If you’re even remotely interested in social media, you can’t have possibly missed today’s big news – and a long anticipated move over at Facebook. Hashtags (those words preceded by this little sign: #) have been in use for a long time on Twitter, Instagram, and other networks.
It’s those two that made the hashtag craze what it is today. It’s a nuisance to some, a way of connecting with like-minded users for others, and a great tool for marketers. But before we delve into what exactly this change means for Facebook and its users, let’s take a look at how hashtags have worked thus far.
Trends and data pools
Back when Twitter first started gaining prominence, particularly among news makers and opinion leaders, hashtags started being monitored by search engines, as well as by data analysis companies. It quickly became obvious that that this system was the simplest and most organic way to follow trending topics online.
In virtually no time at all (even by Internet standards, for which everything is so fifteen minutes ago), hashtags were generating memes – some of the more (in)famous examples include #yolo, #nobama, #belieber, etc..
Soon enough, and more prominently since Instagram also introduced hashtags as a way of grouping together photos taken with the same technique or with the same theme, brands also caught on. It dawned on them that hashtags are also a great tool for generating user-content to serve the purpose of their brand.
Recall, if you will, the recent privacy policy change at Instagram, which generated an understandable dose of controversy, since it allowed the app’s owners to sell photo usage rights to third parties. The assumption in that case was that users might end up seeing their photos on public sites, or even in printed media or on TV, without their explicit agreement.
And if you head on over to Buzzfeed, you might notice that they are, in fact, running sponsored posts, which feature photos collected from Instagram accounts.
How hashtags will work on Facebook
Depending on where you live and how active of a Facebook user you are, you may have already noticed the hashtag emerging all around you. They can be used on profile timelines, within the recently implemented graph search and in groups.
Hashtags are, of course, clickable, and they reveal similarly tagged content posted by others – the first search results you get are those made by your friends or by ‘people you may know’ for timeline posts. For groups, the hashtag search results are currently ordered chronologically.
Obviously, the hashtag feature has great commercial potential, as countless memes and campaigns have proven, of late. We have even seen examples of TV or printed media campaigns, which called on users to submit their own content via hashtag.
If you’re interested in social media marketing, click here for more information on famous digital campaigns and SEO trends. As for the hashtag, it was only normal that Facebook should jump on the bandwagon as soon as they could.
The next logical step is that the social media giant will use these trending topics, in order to sell advertising space to companies. In return, they will most likely receive access to shares, clicks, and other stats, which will help them better target their promotional efforts.
One question that becomes essential, with the introduction of the hashtag, is that of the users’ privacy. Facebook still allows users to manually set privacy limits for each individual post. But hashtagging a post might mean an implicit renunciation of those rights – for, how would advertisers know what trend or topic you’re following, if they can’t access your tagged post.