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Turn Twitter Followers into Blog Subscribers in 2 Steps

Posted By Guest Blogger 27th of July 2012 Social Media 0 Comments

This guest post is by Momekh of LifeETC.

Too many interesting people out their are not using Twitter effectively. They may be using it to make solid connections, which is great, but they are not using it to directly build their own communities.

I propose a little experiment. It won’t take much of your time, as you’ll see. The benefits, on the other hand, can be significant.

Here are the assumptions:

  • You have your own blog (home base, as Michael Hyatt calls it) and a Twitter account. In all probabilities, your Twitter bio includes the web address of your site.
  • You understand that the purpose of both your blog and your Twitter account is to add to your platform and community. You are “community minded.”

Now for this experiment to work, I suggest that you make the following quick changes as you read them. The steps—two in total—are easy to do. And if you have any difficulties, you can always ask in the comments section.

Ready?

First, a reminder

Following people on Twitter is like voting. It’s almost a nudge, to tell the person that you find him or her interesting and relevant.

So take this idea a step further. Start following people who are following your person of interest.

Find someone interesting in your niche? Start following that person’s followers. These people are your prospects. They are the perfect candidates for your community.

Although there is plenty of great advice available on how to use Twitter, this post will help you convert the traffic coming from Twitter into subscribers for your community.

Now, it is time to make those quick changes we talked about.

Step 1: Update your Twitter bio

You are what you say you are. This is especially true if your bio is the first—and in many cases, the only—thing your prospects see before they come to your blog.

You want your Twitter bio to do two things, in this order:

  1. Make it truthful and relevant: You do not want to make it sound “cool” if what you include is untrue. Being honest has more benefits than the obvious ones. The prospect should be able to tell from your bio exactly what you do.

    Note that there is usually a difference between what you tweet about and what you do. The bio should be about what you do, so the prospect can see what your community and blog are all about. This helps them decide if you are relevant to them.

  2. Now, incorporate a call to action: Rephrase your message. Work on it. Test it out. It will be awesome if you can use it to introduce your website address. For example, see my Twitter bio—I ask users a question in the end, and then give them the website address as the answer to that question.

Step 2: Create a Twitter landing page

So far, your prospect has read your bio and your message resonates with her. The bio is clear, relevant, and even invites her to check out your site.

The prospect clicks … and sees your blog’s front page in all its glory.

That’s just wrong! I tested this out. I first changed just my bio, and sent interested Twitter followers to my blog’s homepage.

I saw an increase in traffic coming from Twitter. But there was no noticeable increase in my blog community (in terms of subscriber figures). I thought, “Well, people come and check out the blog, and don’t find it relevant, so they don’t subscribe.” And I’m cool with that—I don’t want people joining the community for the wrong reasons.

But then I thought that maybe I was looking at it the wrong way. The front page of my blog is, well, like a front page of a blog! It’s generic by design.

But someone coming from Twitter is already in a certain state of mind, a step into the “funnel” we could say. This means I can present the message of my blog to the prospect in a more meaningful way. Landing pages anyone!?

While writing your Twitter landing page, keep the following things in mind:

  • You are addressing your Twitter followers, so be as specific and personal as you can be. I start my page with “Heyya to my Twitter friends.” We already know the frame of reference for the people coming to that page, so use that information to better communicate with them.
  • As you present the central theme of your blog, make a call to action. I invite the prospect to further check out the blog content and to subscribe. There is ample research to show that a clear call to action works, so use it to your advantage.

There are tons of articles out there on how to write a landing page. That’s not necessarily a good thing. I knew I could easily fall prey to information overload, so I quickly wrote a new page, just keeping the two basic ideas above in mind, and deliberately forgetting everything else.

Writing a new page in WordPress is easier than stealing candy from a kid (not that I’d know). I gave it a page slug of “t”, and changed my blog address on my Twitter bio to reflect the change. My new Twitter landing page was live.

Now, that’s not a very elegant technical solution, as the coders amongst us would use a redirect to direct visitors from that link to the landing page. But I am no coder, nor elegant. So I just slapped the page together, put it on my Twitter bio and sat back.

