Facebook Hashtags Are Here - What You Need to Know

What Are Hashtags?

#This is a hashtag. You've seen them. You may or may not use them. Their popularity expanded on Twitter and are also used on services like Instagram and Tumblr. Hashtags allow people to unify topics. Clicking on a hashtags allows you to see posts by users using that same hashtag, thus seeing what everyone is posting about that specific topic.

Until now, hashtags on Facebook had no functionality. Nothing stopped you from writing "#fun" on your Facebook post, but it had no specific function. Now, hashtags will be automatically turned into links which can be clicked by people who see your posts. They will then see a a feed of all other posts shared with them that use that hashtag.

From the Facebook Blog:

Introducing Hashtags on Facebook Starting today, hashtags will be clickable on Facebook. Similar to other services like Instagram, Twitter, Tumblr, or Pinterest, hashtags on Facebook allow you to add context to a post or indicate that it is part of a larger discussion. When you click on a hashtag in Facebook, you'll see a feed of what other people and Pages are saying about that event or topic.

Read the full post from Facebook here.

Image from Facebook Blog

What This Means for Your Marketing

This is great for marketers and organizations on Facebook. It will help expand your reach and help your followers share what you are talking about in a more meaningful way.

For example, if you own a restaurant in San Antonio, you may want to send a message about watching the Spurs game at your location. You can add "#Spurs" to your message. Now, people around San Antonio will be posting the same hashtag and if someone clicks on one to view people talking about this topic, your restaurant may be present on that feed. Using hashtags helps you get your post in front of followers who are interested in the same topics at that moment.

Messaging From Squareberry

Whether you are sending an instant message or schedule messages far in advance, you can include your hashtags in the message you compose. The most interesting aspect of this is for people who publish to both Facebook and Twitter. Previously, using messages with hashtags on Facebook looked silly and offered little to no benefits.

Now, using the same message on both Twitter and Facebook is more feasible and can be more effective. The only major difference remaining between the two services is the character limit. Facebook still allows you to publish much longer messages. Because of this, you may consider still scheduling separate messages for your different social networks.

Tuesday Tip - Fan Only Content on Facebook Pages

Facebook Pages can be a powerful platform for generating leads, driving in new customers and retaining existing customers. A customized Facebook Page is an essential aspect of that. These customized pages and extra tabs are becoming as common as standard websites and allow for powerful and creative interactions.

"Fan Only" Content

Customized Facebook Pages allow you to set content exclusive to those who have "Liked" your Facebook Page. This can be a powerful marketing tool and leads to creative and useful implementations.

With these capabilities, you could offer exclusive items to Fans. For instance, coupons or contest entry forms to those who have "Liked" your page are great ideas for generating more "Likes". The key is to make your "Welcome Page" eye catching and clear. When people visit your page they need to know why they should "Like" it.

Don't Be Too Tricky

While offering exclusive content and elements to those who are fans, it is important to not be too tricky. Remember, the Welcome Page (content for non-fans) is seen by everyone and may be the only thing someone sees. In many cases, you have one chance to get someone to "Like" your page.

Devoting your entire Welcome Page to encouraging Likes can help you get more fans, but it also can cloud your message or make exactly what you are offering unclear. A great idea is to have a video on your Welcome Page. Videos are eye catching and attention grabbing, allowing you to deliver the message you want right away. But remember, you do want to get those "Likes". At the end of your video include a "Remember to Like our Page for More Updates and Special Offers". A message like this at the end of the video is a great way to encourage more "Likes".

Why Google+ Business Pages Could Overwhelm Facebook Fan Pages

Google just launched Google+ for brands and businesses. The much-anticipated release of Google+ pages for brands has been discussed for months and how it might be better than Facebook fan pages for businesses, celebrities, and organizations. From your local laundry shop to that pizza restaurant downtown, Google+ Pages will help users connect by establishing a firm relationship between merchants and customers.

Aside from enhancing local businesses, Google+ Pages will help people connect with their favorite sports teams, news organizations, and games like Angry Birds, Fox News, and Chicago Bulls. Google+ brand pages will carry a tiny square icon that suggests that it's a Page instead of an ordinary Google+ profile. Google+ Pages are now available worldwide to all international and local brands. But can Google+ Pages measure up against Facebook's Pages?

I've compiled a list on how Google+ Brand Pages could trample Facebook Fan Pages:

Search Engines Enhance Social Networks

It's not everyday that a search engine builds a social network. Google+ Pages will have the edge in terms of SEO. As Google supercharges its ranking algorithm, expect Google+ Pages to be on the top of the SERPs. But Google is all about social business and not just social networking. If you want to bring relatives and friends together then you build a social network, BUT if you want to entice customers then you establish a social network backed up by the world's largest search engine!

