A Newbie's Guide to Hashtags on Social Media

By Susan Friesen  

Tips, Explanations and Examples on How to use Hashtags for your Business
If you are new to social media you may wondering what hashtags are about. We see them everywhere - Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Google+, Pinterest and even Tumblr.

But what are they supposed to do? Why do they seem so random? Who is supposed to use them?
It's no wonder this all can seem very confusing!
That's why I've put together some tips to help you understand what the heck hashtags are and how to use them strategically in your business.

What are #Hashtags

Basically hashtags help people find stuff and share stuff. They are like an organizational tool for social media. They are a way to make it easier for people to find posts on a given topic as long as those posts use the same hashtag that is being searched for.
Hashtags are where given words are prefaced with the keyboard pound hashtag sign: #. One or more words can be used if the hashtag and keyword(s) have no spaces in between them. Once added to a social media post, the hashtag phrase becomes searchable and clickable.

For an example M&Ms just unleashed a new Pumpkin Spice flavored candy for Fall. Starbucks is also promoting their Pumpkin Spice latte. If you go into Twitter and types hashtag PumkinSpice in the search feature, it will pull up a list of these and other Pumpkin Spice related posts.

Why Use #Hashtags

When done properly and strategically, hashtags are a great way to gain more exposure for your business. Here are a few examples how:

• Knowing popular hashtags for your industry and adding them to your posts can help you get traffic to your blog or website.
• Searching hashtags helps you do research on topics, spy on your competition, and discover great content.
• Adding hashtags can help brand yourself, your business, your products, and gain you recognition.
• Promoting specific hashtags for a live event can gain community amongst your attendees and followers.

And some people use hashtags just for fun or to make a point. My favourite is #ChocolateIsSacred and have used it more than once!
Read more below about strategic ways to use hashtags in your business.

When Hashtags Were First Created

Twitter created the #hashtag feature on June 1, 2009. All Twitter hashtags (words with the # sign in front of them) became hyperlinks to discover more tweets pertaining to that subject.
Other social networks soon followed such as Facebook in 2013, Pinterest, Google+, Tumblr, and Instagram. Some networks like Google+ and Instagram have embraced hashtags with a fury where Facebook still lags at bringing this feature into mainstream usage.
In fact, not long ago I conducted a very informal survey about the use of hashtags on Facebook and many said they had no idea what they were, others thought they were spammy and cluttered up their newsfeed and most all never clicked on them. Indeed, the only people who were using hashtags were either marketers or social media managers!

But that doesn't mean they shouldn't be used... as you'll see there are plenty of reasons to incorporate them into your social media strategy.

Rules for Hashtag Use

Different platforms have different official and "unwritten" rules about using hashtags. Here's a few to be aware of:

• Sentence case doesn't matter, but you can use it to improve readability like: #SecretStarbucksMenu.
• You can't use special characters such as dashes, asterisks etc.
• Do not get spammy. Three or less hashtags is perfect. Use too many and it can be considered hashtag spam.
• Avoid having your Twitter or Instagram posts automatically send to Facebook when you tend to use a lot of hashtags. This is a real turn off for those on Facebook.
• Research a hashtag before using it. An existing hashtag may be used for something else that you don't want to be associated with or draw attention to.

15 Strategic Examples On Using Hashtags in Your Business
Just like knowing the best keywords of your industry and optimizing your website content to include them in order to be found in search engines, hashtags can also be used to help you get found in social media.

It's important to create Hashtags for:

1. Events you are holding. For example the Pacific National Exposition in Vancouver just ended for another year and throughout their Twitter campaign, they used #TheFair hashtag as seen in this example below.
2.  
3. Tagging famous people or big companies who are mentioned in a post. For instance, hastag Elvis Presely results in hundreds of posts about the King of Rock and Roll.
4.  
5. Posts related to trending topics. Author and Spiritual Teacher Wayne Dyer recently passed away. The hashtag RIP WayneDyer was created to tap into the social searches for news relating to his passing.
6.  
7. Doing research. For example, if you were doing research on the latest news for our upcoming Canadian Federal election, do a Hashtag search using # CanadianElection2015to find several posts on the subject.
8.  
9. Product promotion. Creating a special hashtag for your brand or product can help you gain a fan base. Creating a hashtag for your book or movie can help get traction and turn it into a trending topic.
10.  
11. Humour. People also use hashtags as a way to share funny stuff with others and have a good laugh. Here's a hashtag used by late night talk show host Jimmy Fallon describing his friend's car and going on a road trip with him.
12.  
13. Popular Industry Topics. If you see a post on a popular industry topic, by adding that same hashtag to a post you create will help you be discovered by others looking for content on that hashtag.
14.  
15. Campaigns.Lots of people "monitor" certain hashtags. So using a hashtag consistently can help you gain a following. For example Nike held a series of promotions using the #nikezoom hashtag.
16.  
17. Live Chats. Chats offer businesses the ability to connect to their customers, extend their reach and awareness. If you have a live chat on a certain topic, creating a hashtag can help you attract people to attend. For Example #BeTheOne is a monthly chat about inspiring people to make a difference through personal leadership that infuses integrity, dignity and character.
18.  
19. Tap into Trending topics. Including a trending hashtag in your post can increase the overall reach. Ritetag is a great tool to help identify trending hashtags to use. It allows you to search 11 million hashtags to see what's hot or not, has a long life, is overused, and underused.That way you can select the best hashtags to reach your audience.
20.  
21. Company or Personal Name. Gain recognition by creating a company tag like #Apple and #stephenking.
22.  
23. Quotes. If you share quotes, hashtags will help you be found. Some top ones to use are #motivationalquotes #inspirationalquotes and #quotes. Look at the use of hashtags in one of our recent Twitter posts. Every topic relating to the quote has its own hashtag.
24.  
25. Recurring post themes. For example you may post a #photooftheday, #followfriday or #throwbackthursday for daily or weekly recurring posts. We use #eTip as a daily theme where we share tips on various subjects entrepreneurs utilize in their business.
26.  
27. Gaining blog readers. Using a hashtag on Pinterest pins can drive readers back to your website or blog. When someone clicks on a hashtag of yours most of the results that are shown on Pinterest link back to related blog content. Note that these results are somewhat different than what you would find in Twitter. Where Twitter displays results in chronological order, Pinterest displays in popularity.
28.  
29. Research your competitors. Follow hashtags your competitors use to do market research and keep up on their latest news.

Hashtags are a lot of fun once you get the hang of it you'll be hashtagging with the best of them.

Make a point to create and use hashtags for your social media and don't be afraid to create your own unique ones like what we did with #SocialBlast and #eTip (even though others now use it too and that's OK!)
It's a great way to tap into a base of hot prospects interested in what you have to share. Jump in, Try Hashtags Today!
What's your take on using hashtags? Do you use them in your business social media marketing? As a user, do you find them useful or spammy?

Susan Friesen is the founder of eVision Media, a boutique web development and Digital Marketing firm of over 15 years that specializes in designing, building and marketing professional, unique websites for entrepreneurs, businesses and organizations.

Visit http://www.ultimatewebsiteguide.ca and grab your FREE "Ultimate Guide to Improving Your Website's Profitability - 10 Critical Questions You Must Ask to Get Maximum Results".

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Susan_Friesen

5 Ideas To Help You Use Solo Ads To Drive Traffic To Your Lead Magnet

By Rosemary Nonny Knight

So, you have set up your initial sales funnel and everything has been tested and it all works but now you need to inform people of it and get them to take advantage of your kind offer - Solo Ads are a way of making this happen. A solo ad is a form of advertising that occurs when you buy a one-time spot on someone else's mailing list.
So, the vendor agrees to send your message out to their subscribers and you get traffic to your offer as a result or so you hope.

Here are 5 ideas to consider to get a successful solo ad campaign.

1. Know Your Niche

You need to fully understand what kind of people you want to get in front of. There is no point buying a spot on s newsletter in the health niche when you are selling chocolate. Hopefully, the vendor would not take your order anyway.

However, it does not mean you need to stick completely to your own industry alone as your people may be found in another industry as well. So, get clear on the interests of the people you are trying to attract and find solo ad providers in those industries.

2. Get recommendations

Before choosing to work with a particular vendor or solo ad provider, get a few references from other people. The most popular vendors will probably have easy-to-find reviews if you do a Google search and you can join in on Facebook groups that deal with solo-ads and see the testimonials being given by happy or unhappy customers before you make a commitment to purchase.

3. Arrange a conversation

Try not to buy a solo ad without making contact with the vendor - Via Skype or actually speak to them on the phone.

4. Get good at writing Ad Copy

Some vendors will create the advertising copy for you so that you do not have to and sometimes that works because they know their list but how can you test that? Choose instead to do your own writing and ask for two versions of your copy to be sent to the list, if possible. Not every vendor will agree to this but it will help you understand what is working and what is not.

