Evolution of Hashtag

From an aloof button located on the bottom right corner of the now-discarded phone to becoming the global icon, #Hashtag has come a long way. Literally, a Hashtag is an unspaced phrase prefixed with an insignia of net (hash character) to form a label. Words or phrases in messages or posts on microblogging sites and social media networks like Google+, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram acquire a new character by entering hash (#) symbol before them. I would miss a vital point here if I failed to mention that Hashtag is the new fad in the sphere of the Social Media marketing.

Advantage Hashtag:

Like a predefined package Hashtag too comes with a bundle of delight. It regroups identically tagged messages thus making things more visible in the electronic search across the various mediums. Today Hashtag depicts the trending topics across the globe. On social networking or microblogging sites, it can be inducted anywhere in the sentence thus adding exclusivity to the quoted entity.

Advantage hashtag leverages the reach of a message exponentially, thus educating the most introvert mortal who is unaware of the trending activities. While the icon makes for a formidable tool, it influences the group activities, online conventions as in the shorter terms that depict the latest fad, like #lolz #TGIF #GloomyMon. In fact today, the hashtag has become an instrument to represent our mental state. If you are really happy or angry at someone, you need not reach up to the person and talk to him, rather tags like #blessed, #annoyed, #high expressed in a better way.

Talking about its origin, the concept hashtag was first brought up by InfoTech to highlight a special meaning. It depicted an immediate address mode and has been known as a hash symbol in some countries outside North America. If Wiki source is to be believed, it was Chris Messina, who first used the hashtag on Twitter on 23 Aug 2007. It went on to become a writing style in 2009-10 Iranian Election protest where it was prefixed with English as well as the Persian language. Seeing its popularity, Oxford English Dictionary inducted it in its fleet.

Your own Business Tool:

It started from twitter and the phenomenon has spread through to other platforms like G+, Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, and Tumblr. People greeted it with open arms and used it strategically to categorize their messages on twitter; as a result, it is one of the most potent marketing weapons for a businessperson today. Hashtags today improve your reputation online. It not only initiates a discussion but also propels it further. Analytics says that hashtag has accounted for a major chunk of twitter activity since it came into the picture and has emerged as a force around which social media market thrusts. Today people also use it as a strategic functionality to kick-start a campaign. Use a Hashtag & you can invite people to join your venture as well.

For a budding prodigy, the hashtag propels additional functionality that covers the same group of people and helps them with better insight for business. Ask a question under a hashtag and see it attended by enthusiasts across the globe, which results in the amplification of your knowledge bank.

If I were to opine about the hashtag, in general, I would have you include this weaponry in your arsenal when you are chalking out your business strategy. Seeing all the goodies that it brings with itself, the hashtag is already on its course to become one of the greatest things in the sphere of social media. Be it garnering maximum followers or arranging your tweets, hashtag provides more than one could ask for.

All you gotta do is Tag ‘em perfectly!