You may be familiar with #hashtags, they are commonly used on social media to help announce target words and grab users’ attention.

How to Use Them Successfully!

You may be familiar with #hashtags, they are commonly used on social media to help announce target words and grab users’ attention. This trend appeared to come out of nowhere, leaving many to scratch their heads in confusion. As the hashtag became a household name, many either avoided them all together or started overusing to fit in! To better utilize hashtags, understanding them is the first step!

Hashtags help companies get found! By using a hashtag that aligns with your brand, you can be found across the web, by people searching on that hashtag. Let’s use Yakima Branding as an example, here are some of the hashtags we use to be found across the web.

#SEO – We specialize in SEO, helping local businesses get found on Google by providing fresh content, fixing broken links, and providing a healthy website.

#Ads – We run ads for businesses in a variety of ways! We use Google ads, Facebook ads, print ads such as newspaper and magazines and even radio ads.

#Socialmediamanagement – We manage businesses on social media to take the edge off the pressure to maintain their online presence, so that business owners can focus on their work.

When social media users search a specific hashtag, your post will appear to them for viewing! This is helpful to bring more eyes to your content. Although it seems easy, there are some guidelines for using a hashtag correctly:

• Make your hashtag simple: Overcomplicating a hashtag can make it hard to read, confusing, and likely, unsearched. Instead of #localdigitalmarketingteam, it can be simplified to #digitalmarketing, #local, #localmarketing, and used in a variety of ways that keep it simple and easy to read and understand.
• Use hashtags that align with your brand: If you own a coffee shop, you want your hashtags to align with that industry. Using hashtags like #coffee, #mocha, #energized, and #caffeine would make sense, hashtags like #Mollyisourfavoritebarista would not. The chance of someone looking for that specific hashtag would be rare, so if your focus is grabbing more viewers, it won’t be efficient.
• Don’t use too many: You don’t need to highlight every menu item or every service you provide all at once. Having multiple hashtags is messy and can be mistaken for spam. Having a few (3-5) is best, keeping your post looking clean and easy to read! A few services/products you’d like to highlight would be best, you can always change your hashtags with each post!

Now that you have a better understanding of what hashtags are and how to use them successfully, you can have fun and play around with learning which ones show the best engagement! Hashtags are a fun, easy way to be found across the web and allow you to get your products or services out there in an organized way to show relevant services/products you have to offer. Please #like and #follow for more social media blogs!