Watch out – hashtags are everywhere! Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and even YouTube use hashtags, letting their users reach the trends. If your social page is among the top ones, your online store will totally see a boost in sales and conversion. Don’t believe me?
We work with lots of brands which use famous hashtags in their social networks and benefit from it. So, we have conducted hashtag research for you and will prove that hashtags are a number one thing for successful digital marketing. Discover what a hashtag is, how it works, and why your social networks need it – let’s begin the story.
What is a Hashtag?
Where do Hashtags Come From?
Where are Hashtags Used?
Why Does Your Brand Need Hashtags?
How to Create a Hashtag for Your Brand and Use It
Top Hashtags in Instagram, Twitter and Facebook Today
How to Use Hashtags in Marketing
What is a Hashtag?
It’s no secret that your business needs to be active in social networks to reach customers all over the world. Everyone knows that a hashtag is a great thing to attract new customers. That’s why we decided to let you in all the dos and don’ts of hashtags usage and show how they can empower your marketing strategy. But first, we want to explain what a hashtag is – and how it has appeared.
Where Do Hashtags Come From?
A hashtag, in simple terms, is a keyword phrase written without spaces with the # hashtag symbol. When you write a post for a social network, you can add these words anywhere in the text: in the beginning, at the end, or between words. So, why do you need to do it? Hashtags bind conversations and posts of different users into a single flux that you can open clicking on it. And when potential customers use a hashtag search, looking for a product, they may encounter your website profile in a particular flux. Hashtags that are used by lots of users get into trends. If a keyword is popular and widely used, you have a high chance to boost conversions. But how did hashtags become a household term?
The hashtag history goes back to 2007 when Twitter started using them as a way to index keywords. It was aimed to ease the search for the users and make the results they get more relevant. Chris Messina wrote a post with a first-ever used hashtag in August of the same year. After over a decade, almost all social networks started using hashtags following the same goal. So, let’s see what social networks have these keywords and how to use them effectively on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.
Where are Hashtags Used?
How to Use Instagram Hashtags
What comes to your mind first when you hear a word hashtag? Instagram! Most of the posts on this social network have lots of different hashtags both trending and barely used. But is the strategy of using dozens of hashtags effective? Not really – at least, not anymore. Some years ago, when the sign # just started to win the popularity in social media, it was a trending tactic to put as many hashtags in the post as you can to get into the top. Today, this technique no longer works. In order to help you improve your digital marketing strategy, we have some tips on how to use hashtags on Instagram in the right way:
- Make sure that a hashtag suite your post since the main role of it is to reflect the post picture and attract the target audience. Inappropriate hashtags mislead the users and it can influence your brand negatively.
- Try not to flood your post with lots of unnecessary hashtags. We recommend using five to ten of them in one post. Moreover, Instagram hashtag limit is 30 per post. If you exceed the limit, the platform just won’t let you post it.
- Do not randomly mix hashtags with post content – it might irritate the readers and will make your Instagram account look completely unprofessional. It is better to add hashtags at the end of the post in order to make a good impression.
- Don’t use hashtags in comments below the post because Instagram doesn’t rank them in search.
- Use hashtags in stories. If you add a creative hashtag in combination with an eye-catching story design, you can gain lots of views in a short time.
How to Use Twitter Hashtags
When you promote your brand on Twitter, hashtags should become an essential part of your marketing strategy. Why? Tweets with hashtags engage more customers than ones without them. Running a Twitter ad campaign, don’t forget about following certain rules:
- Great news – Twitter hashtag limit does not exist! But the platform itself does not let the users put more than 280 characters in one post, so you won’t be able to add a lot of hashtags.
- It is sufficient to use just one or two hashtags per tweet in order not to irritate your followers.
- Motivate the followers to retweet your posts to engage even more people and as a result, get more potential customers.
- Find and use trending hashtags to maximize your Twitter impact.
- Create and use Twitter bots that can help you choose specific hashtags and simplify the tweeting process. Sending posts automatically, you save a lot of valuable time.
How to Use Facebook Hashtags
Everyone knows that Facebook has hashtags but can they be useful for your ad campaign? Definitely, yes! Hashtags on Facebook are a great way to reach new audiences and attract more people to your account if you follow just a couple of rules.
- Make sure that people can see your posts on Facebook. Surprisingly, but many users really forget to make their accounts public. Otherwise, only your followers will see your posts. If you make your account public, Facebook users will be able to see your posts searching by hashtags.
- Use hashtag from any other social networks if they are connected to your Facebook account. Any Instagram or Twitter hashtags are clickable on Facebook automatically. Isn’t it a great opportunity to run your marketing campaign on all social networks together?
