Hashtag marketing has become more than a casual social media strategy for businesses. It has grown into a tool that can help raise brand awareness. By using it, your content is much more likely to go viral. Tools like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram employ hashtags, which have proved to be powerful strategies for increasing brand visibility and engagement and creating viral campaigns. For instance, the # ShareACoke campaign by Coca-Cola and the # IceBucketChallenge by the ALS Association are prime examples of how hashtags can create viral campaigns and significantly increase brand visibility. Furthermore, I will walk you through a hashtag marketing campaign, including examples and strategies.
Key Points
- Hashtags increase visibility and reach on social media by grouping related content.
- Successful hashtag campaigns, like “SweetTreatChallenge#”, can boost brand awareness and engagement.
- Examples like #HereToCreate and #ShotoniPhone show how hashtags drive audience participation and brand visibility.
- Research and select trending hashtags using tools like Hashtagify to enhance your content’s reach.
- Campaigns like #ShareACoke and #LikeAGirl demonstrate the powerful role of hashtags in driving engagement and addressing social issues.
Hashtag Marketing
Hashtags have the symbol “#” anywhere in your content. They are used on social media platforms to distinguish and group related content. The Hashtag marketing strategy is applied mainly to increase post visibility and reach a broader audience interested in specific topics or trends. I recall a potent hashtag marketing a few years ago when promoting a small event on social media. Despite my efforts to enhance the visibility of my post,
All were ineffective; only a handful of people saw it. That was frustrating for me until I decided to use some relevant hashtags. Surprisingly, the post started gaining much attention, reaching hundreds of people interested in the event. There I witnessed the power of hashtag marketing. Hashtags are not just a symbol; they can help you connect to a bigger audience.
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Hashtags Marketing Campaign
I recall when I started managing the social media of a small bakery with a limited budget and a smaller following. After observing all these, I realized we needed something to bring attention and engage the community. At that point, I created a hashtag marketing campaign, SweetTreatChallenge#. We invited many customers to share their favorite desserts using a hashtag. Afterward, we got massive followers and increased foot traffic in the bakery.
Hashtags marketing campaigns are a great way to help create brand awareness, increase visibility, and get your audience involved in your content. Whether you represent a small business or a multinational brand, hashtags can serve many purposes. Hashtags marketing campaigns also help track and quantify your content more easily. Using social media, hashtag marketing campaigns assist your brand in gaining followers and engaging with an online audience. These campaigns encourage people to participate and create content that resonates and reaches a wider audience. However, choosing a hashtag is more complex than you may imagine; the following are some of the best hashtag marketing campaigns of all time that have greatly assisted some brands in improving their social media presence.
#1. Adidas-#HereToCreate
This hashtag marketing campaign was created in 2018 to empower creators worldwide. It was initially introduced as a promotion for the 2018 Boston Marathon, for which 30,000 videos were created for participating athletes. Since then, Adidas’s inspirational stories have been shared using this hashtag. The brand also employed the help of prominent people such as Pharrell Williams, Dua Lipa, and Lionel Messi to bring the campaign to a broader audience. People have used the hashtag in over 700,000 Instagram posts to highlight the campaign’s popularity and reach.
What made it successful: The campaign focused mainly on motivating others and delivering inspirational stories that resonated with the audience. The presence of prominent people also boosted the impact. watch the video below.
#2. Apple- #ShotoniPhone
This is one of the consistent hashtag campaigns that is still widely used today. The Apple #ShotoniPhone campaign focuses mainly on Instagram, motivating iPhone users to be more creative and share their pictures. Many people use hashtag ideas to post great pictures using their phone to demonstrate the iPhone camera potential.
Moreover, the hashtag’s widespread use encourages more people to join in, drawing more attention to the campaign. Over 26 million Instagram posts feature the hashtag.
What made it successful: Since UGC was the campaign’s only source of income, more people participated. Photos with the hashtag helped highlight the product’s potential, inspiring other iPhone users to be creative.
