How to Create Branded Hashtags
Every business and brand needs to create a branded hashtag that you use for business posts, and that your customers can use when they are sharing your content. This will help differentiate your business from others in your industry, and allow for customers to find your profile. Branded hashtags are also great for running campaigns and gathering user generated content.
Step One: Create a Business Hashtag
The first step is to create a business hashtag for your brand. This can be as simple as #YourBusinessName or something with a unique, memorable twist. It is important to keep in mind that you should keep it short, but it should be on brand. Another way to ensure that the hashtag is memorable is to make it clever. Research current events or trending topics, that aren’t controversial, in your industry and come up with a play on words for that topic. This will help it’s virality and it will resonate with your followers and customers. It is important that you make sure that the hashtag has never been used before you start sharing it. Always proofread the hashtag before using it to make sure that there aren’t any hidden messages or possible misconception in the text.
For example, for all of our posts on social media we use #KapokMarketing. This helps our clients and community locate and engage with our content. It is important to keep hashtags short and to the point, so if your business has a long name you should shorten it to a point where it still makes sense. By creating a business hashtag this allows for your customers to find more of the content that is created by your business.
(Source: @kapokmarketing on Twitter)
Step Two: Share the Branded Hashtag on Original Content
If your small business is creating original content in-house, it is a good rule of thumb to put the branded hashtag on the posts. This will help other users know that this is unique content that your business created. Also, when users are looking for more content related to your business it will populate under this hashtag. On all of the social media platforms you are able to run a search query using a specific hashtag, and all of the posts using this hashtag will appear in those search results.
There are many places where you can use or promote your business’s branded hashtag:
- Social media posts
- Social media comments
- Instagram bio
- Twitter bio
- Twitter chat
- Website
- Blog post
- Marketing materials such as business cards, flyers, or product guides
Step Three: Create Other Brand Unique Hashtags
Alongside your original branded hashtag, it is a great idea to create other brand unique hashtags for content that you are posting. For example, every Friday we share marketing tips on our social platforms so we use the branded hashtag #KapokTipFriday. This helps our followers know two things: this content is from the Kapok Marketing team, and it includes a marketing tip. Another way that we use brand unique hashtags is on our Twitter. Once a month, we run a Twitter chat with the hashtag #KapokTweetChat. This helps all of the participants of the chat be able to find the question and answer threads in the chat. By having other brand unique hashtags, it is going to diversify your content strategy and ways that customers can find your business on social media.
(Source: @kapokmarketing on Twitter)
Step Four: Run Campaigns and Events
Using branded hashtags are a great way to run campaigns and product giveaways. It is important to create a branded hashtag for these contests and make sure that they haven’t been used before. Branded hashtag campaigns work great if you create a unique and memorable tag. You can also set up notifications for the hashtag to know when and where it is being used. If you are running the campaign on Instagram, you now have the option to follow the hashtag to see all of the latest posts.
Branded hashtags also work great during events. It is important to make the hashtag unique, and on brand for the event. Make sure that the hashtag has not been used before encouraging attendees to share it. By creating a branded hashtag for your business’s events, you are encouraging attendees to post and share their experiences from the event. Event hashtags are a great way for your business to receive free advertising from the users who share content with them.
Bonus: Generate User-Generated-Content
User generated content is a great content marketing technique for businesses to implement. It is important to remember that you shouldn’t ask for too much when it comes to your user generated content campaign. It should be as easy as creating a branded hashtag, asking your followers to share their posts with it, and then reposting that content on your social media platforms.
For example, I Love The Burg on Instagram uses #InstaBurg for its followers to share photos with. I Love The Burg then shares them on their Instagram giving credit where credit is due. User generated content is a great way for your business to curate content to post, and it is a fun way to include your followers in your content strategy.
(Source: @ilovetheburg on Instagram)
More on Hashtag Usage
For more important information on hashtags, download our hashtag guide that is filled with more helpful tips and a list of industry hashtags! If your business needs help with managing its social media presence, contact us at info@kapokmarketing.com or (727) 214-5844 to see how we can help.