How do you get users from social media without an existing audience?
I would really like to learn from others here to know what techniques are currently working :-)
For Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn et cetera It seems like these channels require you to have an audience already (unless you use ads).
Trending on Indie Hackers
Apologies for the self promotion, but I built sif'd ("sift") for this. It's basically a search engine to help me quickly find active, english speaking content creators. (Growing an audience is hard, so I'd rather pay other people with an existing audience to promote my stuff.) Here's a quick demo.
@neb519 Thank you for sharing! Will have to check it out. Any promo you can offer to check out the product?
Good question. If you're truly interested, reach out to me for a demo and then we can chat about a discount. My price is already quite low compared to my competitors, but I have some wiggle room for indie hackers :)
For all the folks talking about hashtags - which ones?
@benjaminboman - take that advice with a grain of salt. Most hashtags come across as spammy. The few that are worth it are good because they truly are about a community. The two examples I know of are #retwit (real estate) and #buildinpublic.
What others are there?
For FB - if you can find your target audience in a Facebook group, participate there. The hard part is that most are spammy / lead gen for the hosts.
LinkedIn has been most interesting for me personally. If you write something that is long with a good 300-character intro... the algo does a good job of trying to distribute it.
For LinkedIn, I am assuming (hopefully wrongly) that any posts need to be 'business focused' so I have discounted it for myself as I am focusing on European travel and helping people do so affordably and with confidence.
Is there a space on LinkedIn for "how to travel affordable" articles?
I would LOVE to utilize LI for finding potential advertising directors who might have budget to spend on advertising on small / new websites marketing Euro travel. I just don't know that my content would contribute to the platform.
Do not discount LinkedIn for 'non business' related content. A large portion of the time people are scrolling LinkedIn without a specific purpose. Often used as an acceptable social media during work hours.
Travel is aspirational, and therefore would make good content and standout from someone's latest job update. That said, don't spam, make it high quality content that people will enjoy reading and viewing.
Thanks for this. I wonder if 'remote work' / 'nomad' focused content would work - as opposed to solo backpacking type of content. THanks for the comment - it's given me something to think about!
Yes, good ideas. For example, best countries to work remotely for US businesses. Then you can consider currency purchasing power, time zone difference etc
You never know unless you try. (Seriously - who knows where your potential audience really hangs out... maybe LinkedIn is a way to reach those daydreamers at work.)
Yeah, I'm not sure whether those comments regarding hashtags are up to date...
Good point regarding Facebook groups.
Really interesting to hear about your experience with linkedin I feel like it's blowing up at the moment. But I'm not sure how much it's driving user sign-ups for people other than just developing personal brands or followings.
For these posts- is the product itself being mentioned as part of the content post? or links added at the bottom? or is it built in public post That's sort of tangentially promote the product?
I think we're really getting somewhere now :)
You are touching on my issue now. All of this social stuff is about personal branding and then hoping/praying that it leads to some sort of business link down the road.
I think this type of stuff works for techie / indiehacker focused products.
But for the rest of the world? I don't know. I think you may have to go back to cold-calling and messaging and marketing.
I have yet to hear about someone who used social media to build a product audience that was bootstrapped and not focused on tech dorks.
I'd say you'd have the most real post here. This seems like the problem: basically, organic / unpaid social requires personal brands to promote stuff. And even then like you said, that works for tech consumers but maybe not other industries.
Things that worked for me was to try to follow conversations on social media on the topic of the product that I was building. I try to answer questions and try to be genuinely helpful without trying to push my product at all.
Example: I have a site that helps people find other developers on Mastodon (fedidevs.com), so I try to find people asking for cool accounts to follow and I try reply with links accounts that they might be interesting for them. I don't mention fedidevs.com right away. If more conversation follows there might be an opportunity for me to pitch my project more naturally and get a better engagement out of it.
Reddit, Just find a subreddit with the subject you need and post. But be sure to read the community guidelines. Big subreddits mostly do not like self promoting, but there are ways around that. There are quite a few post on indie hackers how to leverage reddit for marketing. I recommend to give them a look ;)
If you're going to use Reddit, I would avoid /r/startups. It's moderated so heavily that even if you're not actually trying to promote there you're going to get your posts/comments deleted without any feedback.
This is a good one! I got a great intro to doing this from an indiehacker here. But wondering about the other channels too :)
One of my favourites would be purchasing ad space at the end or within a tweet - when warranted.
Obviously, it will depend on what you're providing and the target audience but generally speaking, there is so much untapped potential for SaaS products to be marketed within threads.
It's worth sending DM's to people on Twitter, who cover your industry and appeal to your end user. Just pitch it to them, let them know you're solving their audiences pain, you'll provide them with a unique affiliate link that'll benefit their users with an extended trial or whatever the case might be and ask for their rate.
Mindful tip: They will only see the first few words of your DM, make it punchy and not scammy as everyones DM's are flooded with bots.
If their email is publicly available just email them the same proposition.
Goodluck,
Let me know if you have any follow up questions.
