As we dig into learning the ropes on Twitter this week, it is important to know about Hash Tags. You have probably noticed, or maybe it went over your head so far (I know I saw a few flying over mine in the beginning) people using # in their comments.
Typically the #sign is bunched with meaningless letters, or even a phrase.
This actually has meaning.
Let’s put the use of the Hashtag into perspective. On Friday there is a practice on Twitter where people will participate in Follow Fridays. It’s a practice of introducing your Followers to other Twitter people by listing the people you like to follow.
By making a list you not only introduce others (think cocktail party here) to the world, but while doing so you boast your followers by offering them the opportunity to meet new people, or in Twitter Talk get more Followers.
Here is an example where two different Hashtags were used for the same purpose. In the first example @mizzle was probably running short on space so she abbreviated the #ff.
Taking this one step further, let’s say you wanted to collect all the Follow Friday Tweets on Twitter, you could.
To do that you simply put “followfriday” into the search box in the right column of Twitter. Like this:
As you click to search for all the #followfriday tweets, a new window will appear listing them. It looks very much like your Twitter stream only all the Tweets will have the #followfriday in them.
What is interesting is if you remain on that window, reading the Tweets, as more come in they will accumulate until you refresh (hit F5) your browser. A note at the top continues to tell you how many new #followfriday tweets have come in.
Ok by now you are probably scratching your head, realizing there is some huge potential here using hashtags. How right you are!
Hashtags can be used in a variety of very powerful ways. My favorite use of Hashtags is to follow events, either while I am there and better yet when I am not. Vicarious travel is so much easier on the body and cheaper too!
So let’s use the upcoming #REBCSF hashtag. REBC is the acronym for Real Estate BarCamp and SF is San Francisco. REBC’s are happening all over the U.S. this year, they started a year ago so next week in San Francisco will the the first anniversary of REBarcamp, it’s going to be a big deal. Well it’s a big deal if you are involved and in real estate.
Over the next few days there will be a steady stream of Tweets from people who are excited about going to REBCSF and what they are planning to do. Using #REBCSF to promote the event is one way to garner recognition and add to the excitement.
During the event you will see #REBCSF tweets about what is happening during the day. Photos and video will be included as well. Whether you are physically there or not by watching this Twitter stream you will be in the “know” about #REBCSF.
How do you know about a Hashtag?
This question came up in a recent class. One would assume it necessary to go “register” a hashtag in a formal manner. This is not the case.
When having an event, it’s probably a good idea to do a search for the term you want and if it’s not taken, use it. Once the Twitter stream is developed for the Hashtag, others probably will not assume the same term.
If you are attending an event, the coordinator will probably publish (on Twitter) what the #Hashtags should be.
Since Twitter is so new, many event organizers forget or don’t know about the power of Twitter to communicate about events. If this is the case, there is nothing stopping the group from creating their own #hashtags to use.
So what have your garnered from this post? Let’s review:
- Use #hashtags to collect tweets into a followable stream
- Search for hashtags on the Twitter sidebar
- FollowFriday is a good way to increase your followers.
- If you are attending an event, seek out the organizers #hashtags, it there aren’t any create your own.
Thanks for stopping by on Day 4 of Tweet Week here on KrisTalks. Feel free to email me if you have questions. Come by tomorrow for yet another lesson on using Twitter.
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