#3. Dove-#ReverseSelfie
The Dove hashtag marketing campaign was designed to challenge existing beauty standards. It was a highly impactful hashtag campaign. Initially, they used campaigns like #InMyOwnSkin and # SpeakBeautiful for the Dove brand, and it was significant. In 2021, they introduced another trending campaign that addressed the effects of the pressure of looking perfect on social media on girls and how it’s affecting their self-esteem.
They created a short and powerful video of a girl reversing the process of posting a highly edited selfie. The video is all about how social media pressure is hurting girls. It advised parents to “ have a selfie talk today.” This video got 12,000 likes on the brands on your channel. The hashtag marketing campaign was also seen on platforms like Instagram, where the hashtag has been used in thousands of posts.
What made it successful: The key reason the campaign made an impact was that it stood for a cause. It focused on an important issue that the audience is currently dealing with.
#4. Chipotle- # ChipotleLidFlip
Based on their data analysis, Chipotle realized they significantly affected Gen Z customers. So, to connect effectively with this audience, the brand decided to initiate a TikTok hashtag challenge. The #ChipotleLidFlip started with the help of content creator David Dobrik.
The trend gathered many TikTok users doing the same stunt and using the hashtag #ChipotleLidFlip. It grew viral on TikTok, gaining more than 335 million views. Moreover, this led to more significant downloads for the Chipotle app and delivery orders from a Gen Z audience.
What made it successful: The brand used data to judge which platform to employ and which audiences to target. Furthermore, involving a popular content producer helped to kickstart the campaign, which finally went viral.
#5. Fitbit: #FindYourReason.
In 2017, Fitbit started the #FindYourReason hashtag campaign to urge individuals to discover a cause for exercising. The campaign mainly focused on inspirational stories of individuals who overcame psychological and physical painful challenges. It began with five dramatic documentary-style videos of Fitbit users who found motivation to overcome their health challenges.
Fitbit also urged other users to share their tales with the hashtag #MyReasonIs, allowing them to be included in the campaign. Afterward, thousands of Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook users participated in the campaign. Even the fitness and motivation industry joined the #FindYourReason hashtag, with over 41,000 Instagram postings.
What made it successful: Sharing inspirational stories about actual people encouraged others to participate. It inspired people to make a genuine difference in their lives by showing the difficulties that others had faced.
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Hashtag Marketing Examples
Hashtag marketing has made Instagram popular; it has become a reliable tool that social media marketers use to turn a simple word or symbol into a powerful tool for engagement and visibility. Considering the buzz around Nike’s #JustDoIt hashtag marketing. It did not just promote a slogan but became a global movement motivating many individuals.
Similarly, Starbucks’ # RedCupContest created a sense of community among its customers because the campaign generated a lot of excitement and transformed its seasonal cups into a must-have conversation piece.
Over the years, there have been some examples of hashtag marketing by a well-established brand. Let’s go over some of the most successful ones that you can analyze: how they tried to achieve their campaign objectives, how they got great ideas or how they were able to recognize a great hashtag marketing opportunity. The top examples of Hashtag marketing include:
#1. #ShareACoke by CocaCola
This campaign was first introduced in 2011 in Australia and spread worldwide. It aimed to increase the sales of Coca-Cola during that period of the campaign and resonate with its customers. In this example of hashtag marketing, the campaign changed the initial wrapping around Coca-Cola into “Share a Coke with” and many other popular names. That change in the label created a close connection with the brand and its consumers. In addition, it urged its customers to share moments of happiness on social media.
Outcome
The #ShareACoke marketing campaign achieved a great result in sales. In Particular, up to 1.25 million teenagers tried Coca-Cola during the summer. This includes the 496000 accounts that used the hashtag on Instagram and 89000 on Twitter. Due to these effects on teens, the hashtag campaign increased sales and brand awareness. The viral hashtag inspired the most iconic user-generated content campaigns.
#2. #LikeAGirl by Always
This is one of the hashtag marketing examples created for a good cause. This hashtag campaign tried to remove gender stereotypes and debunk the phrase “Like a Girl” so that it would not be used as an insult again. Also, it aims to establish Always as a brand that stands for gender equality.