Interesting feedback, thank you.
"One of my favourites would be purchasing ad space at the end or within a tweet - when warranted."
Wow. I've never heard of this. How did you learn about it?
My background is in creative advertising, growth hacking, strategy etc.
I've always found pockets of gold to extract a lot of value from on the internet.
I'm busy working on writing about these type of things.
We should chat.
Sounds good. Do you use Twitter much? Followed
Check your dm's 🤝
I'm not sure if this is going to work, but I have recently created a daily to-do list to help me use Social Media, specifically Reddit and Twitter and Youtube to try to build an audience and gain followers.
I started with zero and still have less than 100, but have only just started my social media 'journey'. I am hoping by sheer consistency and (hopefully) good content posts that I will attract followers over time. I'd love to find a way to make it a Sprint, but I know this is a long slough marathon, and accept that and the work it will take to achieve.
This is my daily process:
Twitter
- Send 5 Tweets about Eurotripr
- Tweet 1 - 6a
- Tweet 2 - 10a
- Tweet 3 - 1:30p
- Tweet 4 - 6p
- Tweet 5 - 10p
- Find 5 new people I want to be friends with in the Euro Travel Space - follow them, introduce myself, and comment weekly on each to build relationship/friendship
- Comment on 5 travel 'Influencer' Accounts
Reddit (cycle through these subs daily: /travel, /backpacking, /soloTravel, /shoestring, /europeTravel, /europeTravelGuide, /exploreEurope, /digitalNomad, /startups, /entrepeneur, /sideproject
Post (in a travel sub)
- Critique THis Itinerary (1 per day)
- General Euro travel Question (1 per day)
- Repurpose Blog Article as a Helpful post (1 per day)
Read through 3 Startup subs (5-10 posts per - get to know the communities)
Reddit: 5 Comments on others’ posts (in a travel sub)
Indiehackers
Youtube - Record and post 1 video per day - DO NOT EDIT, just post it to get them up and get comfortable. Make sure they are RELEVANT and HELPFUL to European travel and first-time travelers.
----------
Do I get ALL of these done each day since I started? No. I have a 9-5 and a family. BUT I go down the list each day and where ever I finish one day, I start off the next day. I'm getting faster and more consistent, and more comfortable with social media which I never used in the past. Every 2-3 days I get thought this list plus a bunch of other ToDo items I have for Eurotripr.
Good luck.
I dare say, if you're able to keep up with this regimen, consistently providing genuine value with your S/M interactions and forming genuine relationships, you'll have a sizable audience pretty soon!
I'm hoping that will be the case. Thanks!
Hey, it's nice to see a hustler. Social media is really hard for me. It's a nice encouragement:)
Btw, I just checked your site (cause I'm thinking about going to Europe next). I wasn't sure what it did, sorry. Looks like a Nomadlist?
No worries - it's a work in progress. I'm really ADHD with it and am trying to finish 'all the things'.
Yeah, the way I explain it is (in its final iteration): I want it to be as if NomadList and Indiehackers had a baby and that baby helps people plan trips to Europe.
I am currently in the neverending 'data input' stage for countries, cities, and attractions. I am also inputting curated travel itineraries so people like you can search/filter for the best places to visit based on your criteria (costs, things to do, weather, etc) and then view itineraries you can use for your trip.
To keep me motivated while doing the boring data input, I'm also interviewing other travelers to share their stories and experiences on the site, and writing content for future SEO.
Now with the AI wave, I'm trying to rewrite some elements that can be better done through AI.
So many features, so much data, so much content, never enough time 😅
it's slowly coming together, but never quick enough.
Thanks for looking at it and your honest feedback/confusion.
Thank you!
I'm curious as to how this is done without having an existing audience, or building one. Hehe
"Or building one" - missed that comment, haha
I wish I had the answer to that as it would save me a lot of time and stress - i really stress over posting on Social Media. I am very old school and though Social Media has been around FOREVER now, I still feel the "Who wants to listen to me / see me" fears and have had to just get ok with putting up 'crap' until I feel more comfortable.
It's why I have tried to systematize it as much as I can. Otherwise I will overthink and talk myself out of ever posting anything. My assumption and hope is that after posting 100 times on each outlet I will just be overall posting better quatlity stuff.
I guess I'll update everyone when I do.
I feel exactly the same about social media. Which is why I was so curious about this :D.
Makes me look to the sky and ask myself, does it have to be this way? Haha.
I recently discovered some stuff by @kevon which makes posting on social media far more authentic unless stressful. Check out his work if you're interested
Otherwise, I'm in the same boat with you. Just plugging away for now building up that network on social.
I have learned a few lessons from my experience in building an audience of 70K-follower in Twitter over the last 20 months.
First of all, having an audience is really powerful and worth all the time and effort you need to put to acquire them. It is not only going to be a great lead acquiring channel, but also a great place to test all your products and features and know what you customers need. This is in addition to all the other benefits (branding, marketing, ...etc).
