Everyone knows what hashtags are in 2018.
Twitter first introduced hashtags to the social media world in 2007. They’ve been confusing marketers and media professionals ever since.
In practice, hashtags are used to categorize social media content into easily navigable lists. By including the #[INSERT KEYWORD] in a tweet/ post, it then becomes visible inline with other posts using that same hashtag.
However, not everyone knows how to use hashtags well.
Let’s take a moment to clear up some confusion.
In this post, we will tell you how to find and select appropriate hashtags and how to best use of hashtags on most social media platforms.
First things first…
Research Hashtags For Your Social Media Messages
Sometimes, the best way to use hashtags is to find ones that already exist.
Before you can get started, though, you need to actually find those hashtags. Fortunately, there are a number of websites out there to help with this process.
Let’s take a look at a handful of useful options:
Research Hashtags to Use on Twitter
Follow @WhatsTrending on Twitter. It’s a tool that can help you find the top hashtags. You can get new viewers by finding creative hashtags that fit your content and are recently trending.
Twitonomy can help you find personalized hashtags that revolve around the content you post on your Twitter accounts. It can also show you the most powerful influencers using a given hashtag, as well as who’s engaging the most.
You’ll need a premium to unlock this tool’s most useful functions – it’s reasonably priced.
Discover Hashtags For Twitter And Facebook
RiteTag is a hashtag power tool for discovering hashtags.
It also offers up-to-date usage data to show you how hashtags are performing in the real world. While the premium plans offer more functionality, the basic free plan still offers plenty of utility.
In short, RiteTag is like a Swiss Army knife of deep hashtag research and tracking.
Discover Hashtags for Use on Instagram
HashTagsForLikes – Instagram allows a maximum of 30 tags per photo use this tool. This free tool is great!
Can’t find a good hashtag for your content?
Create your own hashtag!
There are times when you might want to create your own hashtag. You might want one to complement an event so attendees can track social posts.
Or, you might have a unique marketing campaign that needs its own hashtag (rather than jumping on one that already exists).
3 Elements of the Perfect Hashtag A good hashtag is:
- Memorable.
- Unique.
- Relevant to the content you’re sharing.
Strike a balance:
- Make it unique but simple to remember.
- Don’t make your hashtag so broad that it’s hard to track.
Now you know where to get hashtags…
Follow These Hashtag Best Practices
Learn How To Use Hashtags on Social Media Platforms
Hashtags On Facebook
A better question might be, “Should I use hashtags on Facebook at all?”
Data shows hashtags on Facebook do not help boost engagement. That means you might be better served by leaving hashtags off entirely. In one study, posts with hashtags received only .80% viral reach, while posts without hashtags had 1.30% viral reach.
Plus, Facebook doesn’t recognize hashtags in the search bar. The only way to find hashtags is to directly click on the hashtag in a post.
If you do use hashtags in your Facebook posts, the bare minimum is the way to go. We’ve found that posts with just one or two hashtags got the most engagement.
Hashtags On Twitter
Stick to two hashtags per post since that tends to grow engagement on your content by 21%.
When you start using 3 or more hashtags per message, you lower engagement by almost 17%.
Hashtags On Instagram
Photos with 11+ hashtags seem to get the most interactions.
However, they can also look like spam when they’re overdone. Insure that you keep them relevant.
Hashtags On Linkedin
There are no limits to the number of hashtags you can use in a post on LinkedIn. That said, we recommend that you limit each LinkedIn post to a maximum of 5 hashtags.
Using too many hashtags on LinkedIn could also result in the LinkedIn Algorithm marking your post as spam.
Hashtags On YouTube
Hashtags on YouTube are most widely used in the comment section.
You can use hashtags to categorize your content to be found by topic, using your keywords as the foundation for your hashtags.
How To Use Hashtags On Pinterest
Pinterest hashtags lead to search results for the keyword in your hashtags. That means if you have a hashtag in your Pin description, your Pinners can click through to find similar content for those keywords, not necessarily only for that hashtag.
There’s also no guarantee Pinterest will index the hashtags you choose to use.
If you do decide to use hashtags on Pinterest, then less is more. There is evidence that Pinterest will even demote the value of your Pins that have too many hashtags.
Furthermore, some say the best way to use hashtags on Pinterest is to use your own customized hashtags that people click to see your own related Pins instead of directing traffic to see a broader category around a topic.
Now, you know how To Use Hashtags To Increase Your Brand Awareness
Hashtags can make or break your social media messages and engagement.
It’s super important that you understand where, when, and how to use them. Now you have a bunch of tips to get you started in the right direction!
Not everyone knows how to use hashtags well.
In my next article you will find out the 6 Common Mistakes of Using Hashtags.
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