Enhanced Local SEO

It's obvious that local businesses can leverage social media more than a multi-national brand does. And as Google makes its search algorithm more "regionalized", there's a great opportunity for local merchants to be noticed by customers. If you type "pizza" the best pizza restaurant located downtown will be on the top 5 results. Google+ Pages will enhance how local business owners do their SEO and it will be more convenient for them.

Instantized Content

People don't really backread their feeds on Facebook just to read news. They search for it! and having a newsfeed ticker on the side doesn't really quench their thirst for content. Users want instant content! Google+ Brand Pages are connected directly to the SERPs. The good thing about it is that Google just tweaked it's search algorithm to provide relevant and fresh results about trending news and recurring events. Aside from that Google+ makes use of hashtags already that whenever clicked it yields search results of the topic.

Google Offers and Google Places

Facebook Deals and Facebook Places are now irrelevant. Google Offers are gradually making it's way through local merchants in every key city in the country. With Google+ Pages, businesses can easily offer deals and discounts to loyal patrons and potential customers. Aside from that, customers can easily know where a store is located with the help of Google Places. I'm looking forward on how Google+ Brand Pages will be integrated with Google Wallet as well. It also helps that Android users are increasing and we all know that Google puts a premium on mobile usage.

The Game Changer: Direct Connect

We live in a world of instant connection. Some people use Google more than their toothbrush. Users are always researching for products, services, and brands. Google's Direct Connect feature will turn every query into meaningful relationships for customers and merchants. When searching for a brand, simply add a [+] to a brand or celebrity so Google can show a brand's Google+ Page. Google+ Pages for Businesses is significant for Google+. Google is the most-used search engine in the planet and owns majority of searches. Google+ is not only connecting a person to another, Google+ now shows the value of connecting customers and businesses.

Tuesday Tip - Facebook Pages are the New Website

Facebook Pages are the new website. As Facebook becomes an increasingly larger and more time-consuming internet experience, Facebook Pages will mor greatly become the central contact and information point for organizations.

Custom Facebook Pages

More and more organizations are seeing Facebook Pages as mini-websites complete with video, contact forms and more. Organizations know that Facebook is the largest portion of many internet users' time. To many, Facebook IS the internet. It is important to communicate your organization's purpose and brand as effectively as possible. Often, you have a very short amount of time to make that first impression on Facebook.

Having a customized Facebook Page helps your organization do the following:

• Stand out in a crowded space.
• Deliver a more customized message and brand.
• Grab attention immediately with videos and graphics.
• Capture leads with contact forms and links to other sites.

Easy Custom Facebook Page Maker

Customized Fan Pages are similar to many other things on the internet: you have to KNOW HOW to get them done. Often times this can be time consuming and frustrating. You may ask questions like: Does your server have SSL? Will my design fit on the narrow space allotted? How do I even add it onto my page?

There are many ways to add in these custom tabs on a Facebook Fan Page, from completely custom design to management systems. Squareberry offers an easy Facebook Page Maker for adding a great looking Landing Page to your organization's Facebook Fan Page.

You can add a YouTube video, featured events and promotions, banner image, custom text/HTML, links to websites, social sites and more, and Recent Tweets or Blog Posts. The Squareberry Landing Page helps drive your Facebook Page vistiors across the web to your complete web presence. The Featured Slider shows off upcoming Events and Promotions, helping to drive people to your real world location.

Like Button is Top User Engagement Tool

It seems Facebook's plan to urge marketers and businesses to think like publishers are paying off even before launching the Subcribe button and People Talking About metric. AllFacebook reports that a white paper from Efficient Frontier shows some figures which concluded that user engagement has increased by 31% over the last year and overwhelming the 24% average increase impressions per post for the same quarter as well. Facebook's LIKE button is the linchpin for user engagement levels to increase and accounts for 84% of all Facebook user feedback.

It only shows that content is more influential and enticing compared to paid social ads. Thanks to the LIKE button, marketers can ascertain if promoting a new product or service through their feeds is actually effective and increases brand awareness rather spending too much on ads.



This is quite similar to my standpoint towards Twitter's advertising platform that trends are more powerful than ads. When a brand communicates and interacts on their social accounts, the more it merits a feedback because the approach is more personal which every consumer appreciates. Feed them ads and they'll probably notice yet ignore it sometimes.

