What is a hashtag anyway?
A hashtag is defined as a useful word or phrase preceded by a pound sign ‘#’. It is most commonly used on social networking sites to link messages or content to the specific word or phrase identified by the hashtag. Hashtags allow you to group messages or posts linked to the hashtag. The power of a hashtag is in the ability to search for the hashtag and generate a set of messages or posts that contain the hashtag.
Why use a hashtag?
From prospective marketing, the use of hashtags will allow:
- Increase your promotional reach
- Amplify the awareness of your brand or company
- Focus your message on your target market
- Increase the likelihood that people will find your content
- Improve your search engine optimization results
How can you use a hashtag?
You must first determine the objective of your marketing message and identify who the content is targeting. Once you have defined these requirements, now consider the following types of uses for hashtags;
- Company or Brand – this is normally unique to your company or product brands. Likewise, you can also create this type of hashtag with your company slogan or brand slogan. A couple of simple rules for any type of hashtag is KISS: keep it simple and short. An example might be #EzineArticles for a company name or #BetterMarketingResults for a tagline. Remember that there are no spaces between words in a hashtag.
- Campaign or Promotional – select a unique phrase that best defines your promotional campaign for memory retention purposes. Your chosen hashtag must support the promotional campaign and must be used in all of your marketing messages during the promotional campaign. You should engage using your hashtag and encourage your target audience to also use the hashtag in their own communications and posts. Telstra’s #ThanksThursdays and Air New Zealand’s #NoLagToLondon are examples of promotional or campaign hashtags.
- Informational or Content – Generally, the use of these types of hashtags are not unique to your company, but refer to words or phrases that your target audience typically uses when searching the Internet for content related to your business. Business-to-business (B2B) oriented examples are #SEOTips and #ContentMarketing. Consumer-focused businesses will use lifestyle-oriented hashtags like #fitness and #fashionista.
- Event or Activities – common use is for business events like conferences, exhibitions or seminars, while community gatherings or celebrations also attract the use of hashtags. #CeBIT2014 was recently used by the CeBIT Australia IT Conference with #AdobeSummit used at the Adobe Digital Marketing Summit.
- Geographic or Location – For a geo-based business targeting a local clientele or a larger corporation with multiple geographic locations, the use of geographic or location hashtags is highly relevant to target your messaging with potential customers within these geographic business locations.
Your success in getting #BetterMarketingResults using hashtags will be the result of keeping these hashtags simple, easy to remember, and relevant to your target market. Also, be sure to use hashtags in your marketing messages and promotional content, while also encouraging and engaging with your recipients who use your hashtags.
Tags: #hashtags, #BestMarketingResults