The power of hashtags is well known among all marketers. Hashtags aren’t a new trend, but rather a powerful tool that is used on a daily basis by social users for quite some years now.
Many well-known brands like Nike (#justdoit), Lay’s (#lifeneedsflavor), or Coca-Cola (#shareacoke) have skyrocketed their brand’s reach using the power of hashtags in their favor. Branded hashtags, to be more exact, have the power to make a brand viral, especially if the quality of the message is consistent with the brand’s culture and marketing strategy.
Hashtags are great tools for business, and especially for startups. The effective use of this social media tool can generate organic traffic and brand awareness on a consistent basis. For a fresh startup, that’s exactly the type of results that will define the success of the business.
In today’s post, we’re presenting 4 successful startups which went viral with their hashtags. The concept of “viral” is subjective, though I’d like to define it as the proof of social success.
If used properly, hashtags can help you get this proof of social success in the early stages of your startup process.
The Melt
The Brand
Here’s a food company that has reached 15k Instagram followers in a matter of a few months. The Melt is a fresh food startup that combines technology with cooking. They basically melt various foods and create “food-porn” art on Instagram.
The Qualities
If you pay attention to the color scheme that’s used in almost every single picture found on their Instagram page, you’ll observe that it remains consistent. Alongside this powerful brand continuity technique, theirsocial activity is consistent, as they post fresh content on a very frequent basis.
The Hashtags Lesson
If you want to gather as many relevant users to your page, use many diverse hashtags. The hashtags that this company commonly uses appeals to food lovers, people who want better nutrition, and people who constantly post photos of foods.
Also, ensure that your post’s description is well written and addressed to your audience. You don’t need an academic writing degree to write quality descriptions – just know who you’re selling to and use your personality to express your offer.
Inspirato
The Brand
Inspirato is a premium and private vacation club designed for individuals who frequently spend their vacations in five-star hotels or amazing places. Their unique value proposition is remarkable. Inspirato offers a very select and unique experience with every location proposal, as most of them have the same degree of beauty as the one you notice in the picture above.
The Qualities
Inspirato has improved its followers’ base significantly after approaching an organized hashtag strategy that involved the strategic positioning of brand-relevant keywords. They know exactly what they’re after, and their hashtags are showing it.
The Hashtags Lesson
If you’re pursuing hashtag marketing, go for a diverse approach.
For example, Inspirato is not only using hashtags related to the traveling type of their target audience (#traveler or #tourist) but they also use them to target people who are able to afford it and people who could benefit from the service (#luxurytraveler or #familytraveler).
Besides that, they’re including keywords related to the place they’ve shown in the picture and related keywords like “goexplore” or “beach”. Of course, let’s not forget about their branded hashtag (#Inspirato), which they post on every single update.
Republic of Tea
The Brand
The Republic of Tea is a company launched in 1992, though their digital startup wasn’t born long ago. that emphasizes the importance of quality ingredients in teas. Their value proposition is the constant supply of high-quality teas and unique blends that target tea lovers of all kinds.
The Qualities
The Republic of Tea has a unique tagline (motto) that allows them to improve their startup’s identity through storytelling. Their mission statement sounds like this: “Our mission is to emphasize a Sip by Sip rather than a Gulp by Gulp lifestyle”
They are successfully achieving their purpose through their amazing blends and natural high-quality teas.
The Hashtags Lesson
Branded hashtags are not negligible. Most startups are using them to expand their brand’s reach and establish their position in the marketplace. As you can see in the screenshot, “#republicoftea” is not just present, but it’s also the first hashtag used.
If you pay close attention, there are two more branded hashtags “#therepublicoftea” and “#sipbysip”.
They frequently follow up with broad keywords like #tea, #teatime, #tealover, and they continue with more specific keywords like #whitetea, #blacktea.
Ultimately, they’re leveraging trending hashtags like #instatea or #teaoftheday to improve their post’s organic traffic.
NailSnaps
The Brand
Nail Snaps creates custom and original nails designs out of Instagram pictures. Basically, the client sends a picture, and the brand creates the nail’s unique design according to the user’s request. Their out-of-the-box idea helped them become viral on Instagram,
The Qualities
This startup presents a lot of qualities. From the uniqueness of the idea to the social media strategy, Nail Snaps creates and delivers quality experiences to its users.
Their success is generated by more tactics, such as free US shipping and international shipping, great understanding of their target audience, and social media marketing consistency.
And of course, they know exactly how to fuse their product with juicy designs and often foods. The visual power of their social updates helps them attract attention and engagement like comments, tags, and shares.
The Hashtags Lesson
When you’re a startup, you want to test as many channels and target audiences as possible to figure out which work best.
Nail Snaps are linking their custom nail service to delicious foods like cakes, chocolates, and salad fruits. They’re emphasizing their nails’ design by putting them in a beautiful background.
In the screenshot above, you can notice that their hashtag strategy is well-aligned and follows up the attempt of the picture. The first hashtags are as follows: “#NationalChocolateCake”, “#Cake”, and “Dessert”.
Then, they continue with the normal strategy which involves relevant niche keywords such as “nailartist”, “prettynails”, and #beautytips”.
The lesson is quite simple. Find out what your audience loves to do and create posts that are somehow connected to your brand’s value proposition.
Takeaways
Because Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter are among the top five social media networks in terms of global users and popularity, it is ideal to treat hashtag marketing as seriously as possible.
Each of these platforms is favoring the use of hashtags. When we take Instagram and Twitter, hashtags are the regular norm, meaning that most people are frequently using them throughout their posts. Do you want full exposure? Then follow the marketplace and follow the signs.
Author Bio:
Peter Hill is a famous essay writer of the best writing service Best Essays. He is a socially active person, likes traveling and photo/video editing. If you need any online assignment help, you can ask him. You can find him on Twitter and Facebook.