- Don’t forget to use trending hashtags and join already existing hashtag conversations. Especially if a conversation is about your brand or related products. Communication with followers and customers is a great strategy to show your professionalism and interest in their customer experience. The only advice here – be patient!
How to Use YouTube Hashtags
Should you create hashtags for YouTube videos? Certainly! Interesting that not all the YouTubers know how to use hashtags on this social network. Follow our recommendations and turn visitors of your YouTube profile for the subscribers into a unique experience.
- You probably want to know whether YouTube limits hashtags or not. Well, the network claims that it doesn’t set the limit. However, everything is not so simple. If you use over 15 hashtags per video, Google will ignore all of them or even delete the video. The best strategy here is to use 1-3 hashtags per video, just the ones which are relevant for users.
- Add your hashtags to the video description. They will appear above the title of the video and will help the people search for similar content when they click on them.
- Simplify the YouTube experience. If you usually upload videos around a specific topic, add hashtags by default. Then, you will never accidentally forget about them.
- Not sure that YouTube hashtags are useful? Google has YouTube Analytics where you can see how your hashtags work as well as their ranking. With the help of this data, you will always know what words are the best to use and how to use hashtags successfully.
Don’t forget the most important thing – make sure that the accounts in all of your social networks are open and public otherwise these recommendations are useless for you since nobody will see the posts.
Why Does Your Brand Need Hashtags?
Using hashtags in social networks just because every other brand does, is strange, isn’t it? We will explain in detail why your Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube posts need hashtags and why you can’t ignore them.
The main task of a hashtag for a brand social network is to help a user – a business owner – to reach the target audience and improve clickthrough rates. Since many people are looking for services or products by searching for certain hashtags, you can turn it into your favor and add these hashtags under your posts to attract more target customers. Using appropriate hashtags, you increase your chance to be found. So, hashtags help to reach new people and if the rest of your profile is done right, turn them into the followers: the more followers you have, the more customers and profit you can get. Sounds easy, doesn’t it? But what if I say that many brands do not use hashtags at all?
It is true that some top brands and industry leaders have rejected hashtags or just use a few of their branded ones like Nike’s #justdoit. The company uses this famous hashtag only for large scale ad campaigns. Why does it happen? These brands want people to know that they do not need to use hashtags to get even more attention.
Companies like Nike, Chanel, Walmart, Audi, Samsung and others have a huge audience. Without various hashtags, their posts don’t look overloaded and they still gain lots of likes and show high customer engagement. People desire simplicity and leading companies follow the trend. If you also want to follow hashtag trends, you need to know how to create a famous hashtag for your brand. Below we will share all the secrets of business hashtag creation and teach you how to use them in social media marketing.
How to Create a Hashtag for Your Brand and Use It
How to create a simple branded hashtag. Using a unique business hashtag, you can promote your products and company – it is one of the social media musts for startups. In the future, your customers will be able to use the brand business hashtag to easily find your networks and as a result, it will increase brand awareness. We are going to help you get in touch with a target audience and give you some useful tips to follow.
- Create a list of hashtags with your brand name (BN) like #shoes_BN, #sale_BN, #news_BN, #event_BN, and others.
- Add a city at the end of a business hashtag if you run a local brand like #BNSeattle. However, try not to go into extremes. No one will be searching for long hashtags concentrated on a district like #shoes_BNnorthsidenewyork.
- Create a list with your brand hashtags and save it in the stories highlights. It eases the profile navigation. People will be able to click on a specific hashtag and view all your brand’s posts where it is mentioned.
- Repost interesting photos and videos of your followers and customers which have your brand hashtag. Followers appreciate this type of content. It is a great strategy to show respect to followers and improve customer relationship.
- Print your brand hashtags on flyers or banners to attract offline customers and turn them into your subscribers on social networks.
Finally, it’s time to introduce your business hashtags. Keep following the article and you will get hashtag ideas you can benefit from and learn about their influence on your marketing strategy.
Top Hashtags in Instagram, Twitter and Facebook Today
In order to simplify your hashtag journey, we want to enlighten you about the hashtag trends. Top hashtags are a power that can move your business forward. You can use them in combination with your brand hashtag to make them more popular as well. The main idea here is to learn what hashtags are most-used since unknown ones won’t reach the trends. Don’t understand why your business needs top hashtags?
