The case for hashtags everywhere
Hashtags ostensibly started on Twitter. But where they started isn’t important. What’s about hashtags is that they provide a common mechanism to organize topics across platforms.
Want to discuss the Home Run derby on Twitter? Just add #HRDerby to your tweets. In fact, Major League Baseball was promoting it on the air and at the park.
But why does it just have to be Twitter? Google looks like it’s going to implement hashtags on Google+, and we can already see them on Facebook when people use a single tool to cross post to Twitter and Facebook.
Hashtags are platform agnostic way of bridging the gap between traditional and digital media. We already know that social media boosts TV watching and engagement. Imagine the opportunities if every social platform used this paradigm to categorize information. They would even be useful in headlines to help give users a stronger information scent.
As Google+ rolls out new features, other social networks will have to adapt in order to stay relevant. Traditional media loves the ability of social media to help them more fully connect with their audiences, but there is the danger that what was positioned as a network might simply become a feature of a larger product, i.e. Foursquare and Twitter. Twitter doesn’t own hashtags, just like Foursquare doesn’t own location-based check-ins.
What are the must have functions of those platforms that are not already replicated within Facebook or Google+? And if not now, what about down the road?
Regardless, hashtags should be adopted as a standard across the digital media industry. They make it easier for traditional media to adopt a social service by lowering the promotional barrier, audiences are beginning to clearly understand their utility and there are benefits to everyone involved, from being able to sell custom hashtags on your network, to connecting platforms and making information easier to find.
