Finding a Better Hashtag: the Basics of Hashtagify

hashtag for indie authorsHashtags are a great way to direct your post on social media towards viewers who might want to see what you have to say. Everybody knows that. But there are about 60 million hashtags out there. How can you find hashtags that will attract the right people to your post?

Hashtagify is a handy tool for finding useful hashtags. Here’s how it works. Continue reading “Finding a Better Hashtag: the Basics of Hashtagify”

Tagging, discoverability and #ebooks

hashtag for indie authorsAs Indie authors, all the work we do in marketing and promotion goes toward just one thing: discoverability. If readers don’t know our magnum opus exists, how can they buy it?

Sadly, the flip side to that question is how can we make our work more visible?

The stock answer is always ‘social media’, but getting noticed on social media is just as hard as getting your book noticed on Amazon – after all, you are still one amongst millions. Continue reading “Tagging, discoverability and #ebooks”

Registering a HashTag

twubs logoThe other day, I was chatting with an author who had registered the title of her book as a hashtag. She really had it together – mentioning the hashtag in her book, and even in her book’s description. I was wowed by this level of planning and technology.

“How did you know to register the hashtag?” I asked.

“It was in an article on Indies Unlimited,” she answered.

Well, I’ll be. And it sure was. Lynne Cantwell interviewed Kriss Morton and wrote Hashtags 501 – and I must have been so dazzled by the amazing amount of hashtag knowledge that I missed that part.

I kind of liked the idea of registering a hashtag, so I decided to give it a shot. I went to Twubs.com and entered “MrPish” in the big “enter a hashtag” box. A little wheel spun for a moment, but there were no results. Cool! This hashtag was mine, all mine! *rubbing hands together in an evil manner* Continue reading “Registering a HashTag”

#twitter #hashtags for novices

hashtag hashOnce upon a time, I believed Twitter to be a site filled with dull people reporting about their dreary days or people bombarding me with tweets asking me to buy stuff. Yes, those exist on Twitter but it is a useful social platform and as I have gradually become more au fait with it, I have discovered a good way to use it to reach a target audience and gain interest in your tweets—use a hashtag.

What is a hashtag? It’s almost anything that begins with the hashtag symbol “#”. You will find silly hashtags #eatingsweets and sensible ones #newrelease. They are a way of organising information on Twitter. So, if you want to find out about new releases, you’d type #newrelease in the search box on Twitter. This will direct you to a Twitter page with all tweets using this hashtag. Continue reading “#twitter #hashtags for novices”