Hashtags are a critical part of every social media strategy. Whether you’re planning a Facebook or Twitter campaign for your B2B organization, hashtags can help you a great deal in boosting social media engagement and improving your brand’s reach. However, if you’re randomly adding hashtags, you may not get the desired results.
When used properly, hashtags can work wonders for your B2B organization. Here are some quick hashtag statistics to help you understand the importance of hashtags in your social media strategy:
- Tweets comprising hashtags can boost engagement up to 2x (100%) for individuals and 1.5x (50%) for brands.
- On Facebook, posts with hashtags see the highest engagement with an average of 592 engagements per post.
- On Instagram, posts with at least one hashtag see 29% more interactions.
But, as with any business on social media, you have to be careful with hashtags and make sure you’re using them properly and not overusing them.
Here’s how to use hashtags… without looking silly or alienating your customers and clients.
The Basics of Hashtags
Here are some basics of hashtags to get you started or improve upon what you’re currently doing:- They always begin with a “#.” They do not work if spaces, symbols, and punctuations are used.
- The most impactful hashtags are short and crisp.
- To ensure your hashtag is visible to social media users, you need to keep your profile public.
- More hashtags aren’t always better; they’re considered spam.
How to Use Hashtags for Your B2B Social Media Strategy
Here are three reasons why you should include hashtags in your B2B social media strategy, and how to do it right.
Hashtags Help Increase Engagement and Drive Conversations
Including hashtags in your social media posts is a great way to initiate conversations with your followers and keep them engaged. Research reveals that tweets with hashtags get twice more engagement than tweets without them.
Hashtags Are a Great Way to Show Support for Social Causes
By using hashtags related to social issues, you can show your customers and prospects that your brand is always behind social causes. For instance, the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter was used across various social media platforms. Many brands also used this hashtag to show their concern for the social issue.
Hashtags Help You Find and Target Your Audience
On both Instagram and LinkedIn, social media users can follow hashtags as well as other users. It can be a good idea to use some trending branded hashtags to help prospects find your B2B brand. For instance, if you use #picnic in your Instagram posts, Instagram users who follow this hashtag will see your latest post and may start following your brand too.
How Hashtags Work on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter
Before we discuss how to find trending hashtags, let’s quickly look at how hashtags work on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.
An Instagram hashtag combines the conversations of different users into a common stream. In simpler words, all Instagram posts under a common hashtag are displayed on one page. So, even if users using the hashtag are not connected, they can see each other’s posts.
It’s simple: All you need to do is add the hashtag to your Instagram post! You can also add them into the first comment on your posts if you want your post captions to be a little cleaner and clearer.
The number of hashtags we advise you to use is between 5 and 10.
Similar to Instagram, a Facebook hashtag combines all conversations comprising the hashtag in one stream. But unlike Instagram and Twitter where the majority of the accounts are public, hashtags created by many private Facebook accounts are not visible to the public. As a result, you may only find hashtags posted by brands, celebrities, and influencers when using the search functionality.
Again, it’s simple: All you need to do is add the hashtag to your Facebook posts before you post on your page or timeline. Also, if you want other Facebook users to view your hashtag, ensure your profile is not private.
The number of hashtags we advise you to use on Facebook is 1 or 2.
Twitter hashtags work just like Instagram and Facebook hashtags. Even if Twitter users who are not connected use the same hashtag, their conversations/posts will be displayed under a common stream.
All you need to do is add the hashtag to your tweet. Also, if you want other Twitter users to view your hashtag, ensure your profile is not private.
The number of hashtags we advise you to use on Twitter is 1 or 2.
How to Find the Most Trending Hashtags
To find the best hashtags for your B2B brand, follow these tips:
Track Your Competitors and Social Media Influencers
The first approach is to analyze the hashtags your competitors are using. Also, keep an eye on the hashtags influencers are using to draw audiences.
Get a Social Media Listening Tool
Social media tools monitor different social media platforms for mentions of brands, products, and more. You can make the most of these tools to monitor what customers and prospects are saying about your B2B brand on social media. They also provide you with insights into trending hashtags and suggest which hashtags can work for your brand.
Identify and Assess Which Hashtags Worked Well in the Past
Create a list of hashtags you’ve used in the past and analyze their performance. Pull out top-performing posts and see which hashtags you used in them. This can help you determine which hashtags worked well for your B2B social media strategy. You can use them in future posts to draw audiences and drive engagement.
Need help with hashtags or social media creation? Please reach out!
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