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Hashtags - What Are They Good For? (Absolutely Everything)

The hashtag – you’ve seen it everywhere. They’re used online as well as on billboards and busses and everywhere in between. Despite their omnipresence, the first use of “hashtag” with its modern definition wasn’t until 2007 in reference to Twitter.
The hashtag enables users to more easily find particular media with a specific theme or content. All items labelled with the same hashtag create a collection through which users can search and explore. For instance, a photo of a setting sun over a beach could be labelled with both #beach and #sunset. Those searching for images with either of those tags will see the image along with all other bits of media with those tags.
But, what is the purpose of a hashtag on social media?

While there are a variety of types, we’ll discuss four main uses of the hashtag: descriptive, association, consistent, and promotion.
A descriptive hashtag is just what it sounds like: the tagged words or phrases describe what’s in the image, video, or content. The #beach and #sunset tags mentioned earlier fall into this category.
An association hashtag aligns the media or content with something. This could be a person, place, or even a concept. For example, we could add #cornwall to our imaginary sunset image if the photo had been taken there.
Trends in hashtags are abundant and therefore we have consistent hashtags; those that are constantly reused. Consistent hashtags are often used for days of the week or a repeated activity. For example, many users on social media refer to Friday as #friYAY to show their excitement for the end of the workweek. Also, we see #throwbackthursday, sometimes shortened to #tbt, for when users upload media or content from the past.

Lastly, and most importantly, we have promotion hashtags. These are ones that coincide with a brand or product in some way. Within the promotion hashtags are two main categories: branded and unbranded. Branded hashtags can include the brand name or product. For example, here at Digity we use #DigityTipTuesday to deliver marketing tips and tricks each Tuesday. On the other hand, an unbranded hashtag wouldn’t include either the brand or product but users may still know the correlation. For example, the #shouldve hashtag should instantly bring Specsavers to mind.
Now, to get back to our initial question, what are hashtags good for? With the ability to add multiple hashtags to every piece of media or content, you extend the reach of everything you post. The more hashtags you use; the greater exposure your content has.
Using hashtags even subtly related to your post can drive traffic from otherwise unlikely sources. As a business, you should be utilising relevant hashtags to gain exposure. Of course, there’s more to social media than hashtags and converting social media likes to business is a blog for another time.

Do you already use hashtags in your social media? Has your reach been extended?

This blog post was written by:

Chris Lunn • Sep 12, 2016

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