Published on December 8th, 2016 | by Guest

The Art and Science of Social Media Hashtags

You’ve seen hashtags everywhere, on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and even TV commercials. But what value do they have to your business? Do you just use them because everyone else is? When used strategically, hashtags can help you to enhance brand visibility in ways you never imagined possible.

Do you have a goal?

Why would you want to use a hashtag? Hashtags can be used for visibility purposes. When people share the hashtag, which has your brand name, it tends to create brand awareness. Hashtags can also be used to emphasize on a new product, a certain aspect of your product or service or even your brand philosophy. It’s important to determine what you want to achieve after using a certain hashtag.

Keep hashtags short and simple

The most effective hashtags are the ones that are memorable for users. Relatively short hashtags with 14o characters or less are more likely to be retweeted. Avoid mixing upper case and lower case letters when using hashtags unless you use an acronym to represent your brand.

Choose a unique hashtag

Tons of users use hashtags on social media. Thus, some hashtags are very common to a lot of people. Using common hashtags may bring confusions to your audience and you will be at a loss if you select a hashtag that has already been used before. Search thoroughly for the hashtag online and make sure no one has used it before.

Promote on hashtag-friendly platforms

Hashtags can have a lot of impact if shared on the right platforms. Twitter, Facebook and Instagram are great platforms to use hashtag campaigns. You can quickly narrow down search and get to know how the hashtags are performing over the course of your campaign.

Take advantage of popular hashtags

Using your own hashtag with other trendy ones can give your content greater visibility. Look for popular hashtags on Twitter, Pinterest, Facebook and other social platforms and think of contributing while mentioning your unique hashtags. Whenever people search for content based on that hashtag, your brand is likely to appear which means greater rankings for you too.

Connect with users

When you get mentions of your brand or popular people using your hashtag, make sure you engage with users. User engagement is key in making any kind of social campaign effective. Make sure the hashtag you choose can easily explain to the user what the campaign is about. Don’t be afraid to think outside the box and come up with a unique one. You can even create a hashtag campaign to support a worthy cause. Such campaigns usually perform exceptionally well online. However, user engagement such as comments can also bring harm to your brand. Be sure to monitor the comments on your post, avoid inappropriate comments or languages as it will give an impact to your subscribers. When such thing happens, respond professionally and positively.

Author’s Bio:

Heidi Kim is a professional business consultant and legal researcher focusing on business laws. She is passionate in helping those who have any queries regarding business laws and how these may affect their respective businesses. Follow her on Twitter @gehreslawatty

Tags: art, hashtags, media, science, social, social media