Having said that, you can get users from social media channels to test your product in different ways:
1- DM influences in your niche market and ask them for their help. You will be surprised how many of them will be willing to help without expecting anything in return. Especially if you were friendly and ask them nicely.
2- Use Twitter paid promotion. It is cheap compared to influencers marketing charges.
3- Use social listening tools to get notifications for tweets that mention certain keywords related to your product then authentically engage with those people and promote your product. Avoid using bot responses, please!
4- Follow all influencers and engage with their audience. But, avoid direct promotions. Just write a clear bio in your account with a link to your product. People who find you interesting and knowledgeable will open your bio and click on the link. Also, the influncer may notice you valuable engagement and retweet your comments and give you a greater exposure.
5- Use zaiper to post the content across all platforms (twitter, instagram, linkedin & facebook) to increase your funnel's top surface area.
6- Ask each new user to share to others who might be interested.
7- Content is king! You gotta keep posting good content to attract potential users.
Good luck!
Great tips, thanks! Wanted to jump on, what about if you want to test a new product that's different from your followers? Engage with a new product account?
Hi @massanishi
Your followers followed you for a reason. Most likely, for your content about a specific topic or range of topics. So, it is best to test products with that reason in mind. your test posts will seem like content to them, but it is a product MVP to you.
Never test just any product with the wrong target audience. They will get confused, and possibly unfollow you. This is part of branding.
Here is an analogy to clarify it: If I became your friend, it is because we share the same interests. If you started talking about different interests, I will probably look for other friends that keep me engaged.
This is my personal observation and you need to test and see if this makes sense to you too.
Best of luck :-)
That analogy makes sense!
My interests jump back and forth, like any entrepreneur making me terrible with the consistent branding.. Maybe, I'll try multiple accounts with tiny slices of my interests!
Thanks for your thoughtful reply:))
I think all of us indie hackers have this in our DNA (wanting to try many products). When I started my twitter community, they kept sending me messages with pain points all on daily bases and I really wanted to build products to solve them. But, after some time I realized that this will not help me send the right messages to them. In other words, I wanted my product to be the first thing that comes to their minds when a certain problem happens to them. So, I wrote a list of the top 5 pain points and I selected the one that I believed would have the most impact and hopefully better business returns later. I kept the other ideas on the side to try out later.
By the way, some of the above ideas were nicely put together in this book if you wanted to dig deeper:
"Company Of One: Why Staying Small Is the Next Big Thing for Business"
You are welcome !
Nice you've prioritized all the golden goose ideas! Hope that's working out!
I'll check the book out. Thank you:))
You are welcome! Best of luck :)
Curious about the ads! I've heard twitter ads are rotten (bad traffic). Do you mind sharing more about that? :)
One more important thing which I think you should start executing ASAP. When someone offers you help and advice, your first response must always be "Thank you very much!". Then, say whatever you want to say.
You didn't say that to me, so I thought you should start doing it. ;)
That's fair. Sorry I didn't thank you first. I appreciate the feedback you shared :-).
I have not used it myself to be honest! But, some competitors have and it seemed working. I will give it a try soon.
how did you find the process of getting any influencers if any? We have tried reaching out to many but never hear back anything from them.
It's my time to shine! Check out sifd.io - we even do outreach for you.
Always have in mind what value are you offering with a posts or social channel. What's the person seeing your content getting out of it.
If you're just posting about you or your service it's won't have much appeal. However if your offering value, e.g. downloadable guides, unique information or insights, tips & tricks etc people will engage in your content. When this happens, the algorithms will help you build an audience.
Thanks! Do you mind sharing some specific techniques that you're trying at the moment that aren't audience building? :)
It's really dependent on your product/ service as to which channels you should explore.
It's always better to do 1 channel well, than 3 channels badly.
providing value via dms
Hey Benjamin,
Techniques come and go as platforms change rules.
What always works is leveraging human psychology.
What that means in real-terms:
build an audience as you go along. Got to start somewhere
build that audience by creating content that is UNIQUE TO YOU and leads back to YOUR PRODUCT only. Doing so creates a brand identity that competitors can't copy.
^^it's the entire basis of the approach I advocate. You can check out an entire explanation of what I mean right here - www.thebluntmethod.com
Hope that helps
Chris
Getting users from social media without an existing audience can be difficult, but it's not impossible. We at Skinive have used these 3 ways:
Use hashtags: Hashtags are a great way to attract new users to your content. Use relevant hashtags relevant to your niche and include them in your posts.
Interact with other users: Interacting with other users is a great way to get attention. Comment on other people's posts, share their content and give likes. This will help you build relationships with other users and increase your visibility.
Collaborate with other users/influencers: Collaborating with other users will help you reach a wider audience. Look for other users in your niche who have a similar target audience and collaborate with them on projects or content. However, remember - you need a strong, unique offer that will appeal to an audience of Inflencers if you want to save your budget
Thank you.
Which channels do you see this working on most? Linkedin? I don't see hashtags being that used on Twitter for example. Facebook seems really quiet
Do you have any examples of the collaborations that drove user acquisition for you?
Your right!