Sometimes the world of social media can feel like the cool kids club – with their inside jokes, mysterious hashtags, and indecipherable instant messaging acronyms. The good news is you don’t need to have a deep understanding of all latest and greatest (even the net-savviest Digital Natives don’t know EVERYTHING) to enter the conversation; ergo, the #hashtag.
Knowing just a few hashtags is like showing up to a party you weren’t invited to with drinks and food – suddenly, everyone wants to know you and likes you.
A great place to start is on Twitter itself – start looking at people you follow – what are they talking about? What hashtags are they using? Have something to meaningful to contribute? Say what’s on your mind, follow it with a hashtag and hit send.
Check out the “Trends” section of your own page – Twitter will list the top ten trending hashtags for that day. See one of interest? Click on it and enter the conversation. Have a favorite sports team, TV show, or hobby? Check out your favorite websites or blogs and see what they are hashtagging. Better yet, use the search bar on twitter and simply start entering words – it will begin to auto-complete the top trending hashtags of the day.
There are some pitfalls to any social media experimenting – so just dip your toe and get the temperature of the water before you dive in head first. You might be surprised how fun (and powerful) hashtagging can be.
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