My grandma thinks a hashtag is something hippies play when they lose their hacky sack.

My generation recognizes hashtags from IRC channels, and Millennials (and pop culture in general) recognizes them as #the #OverUsed #Way #EVERYONE #ExpressesThoughtsonSocialMedia.

People overuse #hashtags for attention, and thus make it more difficult to search through grouped information. If you don’t believe me, search for something basic like #dogs on Instagram and see how many photos have nothing to do with canines.

It’s as sloppy as Napster was with individual song files instead of organized albums and anthologies. It’s also as hilariously misleading as the porn site that snagged whitehouse.com before it was inevitably shut down (though the banner says it’s coming back as of yesterday)..

There’s a fine line between categorizing social media posts for easier discovery and simply being a spammy, trolling, annoying, duck-faced piece of social media you know what.

By the end of this guide, you should know the difference.

The Purpose of #Hashtags

Like I just said two sentences ago, hashtags were originally used for the same thing they are today - categorizing and grouping information.

Much like regular words, the general consensus on context of certain hashtags makes them ideal for grouping and analysis using current technology. Anyone who’s ever studied artificial intelligence, chat bots, conversational interfaces, or even recommendation engines understands context is the key to making everything work.

Once computers can understand context, hashtagging will simply become an annoying overused fad like people who say “LOL” out loud or selfie sticks.

For now, however, conventional databases underlying most software applications in use today can make great use of hashtags.

Like the Dewey Decimal system, hashtags are useful for sorting through large volumes of information. They became popular on microblogging site Twitter, but have been implemented throughout the social network spectrum by this point.

Hashtags are a widely used part of marketing and pop culture, and you can find them on product packaging, on TV shows and commercials, news, special events, menus, and even on some people’s cars…

Everyone from Hollywood to Wall Street uses hashtags (or variations of) to track and analyze ratings, interest, engagement, and other important KPIs.

#TalkinginHashtags

Like slang, bell bottoms, and anything else that was cool at one time or another, once soccer moms and anyone over 30 started using hashtags, they quickly became overused.

#PeopleBeganTalkingInHashtagsInAVarietyofAnnoyingWaysThroughoutSocialMedia

#Obvious #Words #That #Should #Not #Be #Made #Hashtags #Are #Because #Of #People #Who #Write #Like #This

Like anything the general public has access to (compare a public restroom to your own), hashtags soon became warped, dirty, and overly used by people anxious to be popular on social media.

Thinking social media could drive real-life success instead of the other way around is a common misconception in today’s culture. While there are a few exceptions, generally people who are successful online run successful offline business operations. It’s not just luck of the draw.

While you may enjoy getting more likes and views on social media, you don’t need to go overboard and get crazy with hashtags.

As Buffer (a social media automation app) points out, Hashtags are popular on Instagram and Twitter, increasing engagement when used correctly. On Twitter, engagement drops after two hashtags, whereas on Instagram 11+ hashtags is most successful.

Meanwhile on Facebook posts without hashtags still reign supreme due to the more personal nature of the network’s connections, which is often friends and family supporting you instead of your brand.

Hashtags are somewhat similar to tags and categories used by WordPress and other blogging platforms to group posts and make them more searchable within the site. The general consensus of how many hashtags to use depends on the platform, whereas the usage of tags depends on the content.

Picking the Right Hashtags

Choosing hashtags is similar to selecting keywords to focus on during SEO and Content Marketing initiatives. Tools like Google AdWord’s Keyword Tool, Google Trends, SEMRush, and more can help you find keywords, and similar tools exist for hashtags.

Hashtagify, for example,  is a great tool to show you top related hashtags to terms you type into the site’s search engine. The app has Twitter and Instagram functionality.

Websta keeps a running list of the hottest trending hashtags across social media. This is a great place to check for hashtag trends.

Check out Social Media Examiner for more hashtag tracking tools.

Both Twitter and Instagram make hashtags searchable and display trending hashtags in the UI. Check out the competition or related photos to see what others are labeling their pics. Sometimes it pays to join the crowd. Sometimes they actually know where they’re going.

You can also partner with a social media marketing team in order to brainstorm and map out different hashtags. With a solid team behind you, hashtags can be created to track virality of posts and as a great branding experience.

#ShareACoke from CocaCola and #DunkintheDark from Oreo were hit branded hashtags and @Midnight on Comedy Central (along with just about every other late night and primetime show) often uses hashtags to help track viewer engagement. @Midnight #HashtagWars have consistently trended on Twitter, drawing respectable numbers on some nights.

So, while using hashtags can be great for stirring up excitement for your brand, promoting an upcoming event, or tracking branded posts, try not to overuse them.

Understand the hashtagging rules of the platform you’re on and be like the Romans when in Rome...

