Author: Miruna Dragomir / Source: Business 2 Community

Every #socialmedia post one writes is a creative work that started with a white canvas, a well-defined strategy, a plan to reach big volumes and some colors to draw attention and engagement.

Social media is not an easy game because it’s not only about drawing the attention, it’s about beating the harsh algorithms, adding real value and fitting in the customer’s context.

To win that battle, experts should know their emojis, gifs & hashtags. Why? Because on social media, customers are not looking for you. They’re not scrolling through Facebook to find out about a new discount or professional news. They are definitely not there to learn about what your company’s been up to or how your team building went. That’s why you have to think about them when designing your social media strategy.

So don’t barge in, fit in.

Adopt the style, the tone, and format of the channel you’re a guest on. Here’s a snippet of how the miracles of internet will help you achieve social media greatness:

  1. Hashtags help you
    • Join the conversation
    • Start a conversation
    • Define the topic
  2. Emojis help you
    • Stand out
    • Show humanity
    • Show that you’re involved in your social media presence
  3. Gifs help you
    • Connect with your audience
    • Provide engagement
    • Draw attention

Now that we’ve defined why you should enjoy the possibilities of social media, here’s how to truly leverage them.

Hashtags

Hashtags have multiple advantages. They can help a brand engage with a community and gain visibility, they can create brand awareness and help with measuring results and they can even define the topic of your conversation and brand.

We will define in this chapter, 2 main things:

  1. When and why use hashtags
  2. Hashtags for each social network

Why we use hashtags

Here are the use cases when hashtags are used in social media:

  • When you start a conversation or a campaign
  • When you want to join a conversation or hijack a subject
  • When you want to define your topic and increase social media SEO

#CampaignHashtags

When you plan a social media campaign or an integrated campaign that includes social media, consider hashtags your wild card. They won’t automatically make you win the game, but will definitely boost your chances. They’re your wild card because they’ll help you:

  • Win brand awareness
  • Gain more visibility
  • Measure or track the reach of your campaign
  • Create the sense of community

Stressing the latter – hashtags can become the glue that holds the community together during a campaign. Try to remember: #ShareACoke, #IceBucketChallenge or #LikeAGirl.

However, when you decide on your campaign’s hashtag, you should keep in mind a few guidelines. Make sure it’s original – don’t copy existing hashtags. Don’t try to be too witty so that the hashtag loses its meaning along the way. Lastly, we recommend you don’t make the hashtag too brand-focused (unless you’re Coca-Cola).

#HashtagHijacking

Brands have been trying to get in on hot topics for a while now. Some have succeeded and some have deeply failed. Hashtag hijacking can be a beautiful gift! A way for brands to get in on topics shared and discussed by the community and gain great visibility without any costs.

However, with great visibility comes great responsibility and if Ben Parker would’ve worked in social media, those would’ve been his “words of wisdom”, trust me.

Hashtags are used for all kinds of topics, from engaging and amusing ones to extremely sensitive ones. That is why you should think very hard before deciding to jump in on a topic and always keep in mind the Digiorno’s misuse of #WhyIStayed.

#DefineTopic

One of the most natural ways to use a hashtag is in the sentence to basically define the topic of what you’re saying.

It’s quite simple, if I write a tweet promoting a social media resource, I’ll definitely include the #socialmedia hashtag. That will help me reach people following this hashtag and add value to the right conversations.

Hashtags for each social network

Though the concept of hashtags is quite universal and they’re used similarly on all social media networks, each one obviously has their own quirks.

On Twitter, hashtags are very commonly used and are usually intended to be searchable. Twitter is very focused on conversations and hashtags are used to define those conversations and topics. We don’t recommend you overdo it on Twitter. Tweets that end in any possible hashtag…

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emoji engagement Haaretz Hashtag