Hey guys, so I would like to apologize for taking so long to get part two of my two-part blog published. I have been so busy with my job and trying to fit in time where I can for my internship. Now that I am working at the Comfort Inn as a front desk agent, I am just finding it a little more time consuming than what I first thought, but I am making it work like I always do!
Anyway, in my last blog, I talked about why hashtags are important for Twitter and Facebook, so today I want to talk about the importance of hashtags for the social sites Instagram, Pinterest, and Google +.
First I will explain briefly what each site is, because I know that for the people just getting into the whole social media world, these sites might not be familiar to you. Instagram is a quick way to share your life and experiences through pictures. You simply take a photo on your phone, choose a filter for it, and then share with your family and friends. Pinterest is a tool for collecting and organizing things that inspire you. Essentially you have “boards” which are like folders that you have organized into different categories such as “recipes” or “summer projects” that you “pin” the things that you find inspiring to you. Google+ is the final social network I will introduce to you. Similar to Facebook, Google+ allows you to connect with friends, businesses, and interest and has a look and feel similar to both Facebook and Pinterest combines. Google+ tried to differentiate itself by allowing for more transparency in who you share with and how you interact.
Let’s start off by talking about why hashtags are important on Instagram. Adding hashtags to your photos on Instagram is a great way to add new followers and share your photos with more people. But, just like hashtags on Twitter and Facebook, you really should be specific in choosing your tags, so that it will help to connect with other like-minded people. Your tags should also be relevant. Relevant tags will help to attract new followers and keep them. Last but not least, you really want to be observant of other tags. After adding tags to your own photos, you might also find other people sharing similar photos, but with a more specialized tag that you haven’t thought of. This will help you to keep specific and relevant tags on your own photos that you are sharing.
Hashtags for Pinterest are also important and help your account, pins, and website’s pins to be discovered by other people who are browsing or searching through related content. When you hashtag a word within your pin, this allows people who run the same search, the ability to find your pins. Just like the other social sites, you want to be specific when tagging your content. You also want to use tags so people can find more of the images pinned to your site. You can also use the tags to manage your content.
Hashtags for Google+ are useful in finding other posts and can also help you to organize your posts. Woah, didn’t see that one coming, did you? And just like other sites, you really want to avoid vague hashtags, and really utilize these tags to find your own or others posts. Google+ can be a large and intimidating social site, but if you are using these tags, you can really make it much more user friendly for yourself.
So , from this two-part blog, I hope that you learned more on hashtags and their importance of using them on the different social media sites that you are already using! I really encourage everyone to use them, they can help your content and posts stand out, will help you gain followers, and help you organize and better manage what you are putting out there. So go ahead, don’t be afraid to start experimenting with them and see what they can do for you! Until next time….
-Sheryl