With billions of users all around the world posting millions of updates every day, it can feel like too much to follow any topic or conversation on social media. Hashtags can help to provide much-needed organization. They are implemented in slightly different ways across the major social networking sites.
What Is a Hashtag?
A hashtag is a word or short phrase that is preceded by the hash symbol (#), otherwise known as the pound symbol or the number sign. On social networking sites, a hashtag is used to identify a particular topic or area of interest. Their main purpose is to organize content so that users who wish to follow a particular topic can simply click on, or search for the corresponding hashtag, and all of the relevant updates containing that hashtag will be displayed.
From the perspective of the reader, hashtags make it easy to follow the online chatter on a particular topic. This is particularly useful during developing news stories or live events. An example is the #ThingsILongthroatFor advert campaign used by Pepsi most recently. From the perspective of the person (or company) posting with the hashtag, it helps them be more visible, and helps their updates be seen by more people.
Social Networks With Hashtags
Social networks can be used for different purposes, from personal to professional. And while different social media sites use hashtags in fundamentally the same way, each site varies in its own usage. We shall only consider the two most popular: Facebook and Twitter.
Because Facebook allows users to have different levels of visibility with their posts and profiles, like “Public” or “Friends Only,” the visibility of posts with hashtags in them is directly impacted.
When you use the search function at the top of the Facebook page and search for a particular hashtag, only the posts that are shared with you (or set to public) will appear in the results. Similarly, any updates you post with hashtags will only be visible to those with whom you share them.
When posting a tweet, you can include a hashtag anywhere in your status update. It can be in the beginning, at the end, or anywhere in between. It is important to note that the hash symbol, as well as the actual word or phrase itself, will count against Twitter’s 140 character limit.
The most popular hashtags, as well as those promoted by companies, appear in the right sidebar of Twitter under the Trends section. Simply click on the hashtag to view the conversation in real time.
Some Important Tips to Note
Important Tips to Note
Using hashtags is easy, convenient and powerful, but there are a few key guidelines to keep in mind.
- Hashtags can contain letters and numbers, but not symbols or punctuation.
- Hashtags can be one or more words, but multi-word hashtags must not contain spaces. If you want to use “Love My Ofe Owerri” as a hashtag, for example, you can write it as #lovemyofeowerri.
- When using multi-word hashtags, capitalization can help to separate the words (e.g., #ThingsILongthroatFor).
- Avoid connecting too many words together in a single hashtag, as it can be confusing and ineffective.
- Avoid including too many hashtags in a single status update or post.
- While hashtags can be used anywhere in an update on many social networks, they are oftentimes best utilized as a single hashtag at the end of a post.
- When creating your own hashtag, make sure it is unique enough that only updates related to the event will use it, but short and memorable enough that the right people will want to use it.
- Watch for hashtags shown on the screen during television shows and news programs. This helps you better join and monitor the conversation.