We all want shining, honest reviews on every single business listing site online. Who wouldn’t?

People who have never heard of your brand and are seeking the products and services you can offer are going to search online. According to AdWeek, 81 percent of shoppers start their research online before making a purchase.

And online review sites are more influential than the information on your own website. Here are some statistics Neil Patel dug up.

There are tons of services online that help you outsource and crowdsource fake online reviews. Bloggers are often paid for creating Wikipedia pages and writing positive business reviews on Yelp, Google Maps, and other review sites.

While these services may provide results, the content is usually obviously a fake, paid promotional spot.

It’s like buying followers on Twitter. It may make you feel good, but nobody’s buying it. We all know you bought your following and it’s fake.

Instead, you should focus on encouraging current clients, business partners, employees, and the actual people you do business with to join in your online community. This is how truly sustainable online communities are built - not just by following the technical skills of SEO and web design.

Empty Promises and Reduced ROI

In every industry, there are black hat and white hat methods to get ahead. Black hat methods are against the rules and often illegal, while white hat methods follow all regulations and still get the job done.

Much like in your favorite movie, the white hat tactics build a more solid and sustainable foundation for your organization.

On social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, black hat methods can get your account banned, destroying all the time and effort poured into building your followers.

In software and hardware engineering, black hat techniques can get your company fined at a best case and get you imprisoned or killed in the worst.

Black hat SEO firms use site listing tactics that do raise your ranking and appear to be working. However, over time (even if it takes a few years), you’ll be discovered and removed from the listing - literally taken off the map.

BBC, JCPenney, Overstock, Rap Genius, Mozilla, BMW, WordPress, and countless other established brands, businesses, and organizations have been banned, lowered, or suspended from Google search results for various black hat tactics. Nobody is safe from the banhammer.

Google bans are particularly harsh, because YouTube, Blogger, Maps, Places, AdWords, AdSense, Gmail, Drive, Docs, and other online services are all interconnected, and some bans go beyond the service you offended.

Can you imagine being locked out of your email or cloud services because you used black hat techniques on Google Maps?

The money you spend on black hat SEO firms and snake oil salesmen will have an artificially inflated short-term ROI with no real returns.

The Right Way to Get Online Reviews

Instead of throwing money down the drain on black hat tactics, trust agencies that only employ white hat tactics online.

When you buy something, you look to a trusted opinion, whether it’s journalists writing online reviews or the opinion of friends, family, coworkers, clients, and other people in your network.

A whopping 90 percent of customers trust recommendations from connections, while only 30 percent trust messages from a brand.

Online review sites serve to bridge that gap between what you’re saying and what everyone else thinks. Although 28 percent of people still don’t trust online reviews, you can build a credible brand reputation.

For example, you can’t buy online reviews, but you can host your own to encourage people to rate your business on your hosted web page.

It’s also acceptable to print your profile URL for different review sites on receipts to encourage reviews. Asking in person is after a transaction, printing a reminder in newsletters and email blasts, and other PR-type activities are all perfectly acceptable ways of encouraging online reviews.

Experienced PR agencies know emailing announcements and media review units to journalists and bloggers is an effective way of encouraging online reviews beyond just review sites. A great review from a trusted critic for an established media brand with a large following is just as effective as a review on an a user-generated site.

In fact, these reviews are often even more in-depth, honest, and factual than you could have paid for yourself.

To find legitimate journalists, sign up for the biggest trade shows in your industry. Whether automotive, electronics, video games, apps, clothing, home and garden, outdoor gear, food, or anything in between, there’s at least a handful of conventions and trade shows happening that attract media.

Attending one of these events gets you access to media email lists you can contact to display your products or allow them to demo them on the show floor if you can afford to exhibit.

Otherwise, research the top-ranking blogs in your industry and get a hold of these influencers to get your product reviewed far and wide.

Conclusion

While online reviews are a great way to inform consumers and clients about the quality of your business, there are a lot of black hat techniques employed in the industry that can ruin your brand reputation and get you removed from listing sites.

Instead of outsourcing or crowdsourcing online reviews from strangers, work with transparent agencies that employ white hat techniques to draw real reviews the right way.

After a year or two of proper grinding, you’ll have a steady diet of positive, honest reviews throughout both online and traditional media.

What SEO techniques have you been using to stay at the top of the rankings?

Looking back into the recent past, one would see that a few years ago, Facebook’s stock price hit rock bottom soon after its IPO. This turning of the tables can be attributed to the exponential increase in the money the company is raking in from advertising. This spells both good and possibly bad news for small business owners, along with some crucial lessons. We’ll begin with the lessons to be learnt from Facebook’s success, while considering the question of whether or not you should advertise on Facebook. 

Between last year and now, Facebook’s advertising revenue has shop up by 45 percent, with 78 percent of that coming from mobile adverts. No other statistic does such a good job of underlining the pivotal position of mobile marketing in your small business. 

