For businesses, bloggers, and tweens alike, Twitter is one of the most important social media platforms in terms of marketing your content, sharing new features, and just letting your followers know what you’ve been up to. (Okay, tweens probably aren’t using it for those first two reasons.)
But if you’re only using Twitter to build your audience there, you’re not getting the maximum value out of your following. You should also be using Twitter to massively grow your email list.
Here are 5 easy ways to make this happen with just a few tweaks.
1. Link your Twitter bio to a call to action page
Rather than link your Twitter bio to your website, like most people do, link it directly to a landing page that has a call to action.
This will have a much higher conversion rate than just directing people to your homepage. Chances are that if someone has shown enough interest in you based on your Twitter, they’ll also be interested in subscribing to your email list.
Noah Kagan, founder of SumoMe and an email-building connoisseur, does this on his Twitter:
His Twitter bio leads you directly to the landing page of his blog OkDork, where the first thing you see is his call to action to subscribe.
Noah uses SumoMe’s Welcome Mat as a friendly and inviting template to get people to subscribe. This makes it easy for users to opt in right away without having to spend extra time on his site looking for more information. He has seen Welcome Mat get 3x the amount of conversions you might have with a conventional call to action.
If you want to make it even easier for people to access your landing page, include a link directly in the body of your Twitter bio, as opposed to in the section below. Now it will show up in the truncated description of you whenever anyone searches for you.
This simple tweak is sure to get you more exposure and a bigger email list.
2. Use Start a Fire to promote your own content with curated shares
On Twitter we are all regularly sharing posts from other bloggers and other publications in order to circulate the best content possible. While this is important to your social media presence, it creates a problem.
When your followers click on that link they are directed away from you or your brand. Their attention is now elsewhere and they have left you behind.
start A FIRE is an app that allows you to add your presence to external links that you share on social media. When a follower lands on an article that you shared, but didn’t create, a little box will pop up in the corner with you or your brand and some recommended reads from your own content.
This is the article that entrepreneur Hiten Shah of CrazyEgg and KissMetrics shared:
At a closer look you can see that the link back to his Twitter pops up, as well as some recommended reads from his own blog:
This is an effective tool because it increases exposure for your brand and your content, and can drive traffic to your site. You can link people directly to previous articles you have written or to your landing page.
Remember to include your call to action in whatever links you are recommending, and you are good to go.
3. Use Twitter Lead Generation Cards to promote a new eBook
Twitter’s lead generation cards are a great marketing tool. These Twitter ads allow you to plug CTAs directly into your Twitter feed. You get access to emails with one simple click.
Use these cards to advertise an offer such as an eBook, which is an excellent tool that helps you grow your email list all on its own. At iDoneThis, we used Lead Generation Cards to market our eBook, and it’s helped us gain over 10,000 emails for our list.
Create your card under Twitter Ads in the ‘Creatives’ tab. Choose ‘Cards,’ and you will be left with the basic template to fill in, which will look like this:
Here is a finished example from Webtrends:
You will be left with a beautiful lead generation card that will simplify the process of capturing emails over social media.
4. Reply to tweets using TweetDeck to drive people to a call to action
Use TweetDeck to surface moments when you are mentioned on Twitter in order for you to easily reply and engage with people supporting your content.
Do this by clicking on the “Add Column” symbol from the sidebar, and click to add mentions. You can organize it so that you see when you and the sites you write for are mentioned.
Then, every time you tweet something new, take the time to go back and reply to everyone who retweets or mentions your post thanking them for the attention. More often than not, they will reply again in appreciation that you took the time to do so.
Now is the time to act. Take this opportunity to plug in your lead generation card to capture their email with one single click. This tactic has shown a 60-80% conversion rate.
People will respect that you took the time to get back to them, and will feel inclined to subscribe to your email list since they enjoyed the content.
5. Use analytics to make sure none of the above go to waste
Lastly, use Twitter Analytics to make sure you can optimize the results of the above tips.
If you find that you have a small following on Twitter or that your tweets don’t regularly perform well, you’re left without what can be a very powerful and effective distribution channel for your content. That’s why even if you aren’t a social media manager, it’s absolutely critical that you understand how you’re performing on Twitter and how you can improve.
These analytics help you track rates of impressions, retweets, engagements, link clicks, and favorited items, as well as your number of new followers. Focus on when new followers are joining, what content you’re tweeting during those times, and why new followers are joining.
Once you’re on Twitter Analytics, the analytics are easy to access and understand. Clicking on the “Tweets” category from the menu bar will provide information about how many people interacted with your content.
If you scroll down, you will see your specific breakdown:
This information should allow you to immediately assess the effectiveness of your Twitter content. You can then take the next steps to get more followers and create better content using the above four tools, so that more people engage and you can build your email list.
Hint: if you find your numbers are anything like the ones above, you have a lot of work to do.
If you find that these numbers could use some work, try these additional tweaks to your tweets:
- Add images
- Ask a question
- Tag influencers or relevant users with many followers
- Use hashtags
Don’t just use Twitter to build a Twitter following
Use your Twitter following to cross-promote your relationships on other platforms (and vice versa), and you’ll create massive leverage.
Email is still one of the most personal and powerful ways to communicate with your customers and fans, so move folks from Twitter to your own site, where you can capture their email addresses and strengthen those relationships. You’ll find that all of your networks will reinforce themselves, grow your following, and drive success for your business.
