5 Reasons To Use #Hashtags For Business (Sparingly)

By now, we have all seen this hilarious (and eerily spot on) sketch by Jimmy Fallon and Justin Timberlake (and subsequent similar ones).

I am also sure you all have at least one friend or colleague who is overly fond of the hashtag, putting so many in their social media content that it #sometimes#becomes#hardto#decipher#what#itsabout. Both the comedy sketch and your friend demonstrate too much of a good thing.

And no, hashtags are NOT ruining the English language… When used properly.

If we take one step back, those who aren’t familiar, here is the hashtag formula:

Hashtag = “#” symbol + relevant keyword or phrase

You should be using hashtags strategically in all of your social content. Here is why:

#1 Find information and follow trends

Now more than ever it’s important to stay on top of things when it comes to running your business. With enhanced connectivity online and information at everyone’s fingertips, why not tap into the information using hashtags? Call up a search for something specific. Maybe you are trying to find information on #EmployeeEngagement. You will be surprised at how many tips and tricks you will find through articles that have been put out there through social media.

#2 Generate discussion and make connections

Source: freedigitalphotos.net

Hashtags are an amazing tool that can be used to start up and join discussions that are relevant to your brand interests, your product, or your industry. For example, if you wanted to see who was talking about entrepreneurship, and what they are saying, you can search for #Entrepreneurship and a list will pop up. From here, you can reach out to specific people and comment on discussions.

Another thing it is useful for is to follow discussions about your own brand. Why not track what people are saying about you? It is a great way to track your online reputation. First, you should try to establish some sort of online presence. It can build into a really effective customer service tool when you are able to interact with your customers.

#3 Promotions and Contests

This is a great way to encourage user-generated content. For example, if you were going to organize a photo contest, you would have people tweet or post photos using a specific hashtag like the #Jackspatio contest that was run by Jack Astor’s this summer. You and everyone else can easily follow along with all of the entries. This generates more traffic for you and users will have fun interacting with your brand.

#4 Targeting specific audiences

Just like you may be joining in conversations, you can also target your information towards people who you think would be potential new business prospects. For example, if you sell jewelery and your target market is for weddings, maybe you should be posting images of your work using #Wedding or #WeddingWednesday.

#5 Real time interaction

There are so many opportunities online for hosting chats, or perhaps you are hosting a webinar. If you provide a hashtag for people to use, participants can participate by asking questions and sharing content. A great example is #SMTLive. They Social Media Today regularly puts on webinars rich in content, and you can follow along with the webinar through twitter. Even if someone couldn’t attend, they still benefit from the information and it establishes your brand as an expert in the industry.

I realize that with small business and start-ups time is short, but capitalizing on efficiencies is what is going to make your strategies more achievable. Hashtags take a little getting used to, but once you get the hang of using them in your content, you will find that you have made your social strategy more effective.

Integrated Marketing: How To Avoid Compartmentalized Strategies

So many business leaders compartmentalize marketing into silos. This happens for a number of reasons. Maybe you have a large corporation, some people think it is easier to look at things in separate pieces, and others don’t understand the power that marketing can have, they just see it as a necessary function of business because that is what they were taught.

Wherever your thoughts lie on this, the clear message is that you have to stop thinking in silos. Stop segregating your marketing efforts because you are leaving yourself open to a less than stellar marketing campaign. When you look at your marketing strategy as a blue skies big picture, you can see where all of the different pieces fit into the overall strategy. If you look at, say, digital and experiential as two completely separate strategies, you won’t be able to leverage your own successes through multiple channels. And what happens if one tactic falls short of the goals set out, or effort in that area flounders? A tactic can easily be swept under the rug if it is not given purpose in your overall strategy.

The key is integration. Marketing channels all have specific functions, however all should work together to form a multi-channel marketing strategy (I’m not one for buzzphrases, but this seems to fit).

Here are a few tips to get rid of marketing silos and avoid potential marketing fails:

1. If you do all of your marketing in-house, set up regular status meetings with the whole marketing team. If your company is large, then assign key people to attend the meetings and report back to their teams.
2. If you are hiring an agency, hire one central agency rather than multiple agencies. Only 11% of companies work with a lead agency for both their digital and traditional marketing (SoDA).
3. If your project or campaign is particularly large and needs to be spread across multiple agencies, then make sure you establish who the points of contact are to keep open communication channels.
4. Know where your customers are so you can focus your efforts rather than trying to be in all places or in just one place. This will maximize the effectiveness of your efforts.
5. Talk to your customers on a regular basis to make sure that your strategy is in line with their changing outlook. This includes B2B marketing! Only 5% of B2B marketers actually consider keeping this communication channel open as part of their overall strategy (Forrester)
6. Generate touchpoint maps to see where you customers are getting their information, where they are interacting the most, and who influences them.
7. Always develop an overall strategy before assigning tasks to make sure you are not forgetting about any channels that would work for you.
8. Define metrics to measure the success of your marketing efforts.
9. Be realistic about your budget. This is a tough one, but it could mean working with a smaller agency where you are not lost in a sea of clients, scaling back outreach in certain areas to targeted influencers who will get your message out, or even taking a more guerrilla or grassroots approach.
10. Constantly measure the effectiveness of your efforts in all channels against your goals and metrics to see if you need to tweak your strategy along the way.