The great thing about leveraging "thought-sharing" posts on every fan page is that it's obviously cheaper yet practical compared to paid social ads. When you ask, give a tip, or share a joke to your fans, not only it's likely to be shared, mentioned, or liked, users will give feedbacks and that's instant user-generated content for a brand's page. Liking a brand or a brand's post is instant and spontaneous, no wonder it's the top user engagement drawer on the social network. The Like button is the catalyst that paves the way for more real-time engagement to happen. It's really up to page admins and community managers to inject some creative juices on their posts so users can be enticed to join the conversation to increase engagement levels.

People Talking About Metric: What’s The Real Score?

Facebook launched the newest addition to its Insights Page Analytics called People Talking About. The People Talking About metric enables users and page admins to view a fan page's various interactions such as Likes, Mentions, Photo-tagging ,and Sharing a post which are all fused into a single metric. While Google now thinks like a "publisher" with the launch its new content-enhacing tools, Facebook's making marketers think like publishers through the People Talking About metric.

Like I've said on one of my previous blog posts, the new Facebook metric seeks to bring out more quality content out of brand’s fan pages because any user can easily view if the page's engagement is doing well. But as the new metric rolled out last week, I have yet to see the value the new metric brings to page admins and community managers.

Where's The Value Then?

As much I don't want to make a comparison, whenever Google Analytics releases a new metric it presents its value right away. Does the same goes for Facebook? Another column called "Virality" will be added on the Insights page that will gauge the reach of a particular content posted on a fan page. You can attain Virality figures when you have the numbers of People Talking About then divide it to the content's reach.

The great thing about this Virality metric is if it can let page admins track the posts that bring more user engagement and increase interactivity levels within the page. Page admins can easily ascertain which videos entice more conversations or blog entries are shared the most.

More Content to Increase Engagement

As businesses become more social, Facebook page content isn't limited to what a company announces, promotes, or shares. User-generated content is what fuels every social media platform. But for pages to receive a plethora of UGC fuel, community managers should always be the linchpin of a conversation.

While posting a photo or sharing a video could merit a Like or Share, it's a must for community managers to increase user engagement levels through thought-sharing. Why? While Facebook mentioned that People Talking About metric will only classify every comment whether positive or negative as one, Sentiment Analytics is a crucial factor in determining consumer behavior towards a brand.

My Take As A Page Admin

One of my colleagues mentioned that People Talking About will pressure page admins to increase interactivity. It's true, getting 10k fans every week to increase fan page count is already passe. Marketers and community managers should begin thinking like publishers because content triggers UGC which fuels virality in order to increase brand awareness.

My only concern is that, how a page admin can identify who shares content or mentions the brand in order to generate a comprehensive demographics report. I know this brings another privacy issue to the table. Anyway, for page admins and community managers, I'd like to leave a message in relation to the People Talking About metric - Is the right target niche talking about your brand?

Facebook Launches "People Talking About" Metric

Google launched a couple of new products last week such as the Google Analytics Real Time feature and the stand-out tag for news organizations. Google Analytics Real Time aims to improve how marketers pull the linchpin from their ad campaigns on social networks. Meanwhile, on the other side of the fence, Facebook is revamping their Pages Insights analytics tool. The social network announced a new metric to better assess a brand's page called "People Talking About."

"People Talking About" is just a tentative title to the new Facebook metric. It will enable users to view the Pages below the total number of Likes. Like Google's latest content-enhancing tools, Facebook's metric puts a premium on user-generated content as well, it determines a Facebook page's rating if it has content that has deliberate impact which results into meaningful engagements. While Google thinks like a publisher, Facebook compels marketers and brands to think like publishers which is why the social network urges them to make their pages to carry more quality content to merit more comments and shares from fans.



The People Talking About metric will gauge and measure all user-initiated activity that pertains to a Facebook page. The areas that the new metric will include are:

• Likes
• Posts (Page's Wall)
• Shares (Deals, Pages, Content)
• Comments
• Mentions (Pages)
• Answers to a Question Posted
• Checking in at a Location

While these areas are considered essential in order to gauge how a brand's page is performing, there's one aspect lacking - sentiment analytics. This suggests that every comment whether positive or negative will count as the same. Sentiment analytics is subjective in nature, hence, it should be handed down to social media mission control centers like Dell’s and Gatorade’s for further assessment rather than depending on Facebook’s analytics tool. The focal point will be the number of Likes and will remain as a top measurement for page performance. But as I wrote in a previous post, attaining your next 1 million fans is passe and that it’s time to feed your fans relevant content which will help sustain a brand’s Facebook page.