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Acquisition Channel Opportunities, TikTok, SEO, Facebook Marketplace

This week I've done the hard work for you, analyzing 1500 tech/marketing news from last week and identifying the 3 opportunities that can help you acquire more users from new/existing acquisition channels. Here they are:

1. You Can Now Drive Leads Using TikTok

On April 28th, TikTok announced a new "Lead Generation" feature, which is very similar to how Facebook Lead Ads work.

How TikTok Lead Generation Ads work: People see your ad on TikTok, click on a button like "Register", and are asked to complete a form about themselves within TikTok.

The opportunity: There are 2 myths about TikTok:

a) It's great for exposure but terrible for converting those eyeballs into paying users

b) Only children are on the platform.

Many people have already disputed a) so I'll focus on b).

Savannah Sanchez, a paid social consultant,published a tweet back in April saying that females over the age of 35 are one of the top-converting age groups on TikTok right now. The platform is also working on new ad formats which should be released soon.

If you're into B2B, one great way to dip your toes into this new channel is by retargeting and custom audiences on TikTok.

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2. How to Dominate SEO Via Industry related, Long-tail keywords

Ross Simonds, founder of Foundation, recently wrote an article where he analyzed how AirTable, a spreadsheet-database hybrid, uses long-tail, pattern-based keywords to dominate SEO.

If you type any of these keywords into Google, you'll have an Airtable template appearing somewhere in the results:

  • trip calendar;
  • job search template;
  • personal CRM;
  • social media calendar.

Why this works Airtable is leveraging the fact they're an advanced spreadsheet and the fact they can create templates for almost any industry. These special attributes enabled them to brainstorm 1000s of long-tail keywords, carefully target them and rank for 1000s of keywords.

The opportunity: Can you do a similar thing for your own niche? To get started, ask yourself:

  • What industries can my software be used in?
  • Are there any long-tail keywords I can rank for within that industry?

If you have a social media scheduling software, such as X or Y, and target hair salons, you could target a keyword like "hair salon social media posts" (this appeared as the #1 suggested keyword after I typed 'hair saloon social media'). You could write a few post ideas and have a call-to-action that says: "Want to schedule these posts for the next 30 days on your FB page? Check us out".

You can even go a step further and crowdsource some of your customers' best performing posts (with their permission). For example, make a post "Top X posts that performed the best for hair saloon". This is the power of data.

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3. Classified Ads Are a Viable Source of Leads & Users

Facebook announced something interesting in its latest earning call: Facebook Marketplace now has 1 billion users. Craigslist is also doing great, with 336 million users per month.

The opportunity: Classified ads are alive and kicking. A common myth is that these channels dont work in the commerce industry. According to my Zero to Users research, this idea is false. Classifieds can work for services as well. Take Access Database Support ($2k/mo), a database consulting service, and how they got their initial users:

I also have alerts set up on Craigslist in the computer gigs section. This has brought me a little bit of work as well.

Facebook Marketplaces have also used classified ads to drive supply/demand. Take GreenPal (making $25k/mo) and how they drove lawn movers to the platform:

We figured out that we could call every advertiser on Craigslist on Sunday, when they weren't moving yards, and actually get 5 seconds of their attention and pitch them on the idea to use GreenPal.

If you're creative, you can use classified ads sites to drive real people to your SaaS/service/marketplace.

Thank you for reading!

Get opportunities like these every week via email:

  1. 2

    Great write-up as usual. Keep it coming!

  2. 1

    As SaaS founders, one of the most important insights we can find are the industries to which our SaaS applies. It seems Airtable did a pretty good job on this.
    Check This. https://apkhigh.com/

  3. 1

    I'm really interested in the TikTok new ad unit. I run product for AWeber and Facebook Lead Ads is one of the most popular tools our users experiment with to keep large lists growing.

    1. 1

      If you take a look at the blog post, they published 2 case studies of the type of businesses that use TikTok Lead Ads successfully. That might help.

  4. 1

    Pretty good stuff, especially with the classifieds part.

  5. 1

    As SaaS founders, one of the most important insights we can find are the industries to which our SaaS applies. It seems Airtable did a pretty good job on this.

    1. 1

      I bet they did a lot of user interviews to understand a lot of their industry-specific case studies.

  6. 1

    Interesting that TikTok is getting into lead generation. Wonder if Snap is next.

      1. 1

        Wow, I wonder what are peoples experiences with these ads.

  7. 1

    Pretty interesting insight on classified ads. Does this apply to other classified sites for other countires like GumTree?

    1. 1

      Last time I checked, GumTree was displaying suggested keywords for services as well.

    2. 1

      Almost every country has its own version of Craigslist, I don't see why it wouldn't apply to them.

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