I wanted to share this very enlightening article on the use of hashtags...
Maybe you think that the way Twitter works is this–- People follow you.
- You send out tweets.
- People read your tweets.
WRONG!
That can still happen, but it’s rare. This was the original concept of Twitter but here’s what happened.
- People followed LOTS of other people, sometimes several thousand.
- They received too many tweets to read.
- They stopped reading them.
So should you give up on Twitter?
NO! It’s just that you should use it differently.
1. Respond to tweets that mention you
First, some people do read the tweets of the people they follow. But most people only respond to people mentioning them. So, when someone retweets one of my tweets, I reply and thank that person.
Here you see a retweet that someone did of a tweet of mine (notice the #powerpoint hashtag) and I replied and thanked him.
Of course, thank people who mention you! Those people just sent a link to your website out to all of their followers! That’s free traffic!
2. Retweet the posts of others
You do need to retweet other people’s tweets, but always include their Twitter handle. Do this strategically. That means, find the tweets of people who have the same target market as you or whom you want to notice you. Find them through a search as I explain below or yes, occasionally look through your Twitter feed to find good material to retweet.
Here you see an example of a retweet (RT) that I did. It includes the #SM (social media) hashtag that the original tweeter used and her handle (as well as the handle of the people she was writing about).
3. Post the content of other people
Absolutely post content that you find on the web that would be useful for your followers. That’s what Twitter is all about.
But if people don’t read it, what’s the point? Notice the hashtag in the screenshot, #solopreneur, and read on.
Always use hashtags
They way most active Twitter users use Twitter these days is to create searches for hashtags on topics that interest them. To find those readers, you need to use the hashtags that they’re searching for.
Therefore, every tweet should use 1-2 hashtags. This will vastly increase the number of people who see your tweets. In fact, you’ll probably get more people to see your tweets from their hashtag searches than you have followers.
Research has shown that tweets with hashtags get twice the engagement as tweets without.
Here’s an example of what can happen.
I posted a tweet about affiliate marketing because I had written a blog post about it. I used the hashtag #affiliatemarketing. Let’s look at what happened.
- SEO Bust added me to a list. He/she watches posts on that list, so now my posts will get his/her attention. That happened in 5 minutes!
- Automated Wealth Net favorited my tweet — only 8 minutes later! That means he/she can easily find it again.
Remember that these are people who are NOT following me. They have a search on the #affiliatemarketing hashtag.
And look at the retweet near the beginning of this post from viera00. Not only will that go out to his followers, but anyone who is searching on #PowerPoint will see it. This multiplies the reach of my post many fold.
Hashtags are the Twitter version of keywords
Hashtags are like your keywords for your website; you need to know the ones that are right for your business. They might be similar to your blog post categories, but those don’t always work. For your website, you should have site-wide keywords and then specific ones for each blog post. Similarly, you’ll have general hashtags and specific ones.
For example, #internetmarketing is too general and spammy for me, so #solopreneur works better. #smallbiz is also good as a general hashtag. The hashtag needs to be specific enough that people actually search for it.
But for a specific tweet, I might use #socialmedia or #wordpress to attract the notice of people who are search for those terms.
So which hashtags should you use? Just as you can do keyword research, you can do hashtag research. For example, you can go to hashtags.org, type in a hashtag, and get a 24-hour trend graph. Here’s the trend graph for #solopreneur. Note that this graph is showing how many tweets use #solopreneur, not how many people are searching for it.
Here are some more places to research hashtags:
- Hashtagify: This website lets you input a hashtag and shows you related ones.
- #tagdef lets you look up the definitions of hashtags (some are just some letters and are hard to figure out) and gives you popular hashtags.
- keyhole lets you see the reach of a hashtag
- Marketing Tech Blog has a list of hashtag research tools.
So now that you’ve figured out some hashtags to use, use them! Remember, EVERY tweet should have a hashtag. Or two.
How to create a search
Should you create searches in Twitter? YES!
Perhaps you have some Google Alerts that alert you to news on some keywords. Twitter searches are similar. They will keep you up to date on your field, on whatever it is that you’re interested in.
To save a search in Hootsuite, scroll to the right and click Add a Stream. Click the Search icon and enter your search. Here you see a search I created for #solopreneur.
Whenever you want, you can search for a term or hashtag on the spot by going to twitter.com and typing it in the Search box.
Here’s another post that I wrote about Twitter that you might find helpful: “Sneaky but ethical Twitter techniques to get noticed and engage followers“
Facebook, Google+, Pinterest, YouTube, and Instagram support hashtags as well. You can use them to create buzz for events — in this case, people create temporary searches to follow a conference or other event. So hashtags have lots of uses!
My friend and colleague Angela Mondor says, ” Hashtags allow you to be a part of a larger conversation… without them you are talking to yourself.”
Do you regularly use hashtags in your tweets and on other social media? What results have you seen? Leave a comment below and please share using the Share buttons below — after all, sharing is what social media is all about.
