What the Heck Are Hashtags and How Do I Use Them?

If you’re new to social media, you’re probably wondering what the heck hashtags are and how you can use them effectively. You may have asked yourself “What the Heck Are Hashtags and How Do I Use Them?” In this article, we’re going to cover those questions and so much more!

What The Heck Are Hashtags?

Hashtags assign topics to your posts, status updates and articles. Using the pound sign # {or hash} on a social network {think Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Google+ and even Facebook}, turns any word or group of words that directly follow it, into a searchable link, allowing you to organize content and track discussion topics based on those keywords. That means, if you wanted to post about your visit to NYC, like I did above, you would include #NYC in your status update to join the conversation. Click on any hashtag to see all the posts that mention that topic/subject in real time.

How to Format Your Hashtags

The first thing you should know is that you don’t want to use spaces – even if your hashtag contains multiple words. But you do want to differentiate those words by using upper and lower case. For example, Pen Island would look better, and make much more sense, as #PenIsland than as #penisland, don’t you agree?  Uppercase letters won’t alter your search results so people searching for #abc will get the same results as people searching for #ABC.

Numbers are supported, so #EasyAs123 works. Sadly, punctuation marks are not supported. So commas, periods, exclamation points, question marks and apostrophes are out. While you’re at it, skip asterisks, ampersands and any other special characters.

There Are No Presets

There isn’t a master list of hashtags, but you can search your social networks {and search engines} to see if there’s a hashtag already in use for a particular subject or topic. You can even check services like HashAtIt, Hashtagify, and Hashtags.org. Remember, every time you add a hashtag in front of a word or phrase, you’re creating a hashtag. Try it out!

How You Can Use Hashtags

Hashtags are supported on Twitter {where they started}, Instagram, Pinterest, Google+ and even Facebook, now. There are so many different ways you can use hashtags, the possibilities are almost endless. However, I wanted to give you a few ways you can use them, along with a few tips.

•  Don’t forget, hashtags turn words into searchable links
• Always start with a # and leave out spaces
• Use upper and lowercase to differentiate words
• Use them during conferences and events
• Use them in conversations around specific topics
• Use them for Twitter chats
• Use them during television shows (#CNN, #GreysAnatomy, #JurassicWorld)
• Hashtags can be used anywhere within your post or update
• Use them to find like-minded individuals
• Use them to find people discussing the topics you’re interested in
• Use them to create a following for your brand
• Use them to complement photos you share on Instagram (This helps you discover new accounts and pick up followers)
• Use them to show off your personality, brand voice or tone
• Use them for fun!

Again, these are just a few ways you can use hashtags while you’re using social media. What would you add to this article to help folks trying to understand hashtags? How are you using hashtags for your  business or brand? Let us know in the comments below!