Orifunke Lawal

With the little time I have spent on the social media, one of the vital things I’ve had to relate to, learn and use are hashtags. Hashtags have basically been a part of my journey on social media and I would attribute my job as a social media manager to that. What I have observed over the years, though, is that hashtags are relatively becoming more popular than they were on social media a few years ago, especially on Facebook which was initially not designed to accommodate hashtags.

I love to use hashtags for whatever project I am embarking on because asides the fact that hashtags are cool, they very much pass your message across without you having to talk much. However, it is highly repulsive when I see someone use an hashtag in the wrong way. So, since I am tired of seeing such on my timelines, I have written this for the common social media user. Of course, they should help you if you’re looking at using hashtags for an upcoming event or for your business but this is basically for everyday use.
Hashtags are words following an Hash (#) character and are directed at passing a message across concerning a situation, an event, a business and whatever have you at first sight. In other words, when I see an hashtag, I should have a basic knowledge of what message you are trying to pass across. So an hashtag is meant to give an idea of what you’re trying to tell us- succinct and interesting.

What To Know Generally About Hashtags:

1. Hashtags are not meant to replace your long sentences (although this can be permitted on Instagram) but on Facebook and Twitter, please stick to short phrases. Don’t go writing something like, “#Ilovemymummysomuchicoulddieforher” or something like that. That is a very wrong way to use hashtags on Twitter or Facebook. Let your hashtags be short, straight-to-the-point and yes, relatable.

In the same way, you do not have to start all the words of your sentences with an hashtag. Writing something like, ” #Courage #is #needed #to #succeed” is totally off. Please be warned.

2. When using an hashtag, know that the word(s) you are meant to use should be directly behind the hash character. Don’t write something like, ” # Success” else you’ll be having an hash and a tag and not an hashtag. Okay?

3. When using hashtags, don’t use any punctuation marks in between (commas, fullstops, colon, hyphen etc). Punctuation marks will break your hashtag. Underscores (_), however, are allowed.

4. If you do not need to use an hashtag, really do not. I get displeased when I see people using hashtags that have no use in the first place. If all you need is a sentence, write your sentence. If all you need to write is an ordinary word, write it. Like I mentioned earlier, hashtags are meant to be phrases which can convey information on first sight, or at least, make people want to find out what the hashtag is about.

5. For business owners and organizations, be creative in your use of hashtags. You want hashtags that people could, over time, attach to your brand so use hashtags that are unique to your brand, specific, catchy and ones that can stick to the heads of your customers. So, as a personal advice, stick to one or two official hashtags for your brand. I could help out with this if you need help. I have a history of creating good hashtags ?

6. Asides Instagram, one or two hashtags are quite enough for every tweet or post of yours. You do not need to design your tweets and posts on Facebook with hashtags. Instagram allows this though.
I hope this helped. If you have any questions, I’ll be glad to answer.
You could connect with me on these platforms:

Twitter: @Orifunke

Facebook: Orifunke Lawal

E-mail: [email protected]

Photo-credit: Google