The hashtag is a keyword preceded by the hash sign (#) that people often use to identify the theme of content they are sharing on Social Networks. Their membership became popular on Twitter and spread to today’s biggest social media.
If social networks are places where people can share what they are watching, thinking, and feeling, wouldn’t it be great if we could filter research around the topic of these comments?
If you agree with this question you may be happy, as there is a solution to this.
It’s the use of hashtags!
With the widespread use of social networks, the presence of hashtags is becoming increasingly constant.
Many people have seen and even used this device, but do not understand its main function.
So to better understand what it is for and how to use it correctly, check out this post below.
- After all, what is a hashtag?
- How and when to use a hashtag?
- Basic Tips for Using Hashtags
- How can my business use hashtags?
- How do hashtags work on each of the social networks?
- How to use hashtags for marketing on each social network?
After all, what is a hashtag?
A hashtag is a keyword preceded by the hash sign (#) that people often use to identify the theme of content they are sharing on Social Networks. Their membership became popular on Twitter and then spread to today’s most popular social media.
Each hashtag you create turns into a hyperlink that will direct the search to everyone who has tagged your content with that specific hashtag.
When you select a keyword for content, it is automatically added to that topic’s search group.
That is, this is a much more practical way to group various content on a particular topic, facilitating further research on the desired topic.
From this research, you can find the people who are talking about the subject and what they shared.
For example, if you are interested in knowing what people are commenting on about some new content or subject in the middle of Content Marketing, you can facilitate your search by searching for the hashtag with the name of the subject or theme you want to search across networks. Social
This will help you find out what people are finding and commenting on this topic.
How and when to use a hashtag?
Using a hashtag is very simple. Just use the pound sign (#).
And right after that, enter the keyword you think will rank your post better. Remember that spaces are not identified, so write all the words together.
Going back to our example, to talk about Content Marketing, for example, just add the hashtag #contentmarketing or #content marketing and you will ensure that your comment is included in the theme search universe.
Basic Tips for Using Hashtags
It’s important to talk about some tips that can greatly help your hashtags succeed.
Do not put all content on one rod
If you want to know what people are thinking about the movie, use the hashtag with its name, not #WhichPeople are FindingAbout the Movie, as this will narrow your search too much, reducing the amount of content found.
Don’t use a hashtag for every word.
This tip is opposite to the previous one. If you add the hashtags #o #that #people # are # finding #about #the #film, you will add your content to various search groups, not necessarily what you originally planned.
Use a hashtag that fits in with the post theme
Using a hashtag just because it is being highly researched but not talking about the subject of the hashtag will be ineffective for spreading the content.
Check the spelling
A simple spelling (or even a typo) error can make the hashtag a failure, as there is very little chance that multiple people will make the same mistake when creating the hashtag.
How can my business use hashtags?
Now that you know what a hashtag is and how it should be used properly, it’s time to understand how you can apply it to your business practice.
First, it is important to emphasize the importance of having corporate profiles in social networks where their audiences are most present and active.
In this way, it is possible to interact and approach the public, creating a relationship that goes far beyond the simple commercial.
So if your profile is public, using appropriate hashtags can cause your content to be found by many people, besides those already following your page.
So choosing the right hashtags can play a key role in reaching your posts, and increasing the number of followers, fans, or customers.
It’s interesting to create your own hashtag for your brand or event as a digital marketing strategy.
This way you can encourage your audiences to share content with your hashtag to compete for promotions or awards, for example, and in return, they will greatly increase the visibility of your hashtag.
When a brand creates a hashtag and people start appropriating it, they will be interacting directly with the brand and the company, increasing their chance of becoming customers later.
How do hashtags work on each of the social networks?
Even though it was created by Twitter, today they are already widespread in the online context and many other social networks also encourage their users to use hashtags.
It is very important to thoroughly research each social media to understand how people behave and how to use hashtags to get the most engagement possible.
Several social networks have joined the hashtags, such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Google+, Pinterest, and Vine. But the behavior of users is quite different and unique in each of them.
For example, on Twitter, people often use only one or two hashtags in their posts, precisely because it’s a microblogging platform where characters are limited by post.
On Instagram, people use 4 or more hashtags on average.
In addition to the different volumes of hashtags used, each of the social networks has its own peculiarities and specificities.
Therefore, it may be that a keyword that is very successful on Twitter will not necessarily be as successful on Facebook.
We will talk more about this in the next topic.
How to use hashtags for marketing on each social network?