This campaign included many video clips aired on TV and posted on social media platforms. All the videos focused on teenage girls and women, portraying the need for empowerment to tackle the issue of low self-esteem and lack of support among women and teenage girls. Always emphasize the negative stereotypes about the skills and capabilities of women and girls. It further explained the effects of these stereotypes on the viewpoint and self-perception of girls who are coming of age and struggling to find self-actualization.
The main video interviewed males and females about running #LikeAGirl, which aired during the Super Bowl 2015. This video shows how society promotes stereotypes and compares them to how young girls see what it means to do something ‘like a girl.’
Outcome
The main video received over 90 million views, and the hashtag#LikeAGirl received over 177,000 tweets in the first three months. The campaign generated a 50% higher purchase intent among its target customers, more than the marketers expected.
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Hashtag Marketing Strategies
When I hear hashtag marketing strategies, I can’t help but remember some time ago, I was working in a small boutique. They had great products, yet they struggled to reach new customers. As they tried many strategies to grow, they decided to try hashtags. They started by using simple tags like #FashionFinds and #ShopLocal, but everything changed; it was just like opening the door to a new audience that we couldn’t reach; we started gaining customers from all over. Additionally, I realized that day that hashtags can be a game changer in your social media campaign; they will assist you in resonating with many audiences far beyond your current followers. Here, I have explained some strategies to make hashtag marketing more powerful.
#1. Research Trending Hashtags
You need to start with research if you need your hashtags to emerge successfully. Know about popular hashtags within your company using search functions on social media platforms. This is one of the hashtag marketing strategies that require you to choose hashtags that your target audience actively follows and engages with. The research trending strategy ensures that your content reaches the targeted audience appropriately. In this strategy, you can monitor the use of some specific hashtags and the kind of content they are related to. Doing this gives you a clear picture of what engages your target audience.
In addition, there are helpful tools like Hashtagify and RiteTag. They give you information on the relevance and popularity of specific hashtags and assist you in choosing the best one to increase your users and make your content visible.
I have provided a checklist below to ensure you’re choosing the most effective hashtag research checklist. This checklist will guide you step-by-step through the research process and help you identify the hashtags that your target audience actively follows and engages with.
Lamphills Hashtag Research Checklist
#2. Add Value to Existing interactions.
A shared hashtag marketing strategy for Twitter marketers is to choose and include a current topic in the conversation. When you post an announcement about a new product or an upcoming event, look for and use a relevant hashtag. You may use more than one if you believe it will connect with additional categories of people. Take care not to overdo it.
Remember that if you choose to interact with a hot topic, your followers will be able to view your posts. For example, you may become involved in a discussion on Super Bowl Sunday and continue to post throughout the game. Even when expressing your love for football with hundreds of thousands of other fans engaged on the site, your followers can still see what you write.
Always keep it professional and, most importantly, avoid conflicts with cyber trolls. Things can quickly get out of hand, and before you know it, you’ve offended your colleagues and clients who may be online at that particular moment.
How to Make Hashtag Marketing?
It’s time to divide hashtag campaigns into five simple steps.
Step 1: Establish marketing objectives. The first step is to set campaign goals.
Step 2: Choose a hashtag.
Step 3: Involve your partners.
Step 4: Publish high-quality content
Step 5: Spread the word about your campaign.
Is Hashtag a Good Marketing Tool?
In terms of social media strategy, hashtags are essential. They increase your brand’s exposure, allowing you to reach a large audience with your goods. Also, when you apply it several times across other media, people will remember your hashtag.
How Do I Write a Hashtag?
Do not include spaces when using a sentence as a hashtag, such as #usinghashtags. It can be added to a social media post or comment’s beginning, middle, or end, allowing the social media network to index what you’ve written.
How Does a Hashtag Work?
In order to categorize and facilitate their appearance in the X search, users begin their posts with the hashtag symbol (#). When you click or tap on a hashtagged term in a message, it brings up additional messages that include that hashtag. Hashtags can appear anywhere in a post.
References
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