Advertise on Facebook?

Mobile marketing is the best perspective from which to consider the question of whether or not to advertise on Facebook.

One lesson that Facebook’s financial success teaches us is one that might not be immediately obvious: The death of the internet as we know it, for most of us, at least. When one considers the growth in users and the attendant advertising revenue for Facebook, the question arises: Do more users access Facebook via the mobile app, or through their mobile browsers.

To my mind, the larger percentage of users access Facebook via the mobile app, and this is a reflection of the growing trend, especially among younger users, to utilize apps more, as opposed to using mobile browsers to websites.

One might wonder if the Internet is destined to be merely a pipeline to fuel mobile apps. The truth might not be as extreme as that, but it’s certainly reasonable to foresee a time when mobile users rely on mobile apps for different purposes, and are reluctant to deal with clumsy navigation of most mobile browsers.

Need a mobile app?

The trend described above is pushing small businesses towards a couple of options. You could assess the pros and cons of getting a mobile app, or you could consider placing adverts on Facebook and other social media platforms that get a lot of mobile traffic. At this point, the success of Facebook is good news for you, as it illustrates that prior advertisers had been getting value for their money, or they wouldn’t keep coming back.

Advertising on Facebook might not be a “slam dunk,” but if one is smart or works alongside someone with proven success using the platform, all goals can be achieved. This option will help defer the cost and hassle of developing your own app, but still enable you reach customers through targeted and tightly budgeted and Facebook ads.

On the other hand is the bad news, or at least the not-so-good news”: Facebook’s ad revenue success seems to be at the expense of the organic reach that small businesses enjoyed in the past. Even though the blame cannot be placed solely on the company’s management, and they do not publish official figures, it seems that the odds of reaching the lion’s share of your fans has gone down.

Regardless, the challenge for any small business owner is to make efforts to organically get their posts through to as many Facebook fans as possible, irrespective of whether they are advertising on Facebook. Generally, the best strategy is to understand that Facebook and Google’s ranking systems are very similar, in that popular posts get shown to more people.

Flowing from this, it is clear that you should post quality material that will get lots of “likes” and shares. As you become better at this, your posts will eb placed in more news feeds, thereby reaching more people. If your posts do not get fan interaction, Facebook will deduce that they do not care about them, and then stop showing them. After all, their intent is to provide a rich user experience. 

Finally, your posts -even the popular ones- cannot last forever. The average Facebook user has about 250 friends, making it likely that most posts won’t make it to the very top of any of your fans’ news feeds. 

You can still decide though, that your smartest course of action is to advertise your small business on Facebook…

The development and training of your team can not be a one size fits all strategy.  As managers we hire green peas, show them a thing or two and send them off to learn from others whose numbers are below average.  Even worse is that we take the top 25 – 30 salespeople at the end of one month and promote them to manager the following month. We know they can sell a lot of cars, we think they'll do a great job as a leader, developer and motivator, however we often fail to give them the guidance to properly lead a team of sales professionals.

Here are four suggestions to help you and your dealership move the needle.

1.       Ranking system.

Not all sales people and managers require the same level of training. Develop a system that not only rewards your staff, but motivates them to advance to different levels of certification. I use the Bronze, Gold and Platinum levels inside our dealer group. By learning which level each team member is on allows me to devise a specific plan of attack for each person.  I have also created a bonus program for each level. By applying this method it will allow you to see how long and which struggles individual team members are having and allow you to find a better position for them within your organization.

2.       Make time for training.

It’s important to not only set goals for your team but know where they stand throughout the month. I’d encourage you to set aside time two days a week to train and work with your entire team. One of those days you would have the a.m and p.m shifts come in 30 minutes early. Go over role playing, closing techniques, watch a few videos and have a discussion around what they’ve just learned. On the second day, meet with each team member individually, go over their week/month to date stats and help them re-evaluate their production to stay on pace with their monthly goal. I suggest that you setup your team's goals so they are 100% of goal by the end of week three.

3.       Have an acknowledgment strategy.

How you celebrate your team's success is just as important as the trainings you hold. Not every celebration has to be monetary. One of the dealer groups I worked with developed several ways to award employees for a job well done and achieving a certain level of success. Two non- monetary ways where “Diamond Drops” and the “Pride Award”.

4.       Develop a plan of action for poor performing employees.

You may have a poor performing employee in one department but that doesn't mean you'll have the same results from them in a different department. I’ve seen great success from an employee from in a BDC environment into a Service Advisor role, I’ve seen (You use "I've seen" in the previous sentence. This has also proven successful with a poor performing sales person to a customer concierge.

Does your dealerships currently do any of the above or do you have any suggestions? Leave a comment and let me know.