5. Start Low And Then Grow

Though it is tempting to throw your money at a solo ad provider so that you can build your list really quickly, do not do that.
Instead, spread your money over a few different providers and see how they perform before asking for a few more clicks from a certain provider that seemed to get good results for you. Remember this is your money so be wise about how you spend it.

If you want more tips to grow your business, then download the free blueprint here - Marketing Blueprint
Rosemary Nonny Knight was once a pharmacist and then decided to create a profitable business doing what she loves which enabled her to leave work. She also teaches other professionals and business owners to make the same shift.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Rosemary_Nonny_Knight

50 Ways to Boost Your Blog Traffic

By Betty Ciorba

Hello dear friends!
Today I would love to share with you my favorite tips and tricks that I use day by day to grow my blog traffic, without spending a penny.
These tips are not specific for a certain niche, they can be used by anyone.

#1. List your website in blog directories, here is a list;

#2. Share your new posts on Tumblr - use tags;

#3. Swap sidebar blog buttons;

#4. Always reply to all your comments;

#5. Use Digg;

#6. Guest post;

#7. Write often;

#8. Write long posts;

#9. Run a blog giveaway;

#10. Write an e-book;

#11. Submit your blog to Kindlepublishing;

#12. Include your blog URL in your email signature;

#13. Use StumbleUpon;

#14. User Reddit;

#15. Use good quality, eye-catching photos;

#16. Make sure you have social sharing buttons on all posts;

#17. Create an app for iPhone or Android;

#18. Submit your articles to EzineArticles, GoArticles, 
ArticlesBase, SelfGrowth, HubPages, Street Articles, Technorati, Fuel my Blog, Blog Top Sites;

#19. Join collaborative Pinterest, why not join my collaborative board here?;

#20. Use Twitter - 300 million active users;

#21. Remember the importance of SEO;

#22. Reference your posts - just make sure you do it in a non-manipulative way;

#23. Make sure you have a Facebook page where you can share your posts;

#24. Build an email list;

#25. Use a scheduling software like Buffer;

#26. Pin your blog post images regularly;

#27. Reach out to other bloggers- build relationships;

#28. Share your old posts through social media;

#29. Pay for advertising on Facebook;

#30. Write awesome content;

#31. Join social groups;

#32. Get in touch with others - comment on other people's blogs;

#33. Always use photos in your posts, sometimes a great photo makes you read an article;

#34. Make a radio Ad - creative idea and it's a great way to promote your website especially if you are selling something;

#35. Share other blog posts, not just yours! - if you post an interesting article a potential new reader will keep reading articles you are posting;

#36. Make sure you submit your blog posts to all search engines, find the list here;

#37. Use eye-catching post titles;

#38. Join Viralcontentbuzz - I just joined recently and I already love it! Viral Content buzz is a web-based platform that utilizes a crowd-sourcing model to facilitate the generation of REAL "social buzz" on quality content;

#39. Use Twitter between 1 and 3 pm on weekdays!;

#40. Host images on Flickr - link them back to your blog;

#41. List your top articles - in your sidebar or use a word tag cloud, etc.;

#42. Try to link back to older posts;

#43. Translate your content- this might multiply your blog traffic! I am planning to do this shortly;

#44. Link your blog in your forum signature;

#45. Join LinkedIn groups and participate;

#46. Make sure your images are pinnable;

#47. Include Alt tags for your images!;

#48. Use Keywords!;

#49. Make sure your site is accessible on mobiles and tablets;

#50. Have fun and don't give up!

Hope you enjoyed reading my tips and tricks to boost your blog traffic and I also hope you found something useful through it!
Your turn! How else can you grow your blog traffic?

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Betty_Ciorba

A Checklist for Getting Organic Traffic to Your Website or Blog

By Dan H Grijzenhout 

This article is intended to provide you the reader with a checklist of ideas that can help you receive more organic traffic to your website.

Good SEO optimization is not enough if you are just starting out as a creator wanting to get your content found on the Internet. You either have to pay for the traffic by promoting it through Facebook or Google+ or other pay for view services, or you have to manually and organically promote your content yourself, which takes a considerable amount of work when just starting out.

If you do choose to grow your views by organic manual effort, the checklist of ideas listed below should be useful to you.

• Build followers on social media platforms like Google+, Twitter, Pinterest and Facebook with link backs to your website in your profiles and in each post or item you upload to those sites. You may not get a lot of traffic from this, but some views should trickle back to your site.


• If you can, write an E-Book and get it published on Amazon/Kindle then build an "Author Central" profile for yourself on Amazon with link backs to your website. Once done, create additional author profiles on book review sites such as "GoodReads".


