Hashtags are used just about everywhere - they make regular appearances in our social media
posts, they travel across platforms, and they can even carry the message of an entire marketing
campaign for really savvy brands...
But how do hashtags work on different social media platforms - and how does this affect
the way that we use them for business?
These are some really interesting questions that I’ll try to answer inside this video.
Hey, it’s Chia from Brand24 and today I want to talk about hashtags - specifically,
the different ways that hashtags are used across various social media platforms like
Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
So let’s start with hashtags on Twitter:
Twitter is essentially the birthplace of hashtags, and it all started with this Tweet: “How
do you feel about using the pound sign for groups?
As in (hashtag)BarCamp?”
This was the first time that a hashtag was used on Twitter, and the message sums up how
Twitter hashtags are still being used today - to GROUP together individual tweets that
talk about a common topic.
Basically, hashtags on Twitter let us find conversations about stuff that we’re interested
in, so we can join in and voice our opinions or share an experience.
Brands can really easily use Twitter hashtags to engage in conversations about a certain topic
or create a new hashtag to promote an event - like #SMMW19 (social media marketing world).
If you use a pre-existing hashtag, make sure you take 5 minutes to see what it’s about,
so you don’t find yourself in hot water like DiGiorno Pizza did when they turned the
#WhyIStayed hashtag (featuring stories from domestic abuse survivors) into a joke about
staying for pizza.
Now, what about hashtags on Instagram?
Instagram is all about images, and each hashtag contains a visual feed of all the posts that
share the same tag, whether it’s displayed in the image caption or down below in the
“Comments” section.
People tend to go crazy with Instagram hashtags, which is what prompted Insta to put a limit
of 30 hashtags on each post.
What this liberal use of hashtags on the platform tells us, is that they play a key role on
Insta.
Actually, Instagram is almost POWERED by hashtags, making their role in business kind of multipurpose
here.
But, no matter what you’re doing - whether you’re holding a contest or giveaway, or
working on a digital campaign, you want to maximize the social media reach for your posts,
and make sure that as many people as possible see it.
So the best way to do that is by using trending hashtags.
Since these are the hashtags that people are actively using, it guarantees that the IG
post you spent so much time creating, won’t go unnoticed.
Now, how about hashtags on Facebook?
So, Facebook hashtags work in a different way than they do on Instagram and Twitter.
This is because Facebook itself is much more focused on people - including those with private
profiles.
Most people - they don’t really use hashtags on Facebook unless it’s to express some kind
of emotion, like “I’ve been trying to open this jar for the past 20 minutes.
No luck.
#Frustrated"
And they don’t really SEARCH for hashtags there either.
Facebook is where you go to look for people or friends - and sometimes groups or brands
that you like.
But that doesn’t mean that hashtags don’t have a place on Facebook.
On the contrary, this means that hashtags on Facebook have a much more specific use,
especially in business.
So, a lot of brands - they actually forego using any Facebook hashtags, since - as we mentioned, people don’t
really use them to discover content or join in on conversations.
But all this changes when brands want to connect a series of Facebook posts.
In this case, Facebook hashtags become super helpful.
Beauty brand Ipsy is a really good example of this.
They created a series of short videos on Facebook, where they tested different products that
could be found in their beauty subscription service.
Even though each video featured a different product, that could range from foot peels to eyeliner
tape, they were all connected by the hashtag #CrashTestBeauties.
So, anybody who watched one of their videos could just click on the hashtag, and be taken
to what is essentially a playlist of all the videos in that series, helping viewers discover
even more Facebook content from Ipsy.
I imagine that this would also work really well for fitness brands - just invent your
own hashtag like #GetFitWithArnold (or something more clever) - and create content that shows
people the best exercises for different muscle groups, and then connect it all with your
hashtag to show them workouts for total body fitness.
So, this was just a really quick look at how hashtags work on different platforms - whether
it’s to engage in conversation on Twitter, discover new content on Instagram, or connect
a series of posts on Facebook.
Of course, they’re also used on other social media platforms, like YouTube, LinkedIn, Reddit
& more --- albeit in different capacities.
But the number one tip that I have for you guys today, is that if you use hashtags for
business on ANY platform - remember to track them.
See how many times they’re used, WHERE they’re used, WHEN they’re used, and WHO is using
them.
I’ll try to cover how you can track all of this in another video.
And that’s all we have time for today - if you have any questions, feel free to ask away
in the comments section - or just let me know what else you want to learn about.
And if you found this video helpful, remember to like, share and hit that subscribe button
to find out when the next video comes out - which will contain even more tips on how
to do all things in social media & digital marketing.
Thank you for watching - I hope you learned something useful, and I’ll see you next time. Bye!