I immediately started seeing an increase in signups.

Do you use any specific mechanisms to convert your Twitter followers into community members? Have any tips of your own that you’d like to share? Let me know in the comments.

Momekh is a “professional adventurer” and wants to help you attain financial freedom. He writes about creative self employment and wholesome living at his blog LifeETC. You can also follow @momekh on Twitter.

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Comments
  1. Thanks for these tips! We are definitely going to have to try this stuff out.

  2. Thanks for this great post.

    I am guilty only with the second step, but I will try to cover it soon

  3. This is freakin’ fantastic! It’s these tiny little things that make a world of difference – and people (myself included) just don’t think to have a landing page from twitter.

    I’m writing mine now and will test different lengths of text before the opt in form.

    Have you done any other testing?

    • Thanks Graham! Small things matter indeed.

      I love simple. Because one actually gets to do it.

      I am thinking of removing the Sidebar for the Twitter landing page altogether, and making it a single page to really control the message that I want to give.

      But truth be told, Graham, I have yet to take my ‘testing’ to the next level. Now I just might :)

  4. That sounds so simple. I have already updated my bio, which I didn’t even have. Now I’m going to work on a simple landing page like you said. Is there anything else to put on the landing page? Maybe top posts or something like that? I want to add value to the page. I’m just not sure how.

    Thanks for the great post.

  5. Solid advice for using Twitter to get more blog subscribers Momekh.

  6. This was a very in depth post on Twitter strategies. These are very important steps to take to use Twitter to your advantage with your blog.

  7. Nicely written post, Momekh, but to be honest your Twitter profile would NOT make me follow you.

    Maybe I don’t want to be an “adventurer” but seeing Twitter bios like those makes me run away quickly. It just smells of scam to me.

    I do like the idea of a landing page, but this shouldn’t just be limited to Twitter, and it’s not an entirely new idea.

    Russ

    • Thanks for the honesty, man.

      The thing is, that’s totally OK. In fact, that’s encouraged. Because if you are not liking the message I am giving out, it’s better for both of us that we communicate that as early as possible. No? Saves time for both of us, I think.

  8. This is an excellent article! Wonderful tips that I hadn’t even thought of but are incredibly easy to implement. I’m changing my Twitter profile right now. One question though, when you create the new WordPress landing page, how do you hide it so it doesn’t show up in your pages on your main page? Thanks again for the great advice!

    • When you make a new page, that new page comes up as a menu item on your blog, and you want to stop that from happening. Did I get your question right?

      If that’s the case, Jae, you can easily make a custom menu on your WordPress blog. In you Admin area, go to Appearances > Menu and make your own menu.

      Hope this helps. :)

  9. Hi Momekh,

    Specialize. Create value. Prosper. Your twitter landing page idea is powerful. Personalize the experience. Add in some serious value to convert subscribers quickly. Excellent tips here.

    Create value to make your twitter page popular. Gain exposure on lists. Retweet others. Engage. Be patient. Over time you attract more followers and blog subscribers as your stream becomes irresistible to interested prospects.

    Thanks Momekh!

    Ryan

  10. Hi Momekh

    That’s just brilliant. But do we have to keep several landing pages for different sources?

    • You can, and given that making landing pages is so easy, I think that can be good thing to test.

      But one doesn’t “have” to do anything, Binny. It’s just a question of presenting your message to your prospective community in the best way possible. All the best!

  11. Great tips.. i guess we need to start applying them.. thank you for sharing it with us

  12. Hi Momekh!

    Great tips and certainly twitter landing page is a great way to do it.

    Thanks for sharing. :-)

  13. Great advice from an internet marketer’s view, having more Twitter followers will not ensure that we can get more subscribers but a carefully curated landing page is the best call to action strategy for bloggers.

  14. What plug in did you use for the pop up subscription form? These are great tips in an easy to understand format. Thanks!

    • That’s via Aweber (Aweber is an email/list management company). It is supposed to show only once though.

  15. This was so simple and i’ve seen this done before but I just loved the way you explained it. I’ve updated my bio to say what I DO rather than what i am. I liked how you said “YOU IN?” and borrowed that part. Hope you don’t mind. Gonna make my LP today…

    • Sure, borrow away!

