Hashtags have become such an ingrained part of the public consciousness that they are everywhere these days. You see them on tshirts, people write them in emails, and they are used on sites where they don’t even work properly. They have become so popular that Facebook has recently created clickable hashtags for their own site, and Flickr, Instagram and many others have long been using them.
Besides adding context or giving people a chance to be sarcastic (you know you’ve done it!), they are an efficient way of sorting, grouping and searching content. But did you know they are also a way to stay ahead of the game and see what is catching mass attention in social media at a glance?
If you want to continually take part in popular phenomenon and engage people based around what is hot right now, trending hashtags are the way to do it.
What Are Trending Hashtags?
These are Twitter hashtags (can’t wait to see that feature to come on Facebook as well!) which are being used by a large number of people at any given moment. Like all trending content on the web, the effectiveness will come and go throughout a period of time. But while often keywords trending on search engines or stories trending on news sites will stay popular for several days to a week, hashtags are usually more flash in the pan. Only a few will remain active for longer than a few hours.
Because trends ebb and flow with such regularity, you have to catch hashtags at their peak and post while you can before moving onto the next one.
Where Can I Find Trending Hashtags?
If you are looking at trending hashtags, chances are you are doing so for Twitter. Their live update and search algorithm make them more ideal than most other social networks for this form of marketing. Due to that fact there are several places where you can find out what is hot right now.
For a quick look you just have to sign into your Twitter account. On the left hand side under suggested users to follow is a collection of the most popular hashtags being used at that moment. Clicking on them will take you to search results of everything using that tag.
You can also follow @TrendingHashtags. They haven’t updated for a couple of weeks, but they should hopefully be back and are worth looking out for. Every day they post the twenty hottest hashtags for you to use.
Finally, there is Hashtags.org, and their trending section. It updates regularly and shows the most popular hashtags in three different sections.
How To Use Trending Hashtags
Stay relevant. This is the only real advice I ever give on using trending hashtags. Just because something is trending doesn’t mean it can be applied to your needs. Especially when crossing into other industries, you have to be careful not to be too random in your use.
That doesn’t mean something can’t be adapted properly. Just that it has to be done the right way. A great example of doing it right came just today. @TheSims3 used trending hashtag #WorstBreakUpExcuse with the gem “It’s not you, it’s your Sims.” There was no relation to the hashtag directly, but they made it work.
On the other side, @OreoCookie posted “It’s not you, it’s milk.” Somehow, it doesn’t work as well.
Why You Should Never Hashtag Bomb
For some reason, there is a popular bit of - bad - advice that says you should hashtag bomb for visibility. This is taking several trending hashtags, or consistently used ones, and putting them in unrelated tweets in order to come up in more searches.
Richard Soto of VIP Realty puts it like this:
Not only does this come off looking like spam, but it is counterproductive. All it does is kill off popular hashtags, not bring you traffic, followers or positive visibility. Don’t do it.
Do you have any tips for using trending hashtags? Let us know in the comments.
Image Credits: hashtag coldplay, hashtag.
