Hashtag - Your Digital Legacy Playbook 03/03

What can I do with hashtags on LinkedIn?

Now that you know how to find hashtags relevant to your business and how to use them in combination.

We can explore other uses of hashtags.

If you are still unsure, you can read more in the previous article here,

In this article, we explore the use of hashtags to

• Find content ideas that are trending at the moment (a form of social listening).
• Find content that we can contribute value to and demonstrate thought leadership.
• Grow your network organically.
• Increase engagement on your content.

How do I do social listening on LinkedIn?

Social Listening is the collection of mentions of your brand across social media platforms. The analysis of the collection will help brands get a clearer picture of how well the brand message is resonating with its audience, and if they are delivering the promised benefit of using their products or services.

A method of conducting social listening on LinkedIn is to use hashtags. Knowing the hashtags that are relevant to you and your content pillars can expedite your knowledge of the audience preferences that are posting and following these hashtags.

For new content creators, who have just jumped on the content marketing bandwagon, and/or you are just unsure what you should post that is relevant to your topic, here is a quick tip for you.

One effective way is to follow hashtags. Choose five hashtags from your list of relevant hashtags and follow them. Take note to bookmark the Follow Page for the hashtag for easy access on a regular basis.

"Take half an hour each day, especially before you create content, to go through the Follow Page of each hashtag."

It gives you an idea of

• What people are posting about, and
• What topics are popular at the moment, and
• The trending format to post in.

This will guide you in your content creation and how you respond when you engage with the content of others.

How do I establish Thought Leadership on LinkedIn?

"It is crucial for you to regularly show your area of expertise through your content and your comments."

This will increase the Know-Like-Trust factor between you and the members of your network. This will keep you top of mind when members of your network have to recommend someone for the topics that you were covering.

When you create regular content that highlights your unique perspective of a topic that people find relevant and informative, you are establishing yourself as a topic expert and building a community around you that looks up to you for regular updates on that topic.

Remember that your content is an extension of yourself, a digital self that lives on the platform 24/7, always on. It tells people of your knowledge, ideas, beliefs, and other information for them to form an opinion about you.

To ensure that your content has a good reach, your engagement in the content of your network is crucial.

Engaging in the content of others goes beyond just liking and commenting "Good Post". This is the opportunity for you to demonstrate your expertise to the network of the author's post.

Depending on the network strength and engagement level of the author, your helpful and valuable comment has the potential to reach the eyeballs of hundreds if not thousands of people outside of your network.

Over time, with a sound combination of consistent content and commenting, you can establish yourself as a thought leader in your chosen area of topic.

It is highly recommended that you strategize your content pillars and develop a social media strategy before you start posting. This will save you a lot of time and energy from having to pivot at a later point in time.

Of course, your content should contain the hashtags that you have chosen to cataloged your brand and topics under.

Thought leaders in their fields take care in using the right hashtags to promote their work and to curate members by encouraging them to follow their unique hashtag.

How do I expand my LinkedIn network organically?

The growth of your network is crucial as it determines the reach your content has. However, many choose to focus mainly on growing and expanding their network without having quality content nor the establishment of a deeply connected network.

There are many ways to expand your network exponentially by methods of growth hacking, which normally includes mass connections. group invitation requests from people in groups events, and a growth-based membership drive on other platforms.

A large network is always impressive to witness. We are often impressed when we see a person with a network of 50. 60 or even 70,000 connections. I have even seen members with over 1 million followers.

At the point of this writing, there is a limitation of connection we can have. If you did not know, the limits for connections in LinkedIn at the moment are fixed at 30,000 connections. All additional numbers you see are followers.

"I advocate growing your network with intention and the right people."

I segment my network into three main groups,

• My tribe,
• The people who feed into me, and
• The people whom I can feed into.

AKA. People whom I can learn from and people whom I can help with the knowledge that I have.

This builds a network that encourages engagement because we have something to benefit from one another.

You are encouraged to get your network as you deem fit because only you know how you can benefit your audience and how you want the people in your network to benefit you.

But whatever you do, be sure to grow your network consistently and intentionally.

Promoting your unique hashtag is a good method to push your content onto the newsfeed of your network and to monitor your content.

You can read more about other additional uses of hashtags to improve engagement here in this upcoming article.

(Article: 7 Power Tips for your Hashtag Strategy coming shortly)

How do I increase engagement on my content?

Engagement refers to the responses illicit on your content. In the digital age, as our reliance on digital media and platforms increases, there is a rising need to prepare content that satisfies two audiences - the human readers and the algorithms.

The preparation of content for the algorithm is generally referred to by marketers as hacking the algorithm while the preparation of content for the human readers is addressed under consumer marketing.

There is a multitude of factors that affect the reach of content. I will only cover the factors that are influenced by the use of hashtags. The right is an implementation of hashtags could increase the inbound and outbound discoverability of your content and your outreach.

-TBC-

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