Over the past several years hashtags have garnered a negative connotation in the world of social media. If your reading has led you here you likely fall into one of two categories when it comes to your feelings towards the notorious symbol:
I use them sometimes, but I don’t really get the point.
Isn’t that a pound sign?
Most of the negative buzz around the hashtag centers around misuse. That’s right! The truth about hashtags is that they’re an incredibly useful tool for connecting, discovering, and organizing your social media platforms in a crowded social world.
If you’re a business page, your profiles will automatically be public, but if you’re planning to use these tips to grow your following on your personal page, make sure your profile is set to ‘public’ in order to grow your account and make your hashtagging efforts worthwhile.
You can track the performance of your hashtags on each of the platforms to determine how a campaign or style of the post of performing. On Instagram specifically, you can see the total impressions from hashtags, which is often significant when used correctly.
Let’s get into the three proper uses of hashtags to maximize your social success:
Connection
It likely comes as no surprise that social users follow and regularly check hashtags related to their interests. Because of this, hashtags are a great way to expand your audience with users who are already interested in your content and familiar with your line of work. You can take your hashtag game a step further and attract audiences with adjacent interests with broader terms.
Try these hashtags: #promotionalproductswork #brandedswag #corporateswag #companymerch #creativedesign #screenprinting #embroidery #printandpromo
An added bonus when it comes to connection and hashtags is the endless possibilities for live chats. Platforms like Twitter use hashtags to connect individuals with a common goal or interest on a weekly or monthly basis via highly engaged ‘chat-room’ style conversations.
You can join these weekly live chats by searching the hashtag and following along as the pre-set time! Start with these chats:
#promochat, a promotional products industry-specific live chat on Twitter each Wednesday at 3 PM EST.
#brandchat, a general business live chat focussed on brand development for any size business on Twitter each Wednesday at 11 AM EST.
Discovery
How much do you know about your industry and its weekly happenings?
Hashtags are a great way to stay in the loop on industry events and on top of it’s biggest trends. It’s important to do your homework to find out what the trending hashtags for your industry are and to check in regularly as they change. The effort you put into staying on top of industry hashtags will ensure you stay connected to your industry and top of the timeline.
A great way to find these hashtags in realtime is to follow industry associations, event calendars, and even your own competitors!
Try these hashtags to maximize your discovery: #ppww2020 #PromotionalProductsWorkWeek #PromoTalk #ppai #asicentral #PPAIExpoD2U #PromoOnTheGo
Organization
Hashtags serve as a great way to organize related content in a very crowded and noisy social world. You can organize your own posts with hashtags to be able to direct customers and potential customers to a gallery of your work. For example, by using a hashtag like #skucon2020Swag or #skucamp2020MerchCollection, you would be able to see all of the custom gift items we created for these events.
If you’re holding your own event, campaign, or contest, providing a hashtag to your audience is a helpful way to view all related posts from your own account as well as user-generated content. For this use-case, ensure that your hashtag is general to the event without being so common it will be flooded by unrelated posts. For example, our hashtag for our skucamp 2020 event would be #skucamp2020, not #BusinessBootcamp2020.
With these three benefits in mind, we hope that your perspective on hashtags and the value in their use has grown exponentially and you’ve learned a thing or two about how to start implementing them into your social strategy today!
