The Top 10 Hashtags Marketing Agencies Should Use

The best hashtags for marketing agencies.

Hashtags can be a great way to get more traffic to your website.

At GBW, we share our blog posts on Twitter and Google+ and we try to use relevant hashtags.

What makes a hashtag relevant?

We want to use the hashtags that meet three standards.

First, we want the hashtag to be relevant to the topic. We don’t want to use the popular hashtag #TBT (Throwback Thursday) just because it’s popular if our content has nothing to do with it.

Second, we want the hashtag to be used by our target customer. This will vary depending on what your business does and what your customers care about most.

Third, we want the hashtag to have a good following. The hashtag #BloggingTipsForNewBusinesses might relevant to the content and to the target customer, but if nobody is following it then we might as well not use it.

That’s our criteria.

Now let’s see it in action.

Here are 10 hashtags marketing agencies should use when sharing their content on social media and on other places around the web.

Note: I used hashtags.org for basic stats on each hashtags.

Quick Recap

#mobile
#socialmedia
#business
#startups
#leadership
#sales
#economy
#entrepreneurs
#ecommerce
#marketing

1. #mobile

The #mobile hashtag has several hundred tweets per hour and for good reason. If #mobile isn’t the biggest topic for business owners that do online marketing then it has to at least be in the top three. Stars are coming out all the time showing how consumers are using their smartphones for everything. Share the news, but also show your target readers how they can change to take advantage of mobile. It’s one thing to tell people that they should prepare for mobile. It’s another to show them how to do it.

Types Of Posts: News Commentary, Guides

2. #socialmedia

Social media is a hot topic out there today for businesses of all sizes. If you want to reach your audience you have to connect what you do to the items they care about most and social media is one area where business owners have questions.

I thought about including the hashtag #sm on this list. I thought it would be more popular than #socialmedia since its short, but #socialmedia seems to have about 10X as much activity as #sm.

Types Of Posts: Tips, News Commentary, Guides

3. #business

The #business hashtags has similar numbers to social media, but slightly less. With this hashtag you’re going to be hitting on the crowd that is looking for all kinds of business advice. It’s broader than #socialmedia, but another good place to find your audience.

Types Of Posts: News Commentary, Case Studies

4. #startups

The #startups hashtag has a strong following. There are a number of tweets each hour that use this hashtag. People in the startup community seem to follow it and even those with mature businesses follow it to see who’s coming along in their industry. And if you’re targeting startups this is a good place to go as well.

Types Of Posts: News Commentary, Case Studies

5. #leadership

I like the #leadership hashtag. A number of business leaders are looking for information on how to become better leaders. They follow this hashtag to get that kind of information. Create tips and guides that leaders can use to improve their business with leadership. Inspire them. Write about successful leaders. Look for common traits in successful leaders. Business people love that kind of content.

Types Of Posts: Tips, Guides

6. #sales

We’re all in business to get more sales. Sales managers, owners and others will use this hashtag to find information that might help them with their sales process. They’re all looking for more sales.

Types Of Posts: Guides, Case Studies

7. #economy

Most CEOs and executives I have worked with always had a pulse on the economy. They tried to stay aware of all the threats and changes that could be coming down the pipeline. The #economy hashtag is full of the latest news on the economy that can affect many industries. Share and comment on that news with this hashtag to stand out to those executives.

Types Of Posts: News Commentary

8. #entrepreneurs

The #entrepreneurs hashtag kind of surprised me. It gets a few hundred tweets each hour. I’m not sure why it surprised me, but I wasn’t sure if people would use this one. They obvious are and they’re using it to find information about running successful businesses. For marketing agencies, these followers are the obvious ideal reader.

Types Of Posts: Feature Stories, Tips

9. #ecommerce

There are more #ecommerce companies all the time it seems. If you’re a marketing agency you might target ecommerce companies. The ones that do well are usually in the market for some help with their marketing strategies. They can use a lot of vendors for things like SEO, social media and more.

Types Of Posts: Tips, Case Studies

10. #marketing

This one is an obvious one. It gets a few thousand tweets per hour on Twitter and probably similar use on other sites that use hashtags. It’s a broad term, but for marketing agencies it obviously makes sense to use it.