Using Hashtags Correctly in Your Social Media Marketing

I’m sure there are a number of people who which the hashtag craze was over. I understand why. I’ve seen enough posts with an overload of hashtags. I often tend to just scroll right past that kind of post. Usually, the people whose posts are obnoxiously filled with hashtags simply don’t know the purpose of a hashtag and how to use them properly. Let’s give them the benefit of the doubt. Using hashtags correctly could completely change the way you think about them and could become an effective marketing tool for you.

What Are Hashtags?

A Hashtag is a word or word phrase (without spaces) preceded by what used to be known as the pound sign (#). These words or phrases are used to categorize and group your social media content with other posts that use the same hashtag. This then makes it easy for users to search that hashtag and find a collection of posts with a similar theme or topic. It’s a great way to find content you are interested in or to get connected with other users who share similar content.

Are You Using Hashtags Incorrectly?

It’s not hard to conclude that someone doesn’t understand the purpose of hashtags when they include one like this:

#sooverwhelmedwithmycrazylifethisweek

That’s a dramatic example, but let me explain. Hashtags aren’t just a trend of being too lazy to stick a space between your words. They’re not just a way to make your post “cute.” Hashtags are used to categorize posts and make content searchable. If no one would ever dream of searching for your hashtag or including the same one in another post, it’s probably unnecessary.

If you are doing any of these things when hashtagging on social media, you are not using hashtags correctly.

Making them so long, they cannot be remembered
Overloading your posts with them with every possible related word you can imagine
Adding hashtags completely irrelevant to the post

Using Hashtags Correctly

In archery, your goal is to aim with precision. You focus on shooting each arrow right at the center of the target. You’re not going to send arrows flying in every direction and hope somehow you hit the target. Think of hashtags in the same way.

Use Precision, Be Relevant

When choosing hashtags for a post, make sure you are choosing a word or phrase that is extremely relevant to the post and very specific. For example, we might share a post about social media marketing, and hashtag it exactly that way: #socialmediamarketing.

You always want to choose a hashtag that is going to generate search and traffic in order to help more people find your content. And to actually generate more traffic to your pages, you need to make sure when you include a hashtag, it’s adding value to the conversation in a hashtag feed.

Choose Hashtags That Are Already Trending

You don’t always have to create a new hashtag, especially if the audience you want to reach is unlikely to use or search it. Find out which hashtags, related to the types of content you post, are trending already and jump on board. When you include trending hashtags, your content is more likely to be discovered.

Create Brand-Related Hashtags

If you are looking for a way to get your followers involved or simply want to categorize a series of posts for easy search, you can create your own brand-related hashtag. When doing so, make sure that hashtag is not already being used. Choose something that is short and easy to spell. Remember not to add any spaces or special characters to the hashtag (you can use numbers). Include that hashtag with any post you want to pool in that category.

If you want to get your followers involved, encourage them to post with your hashtag. For example, a coffee shop might encourage customers to post a picture with their drink at the coffee shop and include the branded hashtag.

Don’t Go Overboard

If you’ve hung around at all in the SEO world, keyword stuffing is a BAD idea. While over-hashtagging won’t get Google to penalize you, you may still be hurting yourself with bad hashtag habits. Trying to include every keyword you can think of as a hashtag is going to look spammy, like keyword stuffing. Instead, for social platforms like Twitter, Facebook, or Google+, choose two, or three at the most, very specific and relevant keywords for your post. And if you’re afraid you won’t reach as many people with so few, remember that the more hashtags you include in one post, the less engagement it will get. In the hashtag world, less is more.

Tips for Using Hashtags on Various Platforms

Part of using hashtags correctly is going to depend on the social media platform you are using. Twitter is perhaps the most popular place to use hashtags, but other social platforms have jumped on the trend as well.

When using Twitter, remember that hashtags there tend to be more focused on a certain topic or conversation. See this for help on choosing hashtags for Twitter.

Hashtags on Instagram, on the other hand, are used more as image descriptions. Another thing to note is that on Instagram, you can get away with a few more hashtags, up to 7 or 8, without being seen as spammy. On Instagram, people use hashtags as search terms to find related images.

On Twitter, even if people are not following you, they can find your post when they search your hashtag. On Facebook and Instagram, however, if you have a private profile or share certain posts only with friends, your post will not appear in the feed of that hashtag. If you want to use hashtags to be found beyond your current friend or follower list, you need to make sure that your account or your specific posts are set to public.

Final Thoughts

Hashtags, if used correctly, can become powerful tools to grow your reach and audience. When you take advantage of them, hashtags can be a free marketing tool that will make your content more discoverable and more likely to be shared, too. While we’ll more than likely continue to see people spamming up their posts with hashtags that may never be searched, you can begin to use hashtags with strategy and precision.

Over-hashtagging isn’t the only social media mistake people make. Check out this post for more social media mistakes you should avoid.

To learn more about social media marketing, visit our blog or contact Red Rocket Web Specialists.