Event and Conference Hashtags
When it comes to promoting your brand and events, conference and event hashtags are a great way to tell the whole world about your company. For example, if you want to reach potential partners in the Magento world and you have attended the MagentoLive conference or just interested in it, you can write a post about this event adding their famous hashtags, as well as your branded ones. When people search for MagentoLive event, they may encounter your post and check out the profile of your company.
Private Event Hashtags
Organizing various events? Market your brand using private event hashtags. Add wedding hashtags, anniversary hashtags and birthday hashtags to reach your target audience. When people look for an event organizer, they may use their Instagram or other social media to get some inspiration for the celebration ideas. Your company can reach new customers by providing these ideas with the right hashtags.
Fitness Hashtags
If you want to promote your gym, fitness training services or sports equipment online store, you can take advantage of our fitness hashtag examples. Using the right gym hashtags, crossfit hashtags, bodybuilding hashtags, you can reach sports enthusiasts and market the brand among the target audience for free. You also need to try motivation hashtags which are booming in the sports field.
Travel Hashtags
As a photographer who wants to promote the services or a company selling hiking equipment, you can discover new opportunities for your brand with our travel hashtag examples. Travel blogger hashtags, photography hashtags, hashtag nature, landscape hashtags can help users to find your photos, videos, as well as services and products descriptions.
Day of the Week Hashtags
Wondering how popular can be the posts with a day of the week hashtags? Promoting you branded alcohol, you might boost your sales using Friday hashtags, Saturday hashtags and Sunday hashtags. While Monday hashtags can be used for a coffee ad campaign or handmade stuff with “hate Monday” prints. Or you can just pick the most popular day of the week hashtag to reach the trends. Why not?
Celebrations and Holiday Hashtags
Holidays and celebrations are exciting topics for social networks users. Why not promote your brand with Christmas hashtags and New Year hashtags? No matter what products you sell, all people are always searching for exciting presents. As soon as December comes, these hashtags boom the trends. The same situation is with Easter hashtags and Thanksgiving hashtags since everyone wants to buy interesting decorations and, for example, Easter eggs. If you need to market your brand efficiently, don’t forget to check hashtags popularity.
How to Use Hashtags in Marketing
As you have already realized, hashtag marketing isn’t so complicated. You don’t need to hire a hashtag specialist or something like this. But only a few business owners know how to find top hashtags and use them effectively. So, we are sharing this strategy with you.
Don’t know what hashtag to use? Try a hashtag generator which provides top hashtags generated on a selected keyword. Having found all the necessary keywords, you can easily copy the created hashtag and add it to your post. There are lots of either free or paid hashtag creators on the market.
- Best Hashtag is a free and easy-to-use Instagram hashtag generator that provides a list of top hashtags related to the written keyword and shows hashtag popularity.
- Keyhole is a paid hashtag creator for Instagram, Twitter and blogs. It offers a free trial for two searches. The platform provides a detailed hashtag analysis and shows twits with selected hashtags.
- RiteTag is also a free hashtag generator but has a paid version with more functions. The solution shows geotags, which are important for domestic companies. If you run an international business, you’d better use a paid version.
These platforms show high, mid and low-frequency hashtags. If you think that using only high-frequency hashtags for your growing account you will reach the top faster – you are extremely wrong. All new business owners add high-frequency hashtags and get lost among millions of posts with the same one. No one will even see your post. What to do? Using mid and low-frequency hashtags, you have a great opportunity to get on the top, overstay there and be noticed by an audience. You won’t be invisible since there are fewer posts.
Being fond of hashtags, it is really important not to forget that you can’t use the same hashtags in posts which go one after another. Why? They overlap each other and, as a result, your account won’t reach the top. We also recommend creating several branded hashtags to alternate them and have more chances to promote your brand among the top ones, as well as add them at the end of your hashtag list.
So, a hashtag is perfect to attract new followers and customers but is it enough? No. People will never subscribe to a business account which posts photos and videos with hashtags without any description. Your account represents you and your brand. You need to be interesting for potential customers. If they see only hashtags, they will see your unprofessionalism and forget about you in seconds. The best strategy here is to write a post containing advertising, news, or aimed at communication with the followers and add related hashtags at the end of the post but don’t put hashtags in the middle of a text. No one appreciates it.
Conclusion
Hopefully, now you have all the necessary knowledge to launch a successful marketing strategy in social networks. Using hashtags, you can empower your business as well as turn a startup into a global player. We have shared the hashtag marketing secrets with you and hope that the article will help you to reach Instagram, YouTube, Twitter and Facebook trends!
Have a previous hashtag creation experience? Share your thoughts below or use our #belvg_team hashtag in networks to get the latest BelVG news!
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