Online Marketing 101: Hashtags for Effective Marketing Campaigns

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Ahh, hashtags.

 A fairly recent term for what used to be what people called a sharp key or a pound sign and an apparent evidence of just how much Internet Technology has evolved.

I must admit when I first heard of this rather colloquial word uttered by my friends, I was confused.

And when it started making its debut on social media such as Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, I was even more baffled. I had absolutely no idea why this nondescript pound sign which was followed with a bunch of seemingly unreadable words mashed next to it became suddenly popular and trendy
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Deciding to ride with the trend, I started using hashtags in what would perhaps be the most inappropriate way possible. As I had no idea what using hashtags entailed, I just did what I thought what everyone was doing: write a pound sign and write a phrase or sentence next to it (no matter how long)

Of course, by now, all you social media-savvy users know that this is not the way to utilize a hashtag.

And when I did discover what novice mistakes I was making, I began to realize the true potential of the hashtag.

Marketing campaigns

When that sunk in, it became clear just how much this new online trend can be exploited and utilized by online business owners and marketers. However, utilizing the hashtag may seem easy but more often than not disastrous results can happen when applied incorrectly.  

Let this article serve as your guide in navigating the ways of how you can harness the true potential of the hashtag in your marketing campaigns.

Understand that placing a hashtag anywhere before a bunch of words would not help you 

 Placing a hashtag before a bunch of unreadable words may seem like a tempting idea to try, but it is the wrong way to go about how to use it. Additionally, it would not help the cause of your marketing campaign. If you are a smart internet marketing agency, you would know that this is a basic mistake.
Not only that, it would make you look #superannoying.

Hashtags when properly used can be a source of unifying force across all of your marketing campaigns, making you easy to find. To illustrate just how powerful the hashtag is, take a look at a local commercial you see being aired today and more often than not, you will see a hashtag splashed on the screen at some point.

This is an effective way of letting viewers know that should they want expansive information regarding a certain product or whatever is being promoted, you can find it online through that hashtagged phrase.

Twitter- Where it all began

This recent genius all started from Twitter where it made rounds the first time it was successfully introduced. However, there is no denying that its popularity has certainly spilled over other social media sites such as Facebook and Instagram—thus becoming a well-known staple variant for a profitable viral modern marketing campaign.

It has been stated that for maximum engagement, tweets with a hashtag or two are most effective. But be cautious, it has also been noted that exceeding two hashtags in a tweet decreased your chances of engagement by 17%. Choose your hashtags wisely and make sure they are appropriate to your campaign.

This alone can increase your exposure and your click-throughs on the site.

Tread carefully with Facebook

Facebook may allow the usage of hashtags but people who are on the site tend to abuse this feature granted by the social network. In fact, they have been so overused and inappropriately used in Facebook that research conducted by EdgeRank found that posts with hashtags had less engagement than those without.

Like twitter, the formula is easy. One or two hashtags a post will do you wonders and that fewer hashtags will grant you more engagement. However, it is not as straightforward as we want it to be. Utilizing hashtags on Facebook would require you to test out some of your campaigns and see if your audience is receptive to it.

Forgoing the usage in Facebook altogether is not exactly the best solution as you will lose the cohesion across cross networks that would better serve you ultimately. Just test out a formula and limit your hashtags.

Google+ is boon for your marketing campaign 

The beauty in using Google+ is that it automatically assigns a hashtag for your post even without you assigning one. Consequently, your post will be made searchable through the juggernaut of search engines. Additionally, when you don’t assign a hashtag on your post, Google would assign at least one to your post using your post text or the headline of the link should there be one.

Organizing their hashtags by category is also a feature and they include them in their searchable database as well as use them to collate trending topics. Let that sink in for a moment and marvel as this wonderful addition to the social network.



So there you have it, some useful tips to keep in mind the next time you hashtag a post. Keep in mind that hashtags are effective when they are used appropriately and sparingly. Picking just any bunch of words and phrase that comes to mind and hashtagging it is a preschool mistake. Use a hashtag that fits your campaign perfectly, give it a lot of contemplation and make sure no one else has been using it.

When you have found just the right hashtag for your post, you can maximize your engagement from there.