• If you are selling products on your website, be sure to feature them on places like Google+, Pinterest and your Facebook business page which you should also set up.


• Frequently update your website with additional pages and content - you should be doing this at least once a week. This lets search engines know your site is alive and improving which does get you a bit higher in the rankings.


• Promote, promote and promote the content you create around the Internet - such as your articles and videos. Get out there to start getting the link backs to your website. The more activity such as this you have with external sites referencing yours over time, the higher your search engine rankings will be and the more traffic you will receive.


• Don't always promote in the same place. Be looking for additional places to showcase your content. You want wide reach wide audiences for what you create without antagonizing the same groups of people by promoting yourself and your business too frequently in the same space all the time.


• Find Internet business communities your content relates to and target them. Over time, these communities and their members will begin to look at your site as a source point for information and your traffic will grow. Remember, the Internet is no longer about selling people. It is about sharing information with people and sales have become a by product of the information sharing activities.


• Which brings me to this next related point: A good strategy if you have things to sell is to create "how to use them" videos or articles that you can share as opposed to pushing a sales pitch at them wherever possible. Let the sales come organically as an output to advice given as opposed to pushing for them.


• People like to follow other people on journeys. So if what you are doing out there is some form of journey, document it and share it - it will increase your traffic.


• Learn how to build good "Squeeze Pages/Landing Pages" where you can engage people who visit and capture information such as their e-mail addresses. This gives you more ways in which to contact them (such as through e-mail marketing) and keeps you engaged with them.


• If you are writing articles, get them on your website and also get them onto article distribution sites as well. You will get some trickle through traffic from this.


• Post comments on other people's articles on high value sites as well. You can get some back channel traffic from this activity as well if you are entering your website information along with your postings. Be careful with this strategy though, make sure you are only giving link back information on quality sites that Google would like or their search engine might punish you in their ratings just by association.
•  

The ideas above should help you to organically build traffic over time to your site. It is a slower paced growth than paid promotion is, but the longer you work at it, the more your follower base will grow and the better you will do. Accelerating your traffic growth requires spending money and I'll soon be creating an article to assist you in getting a good bang for your buck if you chose to take the paid promotion route instead or as well.

Good luck in building your traffic to your site.

About Dan Grijzenhout: Dan has lived a successful entrepreneurial career for over 30 years. He has been a consultant, entrepreneur, investor and business owner and is now using this knowledge to create a series of "no charge to the consumer" videos and articles in an attempt to help others pursuing entrepreneurial business endeavours of their own.
You can find more on Dan's publications via his website at howtoguru.club and on YouTube at YouTube.com/DanGrijzenhout123

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Dan_H_Grijzenhout

Should You Buy Website Traffic?

By Kevin Ck Lee

Many people are crazy about the number of visitors that their site gets. For the majority of businesses, web traffic is nothing but a number - it is the amount of people visiting the site. Many companies believe that if they get more people visit their site, their chances of getting better sales are higher. Which makes complete sense because you get to use your website to convert your visitors through videos, FAQ's and even other relevant information that can be posted on the site.

The question is, should you buy website traffic? Won't this be a violation of most search engines policies? Can you even expect results these days when buying traffic? Remember, traffic that doesn't convert visitors into customers are completely useless. This is probably one of the reasons why not all companies have considered using this method to market their business.

However, buying website traffic isn't as bad as it looks like - and all it takes is a reliable provider who will provide your site with traffic that you need. This means that if you're planning on buying visitors, you should find someone who can give you targeted traffic, to increase the chances of getting more people interested in your website, business, products and/or services in general.

Here are some of the things that you need to do to ensure that you found the right company which provides web traffic:

Quality

You need high-quality traffic - this means real people, not by those made up by bots. This is an important factor for you to check whenever you buy website traffic. Before you buy website traffic, you should be assured that what you'll get are human visitors, because as mentioned earlier, traffic is nothing when you don't get to convert. You can track the numbers, but all of these are useless for people don't buy from you.

Rates

Compare rates online. Check with other providers and choose one that meets your budget.

Performance

Lastly, when you buy website traffic, track your site's performance. You can even send a broadcast campaign or even see how much of those web visitors are converted into paying customers. If you are getting significant results, congratulations! If not, you probably should start looking for another provider, or, you might be targeting the wrong market.

Usually, the results and statistics would speak for themselves. All you have to do is analyze and see which sources and even Traffic type work well for your business.