In addition to hashtags for important events or dates, and hashtags created by different companies for marketing purposes, some hashtags also come up with useful ideas and go viral.
Your business can use these hashtags to join a conversation that brings together thousands of people worldwide.
Each social network has its own viral hashtags. Some examples are:
- #FF on Twitter – “Follow Friday”, something like “Friday in a row,” a hashtag used to recommend to your followers a profile you find interesting)
- #instagood on Instagram – Used to indicate a photo that looks really good.
Viral hashtags often do not pass from one social network to another. It wouldn’t make much sense to use #instagood in a tweet, for example.
You also saw in the previous item that there are important differences between how people have appropriated hashtags on different social networks. We highlight that in some social networks they are more used than in others.
In addition to these differences, there are also practical issues that change by channel. In other words, the walkthrough of using a hashtag and the available functions also change slightly depending on the social network.
On Instagram, to use a hashtag, you must include it in a post made from a public account. An interesting difference between Twitter and Facebook is that when you start typing a hashtag in your post when you insert the hash symbol, Instagram immediately begins to suggest hashtags based on popularity.
To search for results with your hashtag, you need to type it into the search field and click on the Tags option. You can also see the most commonly used hashtags by clicking the Explore option, represented by the magnifying glass, at the bottom of the screen.
You’ll soon notice that on Instagram, hashtags are much more general than on Twitter. They refer more to the photos themselves, such as the hashtag #nofilter, which indicates an unfiltered photo.
Meanwhile, Twitter hashtags tend to be more related to current topics.
To post a hashtag on Twitter, just include it in a tweet posted from a public account. Keep in mind that if the account isn’t public, other people won’t be able to see your tweet when searching for the hashtag.
One very unique thing about Twitter hashtags is that they can be used to create Q&A sessions on a particular subject. AND
These sessions are called Twitter Chats and can be a great opportunity to network with people interested in certain topics.
Your company can participate in a Twitter Chat following the disclosed schedule. You can also submit your own subject and meet potential partners and customers in a custom Q&A session.
After you post your hashtag via a tweet, you’ll need to keep up with what people are saying with that hashtag.
You can do this by simply searching the field indicated with the magnifying glass in the upper right corner of the screen – after all, you already know exactly what you are looking for. You do not need to use the pound sign for this search, but you must type the hashtag correctly.
With advanced search, you can still drive more results than you want. You can narrow your search by date or location, for example, or even search for positive or negative tweets with the hashtag. This is based on the use of happy or sad emoticons – ? or ?.
Your search results may appear in a few different ways. There are five main ways to display: Top, Live, Accounts, Photos, and Videos. Each has its own characteristic.
The top view first shows the tweets that had the most engagement – such as retweets and replies.
Live mode presents tweets in chronological order and is updated in real-time as they are posted.
Accounts mode only shows tweets from certain official news source accounts, such as newspapers.
As you can imagine, of course, Photos and Videos modes only feature tweets that, along with the hashtag, also bring photos and videos.
On Twitter, the most commonly used hashtags enter a ranking, called Trending Topics – that is, hot topics. Large marketing campaigns may temporarily have a hashtag on Trending Topics in a certain region.
On Twitter, you had to post the hashtag from a public account. On Facebook, by the same logic, the post containing the hashtag must be public. Otherwise, it cannot be indexed in searches.
You can control this setting from the box in which the post is written, using the blue button in the lower left corner.
On Facebook, it’s even easier to search for results using a particular hashtag. After you post a profile update, the post hashtag automatically becomes a link to the page that collects these results.
So just click on your own post to find out what other people are saying with that hashtag.
In addition, you can also search for results with a hashtag using the search field or via the www URL. facebook . com / hashtag / SuaHashtagHere .
With the exception of some countries, Facebook does not list the most commonly used hashtags. As a result, you cannot know which topics are most commented on.
Although Facebook is a social network where hashtag usage is not yet so strong, it has more viewing options for the results of a hashtag search.
It features Top, Latest (which corresponds to Live), Photos, and Videos, which correspond to what we have already seen on Twitter.
But in addition to these, you can also view results in Pages, People, Places, Groups, Apps, and Events modes. The list, respectively, the pages, people, places, groups, and events that are using the hashtag.
What these modes have in common is that all results displayed are officially linked to the hashtag you sought.
So now that you already know how to use hashtags and what you have to do to interact with your brand audiences, are you ready to get the best results on social media?
Use the hashtag #bloggercage and share with us your experiences and learnings on the subject!