From the Horse’s Mouth – Twitter Hash-tagging Tips as recommended by Twitter

All the following tips are taken from the many pages of help and support navigable through Twitter. To save you some time I’ve put together some of the most relevant hashtagging tips in this post. All these tips and many more are available on the Twitter Business pages.

The dos and don’ts of hashtags

Hashtags are a great way to get noticed, encourage engagement and improve your reach on Twitter.

Here are some of the recommendations from Twitter on using hashtags:

Do!

• Make them easy to spell and memorable! Typos are commonplace, and as we know there is no edit button for a Tweet
• Give people a reason to use your hashtag. It may be for a prize you are giving away such as the StormHour @RMets photo competition, or even just for a Retweet. People appreciate RT’s as it gives them more visibility and are likely to use your hashtag again
• Do some research! Check which hashtags are relevant to the conversation you want to engage in and if you are a brand, make sure that another company isn’t currently using your hashtag.
• On the subject of research, try not to ‘cut and paste’ hashtags. It can look spammy, and we often see hashtags, or accounts that no longer exist tagged into Tweets. Don’t waste precious characters on dormant accounts!

Don’t!

• Over hashtag. Twitter recommends one or two hashtags as the sweet spot. Unlike Instagram, where more hashtags tend to be more productive, on Twitter less is more. Every hashtag is clickable and a chance for someone to click away from your Tweet. We recommend using no more than 3 hashtags, but understand the urge to use more!
• Expect your brand slogan to translate to a hashtag. A hashtag is meant to be inclusive, shareable, and discoverable. If it doesn’t organically fit within a Tweet, it’ll feel forced and lose its intended purpose
• Expect people to use your hashtag without a reason or incentive. The best hashtags can draw people in and invoke curiosity to explore and join in on the conversation.
• Use all CAPS. All caps feels very shouty and can be annoying unless you are using it is an acronym.

Hope this helps a little, as always feel free to enter our weekly photo competition and use the correct hashtags! Full details here