Tag: Facebook hashtags

5 Ways marketers can use Facebook hashtags

Do you include Facebook hashtags in your Facebook Page posts?

With 1.15 billion users, Facebook is an attractive place for businesses to market to customers.

Today I’m going to cover Facebook hashtag usage and how your brand can benefit from using Facebook hashtags.

The role of Facebook hashtags in marketing

While Facebook hashtags don’t seem as popular as on Twitter or Instagram, they can still help your brand.

With 1.15 billion users, Facebook is a great place to put your marketing efforts for your business.

When compared to other social networks, no other network comes close when in terms of active users.

Facebook usage stats
Facebook has 1.15 billion active users.

Facebook hashtag usage

Don’t overdo Facebook hashtags

While users are encouraged to use on average 11 Instagram hashtags, Facebook hashtag usage is much lower.

For example, you don’t want to use them in every post.

You also don’t want to use too many. 2-3 hashtags typically work best for Facebook hashtag usage.

Hashtags must be one word

I often get asked what is a hashtag.

Capitalization isn’t important

When looking at Facebook hashtag usage, remember, capitalization isn’t important.

For example, using #Facebookmarketing instead of #FacebookMarketing will take users to the same hashtag.

Personally, I like to capitalize the second word. This way it is a little easier to read the hashtag.

Don’t blindly pick a hashtag – research it first

When choosing a hashtag, be sure you’ve done some research.

If you’re not sure where to look, try these hashtag tracking tools.

Not only can they save you a lot of time, but you can also see how popular a hashtag is before beginning your Facebook marketing campaign.

PiJnz has put together a great infographic on Facebook hashtag usage.

Be sure to read through these tips on how Facebook hashtags can help your brand.

5 Ways marketers can use Facebook hashtags

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Minding your manners with hashtag etiquette

Hashtags seem to be everywhere these days. For example, there are Facebook hashtags, Twitter hashtags, Instagram hashtags, and even Google Plus is using hashtags. This is great because you can begin to incorporate hashtags into all of your social networks. Before you do though, you need to be aware of the proper hashtag etiquette.

Otherwise, you could be doing more harm than good when using hashtags on your favorite social networks.

What is a hashtag?

Oxford dictionaries defines a hashtag as a word or phrase preceded by a hash or pound sign (#) and used to identify messages on a specific topic.

To sum this up, when it comes to social networks, hashtags are clickable links that bring together posts from that network that are also using that hashtag.

This can be useful because it lets you see who else is talking about a similar topic on your favorite social network.

Hashtag evolution

The hashtag has evolved quite a bit throughout history though. In fact, it wasn’t always used like how it is today. There is a rich, storied history of the hashtag.

Common hashtag mistakes

While hashtags seem like they’re very easy to use, here are common mistakes you want to avoid when using hashtags.

  1. Stringing together too many words in a hashtag.
    • For example, using #hashtaqetiquettetips when just #etiquette will suffice.
  2. Tagging every word in a post with a hashtag.
    • Not only is this unprofessional, but doing this can make it difficult to follow a post or tweet.
  3. Using hashtags that don’t relate to your business or brand
    • This is a big no-no when using hashtags. An example of this is using a hashtag and including a link to a product that doesn’t relate to the hashtag. You can be seen as a spammer if you use this technique.
  4. Using hashtags when they are not needed
      Just because you can use a hashtag doesn’t mean you need to. Make sure you’re selective on when you should include a hashtag.
  5. Picking the right network for hashtags
      While Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Google Plus, and Pinterest all include the option to use hashtags. Be sure you know your audience. If they don’t understand hashtags, you could be pushing them away by including them.

If you want to see hashtags in action, Justin Timberlake and Jimmy Fallon created a hilarious video on using hashtags in real-life that also does a great job illustrating why hashtag etiquette is so important.

While it seems that hashtags are ubiquitous, remember, there is a right time and place for them. The team at Gremln put together this infographic on hashtag etiquette. There are also some great tips on how to use hashtags to get your message across and reach your target audience.

Tips on proper hashtag etiquette

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Facebook hashtag marketing tips

Facebook rolled out Facebook hashtags as a way to compete with Twitter, Google Plus, and LinkedIn. While adoption has been slow and feedback has been mixed, they are still an effective way to track conversations on Facebook. Here are some Facebook hashtag marketing tips you can implement now to help you tap into the 1 billion active Facebook users.

Is Facebook hashtag marketing effective?

Not everyone agrees that Facebook hashtags are effective. In fact, some suggest that Facebook hashtags don’t help boost exposure at all.

This is rather surprising because the purpose of Facebook hashtags is to help group conversations across different Facebook profiles and pages and help marketers reach new audiences. To me, this suggests that we need to give Facebook hashtags some more time to develop, as it sounds like they haven’t yet caught on with everyone.

One other surprising stat reported by Consumer Reports is that just 28% of Facebook users make their Facebook posts public.

For those of you using Facebook hashtags, for them to be effective and to reach people, you want to make sure you tell your audience to make any Facebook posts they share that include a Facebook hashtag public. If they don’t make these posts public, this means the posts are not being seen when someone clicks into a hashtag, which means lower exposure.

Missed opportunities with Facebook hashtags

While I have personally used Facebook hashtags in some of my Facebook marketing posts, one thing that I consistently notice is that I’m seeing the same people using Facebook hashtags. This suggests that a lot of people are not using Facebook hashtags (or if they are, they are not setting them to public) so that everyone can see them.

This means there are a lot of missed opportunities for marketers.

This infographic from Prestige Marketing looks at different Facebook hashtag marketing tips to consider implementing in your digital marketing strategy.

Facebook hashtag marketing tips

Continue reading Facebook hashtag marketing tips

How to use Facebook hashtags on Facebook Profiles and Pages

Facebook hashtags

While hashtags on Facebook have been available because of users automating Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest updates to their news feed, they did not become official until today. Now Facebook has their own hashtag called Facebook hashtags that you can use when posting status updates.

Grouping content on Facebook with hashtags

The main advantage of Facebook hashtags is that you can make it easier to follow conversations in your  news feed. For example, instead of scrolling through your Facebook news feed and seeing lots of updates about the same type of conversation such as the NBA Finals, you can click on a hashtag to filter your conversations so that you only see ones associated with the #NBAFinals.

In addition to helping streamline your news feed, Facebook hashtags will also help with Facebook Graph Search. This means you’ll be able to find updates and discover new people and pages to connect with on Facebook.

How to use Facebook hashtags

If you’re familiar with Twitter hashtags, Facebook hashtags are not very different. Basically, it’s a way to organize content posted to Facebook.

To use hashtags on your Facebook Profile or Facebook Page, simply type the hashtag symbol (#) in front of a word.

For example, if you’re interested in the NBA Finals, you would type #NBAFinals.

Other types of hashtags include popular television shows, such as #GameofThrones, #DowntonAbbey, #Oscars, #Emmys, #WorldSeries, etc.

Features of Facebook hashtags

Here are a few helpful tips on using Facebook hashtags:

  • You can include Facebook hashtags in status updates and comments
  • Clicking on hashtags posted on Facebook will sort your Facebook news feed updates for that specific topic
  • Hashtags includes in updates from sites like Instagram, Twitter, and Pinterest will function when clicked
  • You can search hashtags by entering them into Facebook Graph Search
  • Only public conversations are searched
  • Facebook hashtags within Facebook advertising is not supported (yet)
  • You cannot pay to promote a hashtag on Facebook – use Facebook promoted posts instead
  • Facebook hashtags do not work on mobile at this time

How can I get Facebook hashtags?

Just like all new Facebook features, not everyone has this feature just yet. To get Facebook hashtags, you don’t have to fill out any forms. Facebook will be rolling them out to everyone over the next few weeks.

When you do finally get them, you’ll start to see hashtags appear in your news feed. These will be clickable.

How can I use Facebook hashtags to my advantage?

If you’re someone who has your tweets automatically published to your Facebook Profile or Facebook Page, you don’t have to feel silly using hashtags now. Your friends can also join the conversation without feeling awkward. 

In addition, there are other ways you can benefit from using Facebook hashtags in your status updates.

  • Insert your Facebook post into a conversation
  • If you have your tweets automatically posted to Facebook, the hashtags will now be clickable (a time-saver!)
  • If you’re a business, expand your conversations to reach new customers for specific events. Ex: #fathersday, #superbowl, etc.

Question: Now that Facebook hashtags are available, how do you plan to use them, or will you? You can leave a comment by clicking here.