Amongst the early adopters are the big brands. A report by Simply Measured found that 8% of 100 brands surveyed used hashtags in their Facebook posts on the first day of their launch.
This has slowly ramped up and now one in four brands are now using hashtags in their posts.
Out of the 100 brands surveyed it Facebook found that 56% of the brands have used a hashtag in a Facebook post in the last two weeks since they were launched.
How they work
When you do a search for hashtags in Facebook Graph Search you are given a list of all recent posts that have been made using Facebook hashtags, either directly on Facebook or indirectly.
Also if you are viewing a post that includes a hashtag you can click on it and it will give you a feed of all the latest hashtags. At the end of the day hashtags are about bringing together a conversation or discussion on a particular topic.
Currently you can’t search in Facebook for trending hashtags, however Facebook has said that this will change.
Why have Facebook launched Hashtags?
Well it is strongly believed it is to do with the Super Bowl and the massive amount of exposure that Twitter was getting through it’s use of hashtags, and respectively Facebook who don’t use them lost out on the social battle.
The whole purpose of advertising during the Super Bowl is to make great advertising that is socially great, which leads to huge word of mouth, virality and therefore lends itself greatly for a multi-channel strategy that involves social media. Statistics show that 50% of Super Bowl adverts mentioned Twitter, because the use of hashtags allows people to engage in conversations and increases the virality of the commercials and therefore the brands.