Using Hashtags for Organization in Twitter
Options for Making Microblogging Posts Ready for Viral Retweeting
Jan 5, 2009
A hashtag is a word or phrase preceded by the pound sign (#). Twitter, the pioneer microblogging service, saw its visitors quintuple in 2008. With so many more posts (or “tweets,” as they’re called on the site) being made, users are developing ways to organize and track the information meaningfully. The hashtag already used for IRC (internet relay chat), is emerging as a popular organizational tool for Twitter.
How Hashtags Work in Twitter
Twitter users tweeting about a particular topic may precede any post with a relevant hashtag, such as #hashtag. Like many Web 2.0 conventions, the usage is guided by the community itself – a specific hashtag will only become commonplace if it is intuitive or well-publicized. Wild Apricot’s hashtag introduction explains that #sandiegofire “set the standard for the use of hashtags by a Twitter group to track news of a major catastrophy [sic] and to mobilize real-world resources . . .” because it was easy to remember and use. Selecting an appropriate hashtag makes a tweet more visible to its target audience.
Searching With Hashtags
Twitter’s own search function – or that of any of a number of third-party applications – may be used to locate a given hashtag. Some strategies which may be employed include:
- Finding a topical hashtag so that tweets will be included with related content.
- Avoiding hashtag conflict by ensuring that a given tag isn’t being used for an entirely unrelated purpose.
- Monitoring a given topic through an RSS reader or aggregrator.
- Identifying relevant hashtags allows writers to incorporate tweets about their own businesses when the conversation provides an opportunity.
Criticisms of Hashtags
Hashtags are a user-driven convention, and users have raised some concerns about their usefulness. Naysayers claim hashtags:
- Distract from the conversation. As Wild Apricot quotes tongue-in-cheek, “What's #irritating about #this sentence?”
- Are prone to typos. A simple misspelling by a user can not only lose a single post, it can be repeated by others according to Tweetworks.
- Are costly in characters. Twitter and other microblogging platforms cap the number of characters typed, and hashtags use up those valuable letters.
- Discourage use. New users generally are not aware of hashtags, and even more experienced ones sometimes can’t be bothered to type the additional string of the hashtag for every post.
Hashtag Use Still Emerging
As the uses of Twitter expand and it attracts more business applications, it will be interesting to see if and how hashtags continue to be used in microblogging. Whether or not they become a standard for categorizing and tracking tweets, hashtags will always be one of the first user conventions for fulfilling this important task.
As the uses and business applications of Twitter expand, it will be interesting to see if and how hashtags continue to be used in microblogging. Whether or not they become a standard for categorizing and tracking tweets, hashtags will always be one of the first user conventions for fulfilling this important task.
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