In a previous blog, I wrote about the importance of using hashtags correctly in your content.
Not just any old hashtags, those that are followed by people that are (or could be) important to you.
People in target verticals, organisations, job types, specialisms, geographic locations or perhaps just similar interests - people you can start conversations with!
This blog is looking at hashtags from a different angle.
Which hashtags do you follow on this platform?
You can check here:
I happen to follow 286, these are a mix of tags on:
- Industries that are important to me and our business
- Topics that are important to me and our business
- Special interest areas
- Geographic links
- Planet, economy, people subjects
- Thought leadership areas
- Conversational concepts
- Innovation and development
- Fun and interesting
So what #1?
Following a hashtag means that every time it is used in content, that content is pushed into your news feed. Delivered straight to you, as you are someone who has shown interests in this tag.
For example, if you are interested in Energy you should follow the Energy hashtag.
#energy is followed by 4 million people. With a large follower base such as this, it means there will be a lot of 'energy' related content being pumped into this tag feed and, its all then curated and funneled into your feed.
So what #2?
The prize in Social Selling & Influence is the ability to have more conversations than by any other means.
When all this relevant #energy content is pushed into your feed, you can drop a like and leave an insightful comment to start a conversation.
You can also see who is interacting with the content and you can start conversations there.
You can go into the tag and see historic content, you can follow or request to connect with people you find interesting of who could be useful. You can get involved in multiple conversations, all relevant and related to a subject that is important to you.
You can start to become active in this tag and push your own content into the mix.
If this hashtag is important for you and/or your business, you want to start getting well known in this space, you want to aim to own the space. This is the first steps towards what we call 'Digital Dominance'. Not only using Social Media to prospect, but using it to drive a result.
Back to hashtags...
#energy with its 4 million followers is a broad ranging tag and its really busy. How about getting more specific and really drilling down into specific target areas around the main topic?
Perhaps the specialist topic of 'energy transition' is more you bag...?
#energytransition is a much neater and targeted tag. It's more focused on a specific area of interest around energy.
It has 33,500 followers and will be less busy than the bigger #energy. There will be less traffic here and content in this tag will be more visible, for longer.
Just like above, when all this relevant #energytranstion content is pushed into your feed, you can drop a like and leave an insightful comment to start a conversation.
...and so on (see 'So what #2' above).
Maybe not but you should!
If the hashtag that you are looking for doesn't exist, start it!
Simply use it in a piece of content and let people know. Write some content around why you created it and why you think people should follow it. Post regular content to the tag feed and watch your community grow.
If your news feed is getting cluttered or you've changed focus and don't want the feed that you currently have, you can easily unfollow old tags and follow new ones.
I recently stopped following a load of specific industry and topic related hashtags and replaced with industries and topics that I'm more interest into today. Now my news feed is full of interesting, fresh and relevant content.
Hashtag discipline is crucial element of any Social Media strategy. As we pull this through into Social Selling & Influence, hashtags give us places to hang out with people who are interested in the same things as us, and they allow us to do so much more with our content.
What can you do today?
Think of the target verticals or focus areas for you and/or your business and find relevant hashtags for them today.
Start following those tags and you will start to see all that beautifully hashtagged content now streaming into your feed. This is your chance to interact and start conversations.
- Go in and check who is doing what in the tag stream.
- Pick out who looks interesting and start to follow them.
If you like what you see and think you could benefit from taking the relationship to the next step, send them a connection request telling them how much you enjoy their content and how you think you could take over the world together!
Start to think about hashtags as useful conduits to allow you to have more conversations...
If you'd like to discuss how to drive repeatable and scalable value into your business through Social Selling & Influence, I'm happy to walk you through it.
Live Social '21 (and into '22)
Eric Doyle
unknownx500
