type.
The formula that works
From what we see across dozens of profiles, and what Sophia's case confirms, a pattern emerges:
First name · Tattoo Artist · Style · City
And this is how it breaks down:
| Building block | Why | Sophia example |
|---|---|---|
| First name | Personal and recognizable | Sophia |
| Tattoo / Tattoo Artist | The typical search contains "tattoo" | Tattoo Artist |
| Style (1 to 2) | Clients search by style, not by name | fineline, floral |
| City (1 to 2) | Tattooing is a local business | Lübeck & Eutin |
Technical limits:
- 64 characters is the maximum, Instagram cuts off longer names.
- Two styles at most, because more quickly looks like keyword spam and reads as unprofessional.
- Plain letters, because characters from font generators (fancy Unicode) aren't read by Instagram as search terms. Separators like | or ·, on the other hand, are fine.
Sophia's name is 59 characters long and so stays within the limit. It contains all the relevant search terms and still reads like it was written by a person and not by an SEO bot.
Bio and display name have different jobs
| Field | Job | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Display name | Discoverability in search | Tattoo + style + location |
| Bio | Trust, personality, next step | Studios, styles in detail, booking link |
| Handle | Brand, mentions, link | @sophia_ivy.art |
Sophia's bio says "Fineline • floral • nature inspired • microrealism" along with the studio tags. That builds trust once someone is already on her profile, but it doesn't get her into search when someone types "fine line lübeck."
The reverse doesn't work either: optimizing only the display name and leaving the bio empty. The display name gets people into the search, and the bio decides whether they stay and write to you.
What this means for you as an artist
Tattooing is a local business. Your clients come from your region, search for style and location, and compare three to five profiles before they write to anyone. If you're missing at the very first step, you don't exist for them.
Check your display name in 30 seconds:
- Does it contain "tattoo" (or "tattoo artist")?
- Does it contain at least one style you actually tattoo?
- Does it contain your city (or your two locations)?
- Are you under 64 characters?
If you answer "no" to any question, adjust the name, ideally not tomorrow, because the search runs every day, even while you're sitting in an appointment.
In the artist area of tatme there's also a display name check that compares exactly these points against your profile.
What doesn't work
Optimizing only the bio. The bio is beautifully written and the keywords are right, but the display name is still "Lisa" or "Ink by Max." For local search, that gets you nothing.
Keyword stuffing. "Fineline Realism Blackwork Traditional Neo Lübeck Hamburg Berlin" in the name field reads badly, doesn't fit the character limit, and Instagram recognizes such spam patterns.
Characters from font generators. 𝓢𝓸𝓹𝓱𝓲𝓪 𝓣𝓪𝓽𝓽𝓸𝓸 might look fancy on a phone, but Instagram doesn't index it as "Sophia Tattoo." So use plain letters.
Only the style, without a location. "Fineline Tattoo Artist" helps for style searches, but for "fine line Lübeck" you're still missing as long as Lübeck isn't in the name.
Only the location, without tattoo. "Sophia · Lübeck" is better than just "Sophia," but anyone searching for "fine line tattoo Lübeck" needs both.
What you can try this week
Open Instagram and search for [your main style] [your city], not for your name but exactly the way a client who doesn't know you yet would search. Do you find yourself in the first ten results?
If not, look at what the profiles that show up there have. Almost always, tattoo, style and location are in the display name. Adjust yours accordingly, wait a week and then search again. Sophia did it exactly this way: before, she was invisible, afterward she appeared in the local results.
Every day with an unsuitable display name is a day on which potential clients find someone else. That's not because that artist tattoos better or because you're too expensive, but because you don't show up in their search at all. The inquiry lands with someone else, and you don't notice, because there's no rejection, no ghosting and no "I'm still thinking about it." If tattoo, style and location aren't in the name field, it simply stays quiet.
Sources
- HubSpot: Instagram SEO: 8 techniques for increasing your reach, display name and username as separately indexed fields, HubSpot Blog
- Instagram Help Center: Edit your profile, display name and profile fields, help.instagram.com
- Case study Sophia (@sophia_ivy.art): before/after comparison of display name and visibility for "fine line Lübeck" (first-party observation, tatme.com, July 2026)