Hashtags are #Everything

What was once your phones pound sign is now an instrumental part of today’s culture. With its first appearance on twitter in 2007 and then only a few years later being added to the OxfordDictionary, making it clear to be the “most popular means of categorizing content on social media.” The purpose of a hashtag evolves when a keyword or phrase are attached to the end of the # symbol."

It looks something like this: #lovemydog #Raincouver #DONUTDAY

Using hashtags in your posts enhances the reach it gets because anyone who is interested in that same topic “can search for that label to find other messages on that same social media platform.” For example, If I were to go on Twitter right now and search #Raincouver, I would see a ton of tweets from people discussing the rainy week we are having and if I were to tweet using that hashtag I would be among those tweets as well.

Same goes for Instagram, I would see a bunch of people posting photos of the rainy streets of Vancouver, or those sitting by their fire with a cup of tea.

What is so great about the use of a hashtag is how it unites people on so many different levels. “They serve as bonding tools with our peers and even strangers on social media.” For businesses, hashtags are a crucial part of getting your content out to the right target market, and there are three different types of effective hashtags you can use to promote your brand to its fullest potential: brand specific hashtags, trending hashtags and content hashtags. Brand specific hashtags are tags that you make for your own business to market your brand and promotions. It gives you the opportunity to be creative and make a branded hashtag that is unique to your business or defines your business. “Search for it on Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Google+ and Facebook before you implement it. If your company name is common, choose a different hashtag name.” For an example, if you are a hairdresser named Elle in Nanaimo, start a hashtag #hairbyElle for all your customers to use when they take a photo of their fresh new hair cut/colour. So these are a type of hashtags that would trend amongst your close online personal network of followers. However, if someone were to come across the hashtag or see it when searching people’s profiles, then it would trace them back to your brand and hopefully implement more business. There are many companies that have done this very successfully but one in particular is Coca Cola and there brand specific hashtag #shareacoke ,which they use to engage with with the social community of Coke.

Trending hashtags are broader and are recognized by many viewers.  For this type of hashtag, it is important to keep it relevant and offer some kind of value to the topic at hand. “You’ve probably heard people talking about “what’s trending now”. They are often referring to the hashtags that are trending, or are the most talked about right now.” Any business can take part in this, however to avoid getting lost amongst the thousand of others using that same hashtag, you must act fast to get the fullest potential of exposure.  Try and “use niche trending hashtags to connect and develop relationships with your targeted market.”

Lastly, content hashtags are the use of hashtags in front of words that are directly related to the content or location in correlation with your company. “They aren’t necessarily trending or highly popular. They are simply common hashtags that are related to your post content.” For example, it you are marketing an upcoming event in Nanaimo you can tweet something along the lines of: People of #Nanaimo, come on down to the annual #pumpkinfestival to enjoy warm cups of #hotchocolate, #pumpkins, fun #costumes and more! This post will be seen on many searches relevant to Nanaimo, or pumpkins or hot chocolate etc., which is the target market you want to reach!

Overall, hashtags have provided businesses and most people active on social media with rapid growth and the potential to reach more consumers than we could have ever imagined. Regardless of the type of hashtag you use whether its brand specific, trending or content, you have been given the opportunity to be seen all over the world if the hashtag is implemented correctly.

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