      Pretty much everything I’ve ever done has been borrowed from someone else. Originality, to begin with, is usually misunderstood. :)

      Thanks for reaching out at the blog, Annie. Good luck!

  16. This makes a lot of sense. Your explanation made me rethink about this topic. I must say that I totally agree.

  17. Hey Momekh,

    Nice idea, I will surely try this method to turn my Twitter visitors to subscribers, Thanks for the tips tough.

  18. I just found your amazing blog today and have found a wealth of information that will be extremely helpful to this beginner. My twitter following is extremely low. I am curious to see how well this update will work… I am sure it can only help. Thanks a ton!

  19. Great article Momekh. Very practical. And hi, I am going to do that.

  20. Momekh, i read all the blogs from Problogger, they are all good, some are brilliant, and some create a response in me that is like that little light bulb switching on. Very excited to implement these changes to all of our spaces, and see what happens,In our company we are socially driven, so this could be amazing for us. We have spent two years building and tweaking, and not been in any rush, just letting our message seep out and get traction. I can see a bright future with that light bulb on. Thank you very much

  21. This is a brilliant tip – thanks! It seems like such an obvious idea, but I don’t think I’d ever have thought of it! I’ve now created my Twitter landing page (http://www.smashthewall.com/p/welcome-twisitor.html) and will monitor the results very closely!

  22. Hi Momekh,

    Ver nice Twitter strategies! I’ll definitely follow your tips in my upcoming blog project.

    Thanks!

  23. Great article! I just finished making the changes to my twitter profile and blog. Had to go with a longer URL for the landing page in Blogger, but that’s OK. Most people are going to click the link in Twitter, not try to just remember the domain name.

    Can’t wait to see my results. Your article definitely made me think about what I am trying to accomplish with my social presence and being very intentional in how I go about it.

    Thanks Momekh!

  24. I guess I learned something after reading this post, that is to add bio on my twitter page. Thanks for that info. :)

  25. very practical tips, i will put these into action to get more subcriber

  26. Thanks, Ahmed. I’m curious if this will help our company. I’ve already changed our bio for our company and will keep an eye out for click-throughs. If I start to see more, I’ll follow the suggestion for the landing page.

  27. Thank so much for this idea. Already made the changes. https://twitter.com/sundijo

    Awesome post.

    • Just checked out your bio. Started following you immediately :) … seems to be a good start! :)

      Thanks for the appreciation, glad I could help.

  28. Thanks Momekh. Great post. I actually split the difference and ended up linking to my main newsletter page rather than creating a distinct Twitter page. Perhaps my “half” step will lead me to create a dedicated Twitter welcome page.

    Also I like the idea of using this strategy to promote something other than the newsletter.

    In any event thanks for being able to crystallize this idea so clearly that it motivated me to act!

    • “Crystallize the idea so clearly” — that is exactly what I was trying to do. Thanks man. And good luck with your own experiments.

  29. Great post, Momekh – I like your ideas, your goals, and your message. I signed up on your site, too. :-)

    Be well,

    Rich

  30. Would Effing Brilliant be too strong? I’m totally going to implement this strategy, and I subscribed to your newsletter, Momekh. Thanks.

  31. Hi Momekh – This is easily the most unique strategy I’ve seen in a while. I’ll be implementing it on our site. Thanks very much for the original idea.

  32. Apparently I can’t steal candy from a kid. I created my Twitter page in WordPress under the pages section (so it’s not a post but a page…) but when I hit publish it automatically went to my menu bar. I don’t want that. Then when I went to menus in my dashboard to take it off, it wasn’t listed as there, but still showing up on the actual website menu. Any suggestions?

    This is a great idea! Thanks for sharing. Hope I can get it to work!

    Mary Beth

  33. Best. Advice. Ever. You rock, thank you!

  34. Wonderful article, I need to start marketing more with social media, but somewhat afraid to take the plunge.

  35. very interesting article on doing smart business.

  36. Thanks for this article. I was looking for an article about Twitter followers. I also found your blog unique.

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