Are People Using too Many Hashtags? We Wanted to Find Out Why They Exist
Author and Photos by Talking Forests
You are probably thinking; Talking Forests is going a little crazy with those hashtags. The research we have conducted showed us some compelling evidence. We admit, we are using them more now and committed to helping you understand why we recommend them. Talking Forests is keeping up with #hashtag trends on the #social platforms for you. Hashtags got their start on Twitter as a way of making it easier for people to contribute, find, and follow conversations online. We can help you craft hashtag plans! Four reasons why we recommend you put them into your social media plans:
- Hashtags help you get found by your target audience.
- Many people do research by searching on specific hashtags.
- By using the hashtags that are of interest to your ideal customer, they find you.
- Hashtags improve the rate that people click on the links in your posts.
Evidence! Are you still skeptical? Check out this screenshot of our Twitter post:
The post above shows so much engagement with only a few hashtags. No hashtags, no engagement, this makes us sad. Photo Credit: Talking Forests
Conference Hashtag Tips:
Each year, conference organizers use hashtags to promote the event before, during and afterward. They may look like this #IFBC2018, #IFBC2019, #IFBC2020 etc. This is a great way to build excitement and engage your audience, but if you have potential members they may not know what the acronym means. If you only promote the one acronym by itself on social media, you lose people. Our tip is to find industry-relevant hashtags to use along with your conference acronym. We want to invite newcomers to our conference, but we want them to know what conference they are welcome to attend and what it is about in a brief post utilizing hashtags. In your promotional tweets and other social media sites, it is best to use both your conference acronym and relevant hashtags to draw in new followers.
Why does this matter?
People can follow the hashtags you picked the day of your conference and retweet what other attendees were saying and sharing about the event. After the event, you are able to capture some of the best moments by searching the conference hashtag. Even after a conference, if you have a good hashtag, it could be timeless, North American Forest Partnership is testing this out.
North American Forest Partnership’s, Will Novy-Hildesley #forestproud example from Mike Beacom's interview:
This is a screenshot of an interview that Mike Beacom did. He is National Association of Conservation District's Forestry Specialist. Will Novy-Hildesley, Executive Director of NAFP is being interviewed after an event called "From Communications to Engagement".
So enough about #Twitter, what about #Instagram, #LinkedIn, and #Facebook? To attract your ideal follower on Instagram, your hashtag strategy needs to be on point. Start with overall hashtags that represent your organization then niche down to what keywords your followers would use to find you. This is a service we offer to help you with!
Special Talking Forests #Tip: Keep all your hashtags in your notes on your cell phone on a notepad to make them easy to grab and post on any social media. We have had a client post without hashtags and then we save the day and go in and add them for you in the comments section to get people to be able to see the post in their Instagram feed!
#LinkedIn hashtags: We use them when we write a post at the bottom and it increases engagement. Also, LinkedIn is now encouraging you to use them when you write an article because it helps connect you to searches. People can search those keywords and find your article easier. The choice of not using hashtags on LinkedIn could leave you in the dust.
#Facebook hashtags: We will only use a few hashtags to let our #followers know, if you use them, we can look them up and find your post. If we find a post we like, we can feature it on our page someday. Other than that, do not use many hashtags on Facebook.
So, what can Talking Forests help you with? We will go into your account and research hashtags that are relevant to your niche. When we find the best hashtags for your organization, we will put them into the search bar and find followers who are using them. On Instagram, we would search #forestry, #forests, and #forestproud etc. to target those people who you may want to follow. We will like and comment on some posts in their Instagram feed for you and the result? They see your likes and comments and follow you back. This is a tip on how to gain follows on Instagram.