The Great #Hashtag Debate for PR-types

I’m not sure why this has become The Week of the Great Hashtag Debate -they aren't a new topic, per se - but it’s without a doubt a hot topic right now (and not just in our office.) I first noticed something was brewing last week after reading a post by Gary Ardnt (who, in full disclosure, I’ve known for a few years and think is generally ahead of the industry curve when it comes to addressing how to work with online media and bloggers), which included this line:

“I never did it that often, but starting this year I’ve adopted a no hashtag rule if I work with destinations. If I’m posting a photo about Kerplekistan, there is no need to add #ILoveKerplekistan to it. If that is a deal breaker, then I guess I’m not going to that destination.”

So. Gauntlet thrown. I appreciate his straightforward approach, but wondered if this could be as black-and-white for PR people. We still use them quite bit, and during events (even, sometimes, press trips) they can be tremendously helpful to us for tracking content and tying together a narrative of a diverse group of people talking about the same trip (which, clearly, is our responsibility and not the individuals on the trip…but seriously, it is really helpful to PR-types and provides near-instant gratification for brands who want to track their "reach", which is why its hard for us to let go.)

Even with all the FTC drama around disclosure, it's a hard tool to let die. But maybe, just maybe, Gary’s got a point about the quality of content that comes along with a mandatory hashtag and how savvy consumers reading those posts really are. Women’s Wear Daily certainly sees them as a problem; when one of their staffers attended a sponsored event and posted about it, the internet blew up pretty fast – notably because of his use of the hashtag. As Karen Berger noted on an SATW forum, reprinted with her permission,

“The appearance of (or the actual) conflict of interest with press trips has always been a problem editorially, which is, of course, one reason why some publications traditionally forbid it or frown on them. But this kind of takes it one step further. Whereas reporters previously had the buffer of an editor -- you couldn't put in a pandering go box because the editor would take it out; you couldn't just slip in the darling little shop that gave everyone freebies, because the editor would take it out. Now we are writing much more independently, especially when it comes to social media.”

And we’ve been closely watching the very-smartly-done Cadillac influencer strategy, which seems to be everywhere right now, and is #all #about #hashtags.  They’ve had some lovely coverage, including a lot of stunning imagery across channels like Instagram. But then we read this post, and once we got done laughing hysterically and discussing how much we really, really want to spend a Saturday afternoon drinking with this guy (HOW MUCH FUN WOULD THAT BE?!), we sorta had a moment where we wondered how thrilled Cadillac was with this narrative. Which included a pretty telling statement:

“But most of all, I realized how easy it is to get sucked into this incredible, but ultimately vapid and meaningless #influencer lifestyle because it's sooooooo much fun and you don't spend a f*cking dollar despite living like a king. However, doing it all the time definitely makes you look like a f*cking tool.”