Twitter reset 3.0
jasonleow • 17 Nov 2021 •
I’m making a slight tweak to my Twitter engagement approach again. Thinking back on my Twitter journey, I really went all out to make all the mistakes a noob Twitter user can make:
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v1.0 - using brand account @golifelog, engaging other Money Twitter accounts, tweet platitudes, writing, goals. Too impersonal, people didn’t feel it was authentic from a brand account, the Money Twitter accounts cared only for their own network of affiliate accounts, and starting from zero means the ramp up is haaard.
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v2.0 - switch to personal account, make friends, give value, have fun, tweet about indie hacking, building in public but few direct mentions of Lifelog or daily writing. The idea was to not mention Lifelog so as to not appear like I’m selling or get moderator banned, yet if they are curious about what my product is, they will check out my profile ad get funneled to Lifelog. Overall I felt more aligned with this personal approach, follower count growing, got a few viral successes, but no MRR movement. Problem is, the people engaging with my tweets are following my indie hacking journey, not people who happen to write or are bloggers/writers/content creators in their own fields. This approach was too indirect. Great to grow following, not so great for Lifelog. I picked up this approach mostly from @dagorenouf on Twitter, but maybe it doesn’t translate over that well, as his product is B2B one-off logo design, but Lifelog is B2C and recurring.
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v3.0 - stay on personal account and continue making friends, but kickstart a new tweet category in my tweet schedule - writing habits for goals, productivity and success. The “habit hacking guy for writing”. There’s some tangent to my current followers since many are indies. Perhaps I can introduce them to this keystone habit that had benefited me so much not just in writing skill, but in all other aspects of work and life. This is a more direct approach, and the followers I attract will be those who like to read about using writing for career success. I hope. Another learning point: the past few times I managed to get paid subscribers was through direct engagement engagement and DMs. Not cold sales, that’s slimey. Rather, warm sales: First develop relationship, build trust, then invite them into the Lifelog community. I’d also been giving away free accounts to friends on Twitter who I would love to have in Lifelog, just because they would be fun and a great addition to the community. Growing it this way would help Lifelog too, and I won’t have to suffer spam from freemium tiers.
It’s crazy how long I took to realise that I should just do this direct approach. I mean, look at the folks who are successful with a writing community on Twitter. Folks like Dickie Bush and Nicolas Cole who run ship30for30, David Perrell who run his own writing course. Tweeting and writing about writing is their niche. Even folks like Julian Shapiro, Paul Graham write about writing, even though they aren’t authors by profession but use writing as a vehicle for influence and mindshare.
Why should I be any different? God knows what I was thinking.
One reason could be that I was caught and confused between which public persona I should be showing. I’m a writer, but also indie hacker, developer, entrepreneur, marketer. Which one should I write about? My Twitter journey was very much about uncovering that. All the meandering and detours…
In this final leg of my #100daysofmarketing journey, I really do hope this will be the one reset that will make a difference to Lifelog. I might want to spend less time on it in the future and start working more on Plugins For Carrd, but figuring out the right marketing approach and finding that repeatable distribution channel for Lifelog will always be a work-in-progress.
Onwards!
Comments
I think we have both learned a lot about Twitter this year. The highs, the lows and the drawbacks of trying too hard to make it work. You also have to worry about who is backing these bigger accounts. Do they pay for RTs or have a private network of high value individuals? It certainly isn’t a level playing field when you start to scratch the surface of some accounts.
I guess it always pays to remember that people buy stuff from people, not faceless organisations. If you can build a culture around writing, then I think it will work. You perhaps just need to concentrate on the USP for Lifelog.
You are different. and I would argue… you must be different in order to succeed.
But the path you take towards finding your niche, your specialization, or your perfect community member is going to be almost exactly the same.
Let me explain…
It’s a concept used in Ship30 and Nicolas Cole’s whole marketing/writing background that we need to be Category Creators
What you were avoiding ( I believe) was coming off as a Twitter salesman, or spammy advert of GLL… but in reality— you had to go through the process of V1, V2, and V3, to finally come to the conclusion that you’re at now.
It’s totally fine to promote and scale your product, to advertise, and boost your tweets via paid promotions. But what’s important is momentum and building action towards trying new things versus not doing anything at all out of fear.
SO…
The process of finding your category is going to be the same as everyone else. Make noise, listen for signal.
Send out many data points and see what works. Experiment with many things, and double down on the success.
But your end result will and Must be different than what everyone else in the community is doing.
The tricky thing about MRR is that it’s just one of many variables you can measure…and as much as we want to believe that it is the ultimately and most important variable --our actions say otherwise.
Sometimes… a detour to kindle a relationship is more fun. or trying out a new tweet idea, or experimenting with marketing techniques.
It’s late at night and I’m rambling but… here’s a personal story that I think may help
I’ve grown accounts to 5k+ from 1k in 2-3 months.
I’ve advised, written, and experimented with tons of Twitter growth strategies.
and at one point ** I was obsessed with my own “MRR”, which was trying to get to 1k followers.**
After I found out that I had to spend 3 hours on Twitter a day, and DM 20 people, + create threads every week to reach 1k in 1 month— I gave up.
It just wasn’t worth it.
It just wasn’t me.
It was a classic case of, Journey over the destination.
@tao yeah agree re: Money Twitter accounts. Always wondered how some of these accounts got to the tens of thousands followers…
Yeah I think building that culture around writing, being more direct, will be more effective. The indirect route just didn’t work for me though it got followers (which proved to be a distraction)
@brianto2013 great points - after writing this post, it dawned on me v1.0-2.0 weren’t detours but part of the journey. Benefit of writing to think! I think I’m a slow learner that way - where others would have switched strategy quickly I took months.
Love that personal story. I’m seeing that too now. The content threadmill is not worth the burnout. Best to find ways to have fun. That way, we can sustain the long game.
@brianto2013 would love to hear your thoughts in this new approach!