If you’re in business and not using social media to promote your products you’re missing a trick – not only do platforms like Twitter, Facebook and Instagram offer free, effective marketing tools, they also provide a great way to interact with customers in real time.
And, as anyone who knows social media knows, hashtags are a vital marketing tool – so here are the top 20 Twitter hashtags for business…
But before we go into the best hashtags for business, let’s quickly take a look at what a hashtag is.
What is a hashtag?
A hashtag is a word or phrase (no spaces) that is prefixed by a hash or pound sign (#) and this enables the social post (usually a Tweet, but other social platforms also use hashtags to a lesser degree) to be categorised with other posts on the same subject.
And this is excellent for content marketing as it improves the chances of your post being seen by people either in your industry or those who are interested in your products or services.
Using a brand or product specific hashtag also improves the chances of your Tweets being found in targeted searches.
You can use as many hashtags as you want in a Tweet – remember, Twitter has upped the character count from 140 to 280 – but it’s best to use a maximum of three, so as not to overcrowd the post and make it look spammy. And instead of simply including a load of hashtags at the end, try replacing words in the body of the tweet with hashtags.
So, now you’re fully versed on exactly what a hashtag is, here are those top 20 Twitter hashtags for business…
Top 20 Twitter hashtags for business
Using hashtags can help raise brand or promotion awareness, target a trending topic in real time, and push your content to the right people at the right time.
So if you want to grab a slice of the hashtag pie, here are 20 you should be using…
#B2B = Business to business
#B2C = Business to consumer
#BizTips = Business tips
#business = business news or resource
#BusinessOwner = link with other business owners
#Businesswoman = link with other successful females in business
#consumers = consumer behaviours
#DIY = combine this with other hashtags to learn new business skills
#Entrepreneur = inspiration for others
#entrepreneurs = meet other users who are starting or running their own business
#Entrepreneurship = tips on how to make it alone
#HowTo = combine with other hashtags to learn new strategies
#innovation = get tips from industry innovators
#marketing = marketing news and best practices
#networking = tips for networking best practices, both online and offline
#retail = resources for the retail industry
#SmallBiz = small business tips and conversations
#SocialMedia = social media strategy tips
#StartUps = advice, news and resources for new businesses
#tutorial = find specific tutorials by combining with other hashtags
Top 20 inspirational hashtags for business Twittter
If you have a lifestyle or aspirational brand or business, inspirational hashtags are also a good way to promote engagement and generate likes and retweets – so it might be worth trying some of these in your future posts:
#WontStop
#Mindset
#Success
#Hustle
#Freedom
#OnlineBusiness
#Coaching
#Ambition
#Inspire
#ThinkBig
#Startup
#HardWork
#BeYourOwnBoss
#SmallBusiness
#Believe
#Motivate
#Mentor or #mentoring
#Givingback
#InternetBusiness
#Success
The do’s and don’ts when using hashtags
- Do make them memorable – people need to be able to easily remember them, so nothing too complicated.
- Don’t use too many – spamming posts with multiple hashtags will make them lose their impact, even if they show up in peoples searches. One or two – three at most – is fine.
- Do make them easy to spell – don’t over-complicate your hashtags as this could lead to spelling errors and mean you miss out on engagement and make your Tweet harder to find.
- Don’t use CAPS LOCK – capping up your hashtag makes it look like you’re shouting. Which isn’t a good look. SO DON’T CAP UP. The only exception would be for acronyms.
- Do your research – check to see the hashtags people are already using in your industry and either piggyback on these or adapt them for your brand.
- Don’t leave spaces – leaving a space between words in a hashtag renders it useless, as it ends at the first space.
- Do look out for misinterpretation – you’d be amazed how easy it is to misread a hashtag when it’s made up of a number of words put together without spaces. Who can forget the hashtag for Susan Boyle’s album release, when the very innocent-looking Susan’s Album Party became #susanalbumparty. Capping up the first letter of each word is a good way around this.
Where do hashtags come from?
Hashtags are commonplace across social media, particularly on Twitter, so it might surprise you to learn that it took Twitter a couple of years to fully embrace the hashtag – this infographic from Hubspot gives us a potted history of the hashtag:
