#Hashtags - you see them almost everywhere now. But do you know what they are? Their purpose? Why do they not have any space? Why is there a hashtag symbol?

All these questions were pretty common back in 2015 when hashtags started making a niche for itself. Since then, hashtags have become quite popular and found its way into Social Media Marketing content. Who knew that a # symbol on a feature phone's keyboard would set the internet on fire down the line? Now, hashtags have become famous for being a wildly successful and efficient way to communicate and find social media content. And in the past couple of years, hashtags have evolved quite a lot.

Who knew that the pound symbol introduced back in 1870 will be so crucial in today's world. Now, hashtags are used to tag and search on popular social media sites. And now, significant businesses around the globe are branding their company successfully with the hashtag system. This system helps its customers find, tag, and post more content on social media, creating more brand awareness for the organization.

So, how do you make the most out of these hashtags and grow your business?

1) Local hashtags:
Social media users are quite fond of posting their location with a hashtag and searching for people around the same area. Locally based companies can make use of local hashtags to gain exposure. Local hashtags are the best way to create more outlets of exposure to companies situated locally. This hashtag system helps to increase views from specified local areas. People who need a local service can easily find your service if they search with a local hashtag. In this search, they can see the new posts and will be able to satisfy their search. As a business, you should be posting interesting and informative content to keep your content relevant and searchable.

2) Brand-name hashtag:
If you want to market your brand, you should be using a hashtag with your brand name. By continually adding posts with brand names, hashtagged is one easy way to increase the brand's popularity and grow its brand identity. Businesses looking to improve their brand awareness in the industry should be looking at this approach. When creating a brand name hashtag, make sure you are keeping it short and straightforward. If you want your brand's popularity to increase on social media platforms, your business should have an easy-to-read company name that has a bit of a knack for the title. This knack is what will stick to people's minds.

3) Trending hashtags:
Trending hashtags are known for generating a large number of views and searches. When a piece of breaking news comes out, it will be a great idea to add posts and stories related to the breaking news, along with the trending hashtag. In this way, people looking out for the breaking news will also come across your post, therefore, increasing your views. It is quite common for bloggers to write blog posts about these trending items to get ample exposure. As a business, you should be focusing on creating content that reciprocates with the trending hashtag, and the audience should be able to resonate with your content.

4) Activity/Holiday/Season Hashtag:
One of the most searched hashtags on social media is during the holidays, seasons, or during specific activities. Holidays get a ton of views during the specific holiday dates. Summer, winter, rains, etc. are the seasons that can trend during their specific period. Activities also have their own niche when it comes to hashtags. If your company is heading for a convention, hashtagging about the event can help you get more views and followers from those who attended the same event. You can also gain new followers and views when you pre-hashtag and get involved in events.

5) Targeted keyword hashtag:
Every online business has a goal for targeting keywords. Therefore, when posting online, use three primary keywords to hashtag to your social media profiles. Such type of keyword targeting through hashtags can increase your business's visibility to relevant social media users.

With around 74 million tweets out in the social media world, about 10% of them have a hashtag associated with the tweet. That means 7 million tweets are tweeted with hashtags! That's a significant number, considering how actively hashtags are being used to tag content on social media. With the ever-increasing number of posts on social media, companies should be increasing the number of posts and hashtags used to keep the content relevant and fresh to boost views.

Here are a couple of tips you can follow while using a hashtag:

Tip #1: There is no character limit for hashtags. That does not mean you should be bombarding your posts with hashtags. Overusing hashtags won't get you as much exposure as you expected. Do not make your post look spammy using a lot of hashtags. When adding new content on social media, keep the hashtags up to 3, which is considered the best way to keep the content professional and clean.

Tip #2: Target demographics with the hashtags. Research and analyze how many of your users will be posting on social media with what hashtags. Learn about your audiences' age and gender and their posting pattern and frequency. If your goal is to become one of the multinational companies, your hashtags should reflect the same. Make sure your targeted audience will be able to reciprocate with the hashtag you created. For example, for a teenage specific market, think like a teenager and use hashtags that are among the teenage community. For other markets, try focusing more on something advanced and keyword related.

Hashtags are here to stay. Make sure you are making the optimum use of hashtags as it is one of the easiest ways of helping your brand to be searched and found. Trends have paved the way to hashtags being common, and now, almost every social media post has a hashtag associated with it. So today, if you want a hashtag, all it takes a bit of research, some keywords, a keen eye, and a pound symbol - and you are ready to go!

Also, do not leave a space between the tags or use punctuation for the hashtag; it will break the tag!

Authors Bio:

Rohit Chandiramani is the CEO of London Business Training & Consulting, specialized in providing management courses. Having completed his MBA, not only is Rohit a student of Business and Management, but through his firm has also facilitated the delivery of the subject matter to hundreds of learners over the years. A regular trekker, he likes to scale greater heights in the Himalayas, and in the world of business.