The concept of hashtag came to existence in 2007, when Chris Messina bought them to Twitter. They are a great way of reaching people with simple texts. All people have to do is add a trending hashtag to their posts, and it becomes visible to a lot of people. Slowly it became a part of the twitter posts as every post contained some hashtag. No matter if it was trending one or not, it was still used. It became so popular that people started implementing campaigns on its basis, like the #NationalFriedChickenDay campaign by KFC or the #ShareACoke campaign by Coca-Cola.
With its increasing popularity, other social media platforms also adopted it. Today, hashtags are used on various social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest. And when something is creating so much impact on social media, how can it remain unnoticed by digital marketers? They had to use hashtags for their brand promotions. Even the ones mentioned above were a part of KFC and Coca-Cola’s social media branding. These hashtags made the process of reaching audiences through social media, more convenient for businesses. This means brands are able to reach more and more people without much effort of promoting their content online.
But if the brand already does not have many followers, then ‘just any hashtag’ would not work for them. They either have to opt for already trending one or form a new one that would gain popularity instantly. Only then these hashtags would be proven useful for their brand promotions. Here are some tips for marketers for how they can create hashtags for successful brand promotions.
Table of Contents
Less Is More
This phrase stands true for various things in marketing. In the case of hashtags, its importance only increases. Earlier, when hashtags were limited to Twitter, people never overstuffed them because of twitter’s word limit. But with it moving towards other websites, people have started using too many hashtags in a single post, which makes it unattractive. Most people on Instagram use irrelevant popular hashtags to increase the reach of their posts, and that sometimes works for them. However, this does not work in the long term.
When someone is trying to build a brand, the trust of people should be their first concern. That is why they need to use fewer hashtags that are more relevant to the post. Using 2-3 influential and relevant hashtags is better than stuffing tens of irrelevant hashtags in the post. Also, the hashtag should be kept short and easy to understand.
Finding Latest Trends
Something or the other is always trending on social media, and different topics might be trending on various social media platforms. So while creating a hashtag, one has to look for trending topics on the social media on which they are posting. That can help them in gathering more attention towards their post. If there is an already trending relevant hashtag, they can use that too because the ultimate aim is to increase the reach and that purpose will be solved with it.
Along with relevant trends, businesses can also support some ongoing events. As these events already have trending hashtags, so marketers do not need to invent new ones. Using these hashtags, they can increase their social media reach.
Put Emotions To It
Putting emotions in marketing strategies is the best way to influence people. These emotions can be of any kind, happy, sad, romantic, angry. They motivate people to share the hashtag further, and as we all know, hashtags only work when more and more people share it. Also, when it touches people’s hearts with emotions, it leaves a lasting impression on them. And with that, it can survive on social media for a longer time, which is again beneficial for the promotion.
Along with emotions, it should also be delivering some sort of message that can create an impact on people’s minds.
Looking Through All Aspects
There are millions of people who might encounter the hashtag, and it has to be liked by everyone. Marketers have to think according to all those people and find flaws in the hashtag. With this analysis, they can optimize it and make sure it does not gather any criticism after going public. Two things to look for are:
- There should be a single meaning to it. Words or sentences that might have multiple meanings can lead to several troubles.
- There should be no hidden message in the hashtag, other than the one that it intends to deliver. As people have become clever nowadays, so they easily find mistakes in everything. And once it would start getting criticism, there would be no way back.
Using Tools
There are various hashtag tools available on the internet. Marketers can use them for their benefit. These tools can be used to find hashtags as well as to track a hashtag’s performance after going public. They can also use tools to find trending hashtags, in case they are using already made up ones.
Learn
Another trick to make successful hashtags is to learn. Marketers who have just stepped into the hashtag market should learn from their competitors. They can look for their successful hashtags, as well as failed hashtags to see if they are working in the right direction or not. If marketers have used hashtags in some of their posts, they can also learn from their own successful and failed ones. That will help them in looking for what exactly works for them.
Conclusion
Creating hashtags is not as easy as it seems. Marketers have to look for various factors to get a successful hashtag. With all these tips, they can create catchy hashtags that can help them in promoting their brands. Along with all these tips, they also have to update their hashtags with changing trends because each hashtag has its own life duration, after which it has to be replaced. Otherwise, it starts degrading the quality of the posts.
So, marketers should start using hashtags immediately to increase their social media reach and make more profits from their business.