Find out more about how you can get traffic to your website, head over to get online traffic now.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Kevin_Ck_Lee

How to Build a Successful Online Marketing Business

By Tejas Solapurkar

For every business owner, marketing of products and services has become very essential due to rapid increase in overall number of Internet users since some of the past years. This is one of the leading reasons that why starting an online marketing business is one of the excellent ideas. Building an online marketing business might be easy but to make it successful there are several things that are needed to be considered.

Listed below are some of the strategies that can take your business at an excellent level of success.

Products and services selection
 
The products as well as the services that you are selling plays a significant role in the success of online marketing business that you are about to begin. Of course you have to promote the products and services that are quite common or higher in demand.
Such products can easily be marketed and you can attain success in no time and with very little investment. To know the products as well as the services that can help you in this subject of concern, keep an eye on the market. By doing so, you can simply know the demand of all the products/services and choose simply.

Flexibility of your website
 
It is actually your website that will decide how simply or quickly you can promote your products/services over the Internet. With websites that are excellent in terms of information available, payment making option, faster uploading, visitor's queries and other features with for the visitors, you can simply keep up the pace.
On the other hand, if your website is lacking the above qualities, you can simply lose the interest of people. To make your website an interested place for the users, simply go for SEO, brand awareness, target audience attraction and so on.

Writing articles and blogs for the business
 
To make your online marketing business more successful, it is mandatory that you often write some useful information about your business and post it over the Internet in the form of blogs or articles. There are several websites that allow free article posting on them and by doing so you can stay ahead of the game.

Consider social media networks
 
Social media are the leading platforms that can help you in building an online marketing business that can be turned into a business with huge turnover. Creating fan page on the social media and keep posting something interested always help in promoting the businesses. Thus, utilizing social media platforms is something that can unconditionally help in the growth of your concerned business.

Help of an expert
 
Probably there are a very large number of companies with experienced professionals on internet marketing. Such companies can help you in attaining a great height of success for your online marketing business. The best thing is that you can find companies that usually don't charge you a higher sum of money in exchange of their services.

Building this kind of business is one of the best methods of making money from the World Wide Web. With some efforts, you can simply earn money from this business that is sufficient to complete all your needs.

To satiate knowledge, insights and Internet Marketing Strategies to increase business presence with abilities that are capable to help any idea to meet reality, kindly visit http://digitalmarketingadvise.com/.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Tejas_Solapurkar

The One Thing That Everyone Asks About Internet Marketing

By Jon Allo

Internet marketing consists of anything you do to earn money online. Regardless of whether you're selling you own products or services online or earning commissions by promoting other people's products you need to use internet marketing. And the one thing that everybody always asks is:

"How does internet marketing work?"

Internet marketing works when you have the correct mix of strategies to reach your potential customers. There is not a set formula that will work for every person, product or service. Let's take a look at the top 5 internet marketing strategies.

1.Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the process of managing the content on your website so that it appears in the search engine results. Your content needs to contain the keywords that people are going to search for when looking online for the type of products or services that you offer. Other SEO strategies include things like obtaining backlinks from other websites, superior website layout, and consistently updating your website with top quality content.

2. Email Marketing

Email marketing attracts new prospects, maintains and develops relationships with current ones and up-sells or cross-sells your products and services. To build up your database of email addresses, you need to offer something of value to your prospects in return for their email address. This could be an eBook, newsletter, report or video course. You will need efficient email marketing software, like an autoresponder, because as your database grows, you will not be able to do it manually.

3. Social Media Marketing

Social media provides an incredible opportunity to connect with your target audience, increase your exposure, generate leads and bring in sales. Social media websites bring website traffic directly to your website, and when people check out and share your material it will register with the search engines and improve your search engine optimization.

4. Content Marketing

Content marketing is about gaining understanding, confidence and a relationship. It is the process of communicating with your customers and leads without the need of the hard sell. The foundation of content marketing is that as you deliver reliable and valuable information to potential buyers, they will inevitably become loyal and regular customers.

5. Affiliate Marketing

Businesses and product owners like affiliate marketing because they get their affiliates to do their marketing for them. If an affiliate makes a sale, the product owner will pay them a commission. But if the affiliate sells nothing, the product owner pays nothing. Both for the product owner and the affiliate can benefit from this internet marketing strategy and when done correctly, it can be extremely profitable for both parties.

Success in business is mostly about marketing, especially online. Great marketing can sell an average product but poor marketing cannot sell a great product. To learn more about internet marketing that will work for your business and how to find the right products to sell and the right customers to buy them, visit http://www.jonallo.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jon_Allo