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Acquisition Channel Opportunities: Trigger-based cold outreach, Instagram, Pinterest

Need to get in touch with an influencer on Twitter? Trying to post TikTok videos to Instagram? Today we'll be covering:

  • Trigger-based cold outreach: How monitoring Twitter bios can help you contact hard-to-reach people;

  • Instagram said it will be limiting videos re-posted from TikTok. Find how to easily overcome this limitation;

  • Pinterest now has a similar number of monthly active users in the US as TikTok and SnapChat.

Let's dive in.

1. How Monitoring Twitter Bios Can Help You Get in Touch With Hard-to-Reach People

If you've read my Zero to Users research, then you'll know how many founders use Twitter search to successfully find leads.

Let's say you own a SaaS about improving Facebook Ads results. You could use keywords like "facebook ads suck" to find people on Twitter complaining about this topic and see if you can help them.

Many people call this approach "trigger-based marketing", meaning you react to a certain action/trigger that the user took.

It's all about sending the right email at the right time.

Well, it turns you can do "trigger-based marketing" with Twitter bios as well. This article focuses on an app called Snoopbill, which helps people track changes to various Twitter bios.

What surprised me, however, is that the author of this article didn't understand the real purpose of tools like Snoopbill. He called them "creeping as a service tools", assuming most people using them are creeps obsessed with celebrity identities.

In reality, most users are probably business owners looking for new leads.

What this means for you: Take a look at this Twitter bio history from MrBeast, one of the most popular YouTubers on earth:
img

Notice how in July 8th, he changed his website to ShopMrBeast? This is a great moment to try to get in touch with big influencers who are in promotional mode.

Promotional mode: Have you noticed that when small podcasts interview big guests, in many cases, the big guests are promoting something (a recent book they wrote, a recent project, etc.)?

I've been on many Clubhouse rooms on podcast marketing and many people have mentioned they actively implement this tactic; they actively wait for big names to release something new, and then they'll reach them, promising to help them get more exposure to the new project.

Imagine you owned a SaaS company which improves e-commerce conversion rates. If you contacted MrBeast's team on July 8th, my guess is, you'd be much likely to get a response vs. 5 months before that.

The takeaway: You can use this tactic in all sort of ways. Make a list of potential leads of Twitter, monitor their bios, and see if something changes that will make them more open to trying your product or service.

Get 3 opportunities like these every week to your inbox:

2. You Can Now Repost TikTok Videos On Instagram Without Getting Penalized

The details: A week ago, Instagram announced it won't promote Reels that have a TikTok watermark. This was due to many people simply re-posting their TikTok videos on Instagram.

The solution: It didn't take long before tools like this one started to show up. Enter a URL, wait a few seconds, get your video without the watermark. That's it.

What this means for you: It's not a secret that Instagram now gives Reels more visibility over traditional posts. If you decide to try Reals to get more organic reach and re-post your videos from TikTok, now you have various tools at your disposal.

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3. Did you Know? Pinterest is Now As Big As TikTok and Snapchat In The US

The numbers: 98 million daily active users. That's the number of people who now actively use Pinterest in the US.

For a comparison, TikTok has approximately 100 million, and Snapchat 108 million daily active users (for sources on these numbers, see the SEJ article.)

I keep reading over and over and over again how Pinterest is an under-utilized acquisition channel. Personally, I knew they were big, but not that big. Probably because I'm not a female (77% of Pinterest users are female) and don't use it much.

What this means for you: If you're targeting a female audience, definitely consider Pinterest. Especially if you're a tech founder. Most of the things promoted on Pinterest are e-commerce products, and if you can figure out a way to use Pinterest effectively for your SaaS/digital service, it can pay dividends.

Get 3 opportunities like these every week to your inbox:

  1. 3
    1. makes sense. I've always noticed these influencers being guests on podcasts to promote their book/course. Influencers are people too, and when they publish something, they get this urge to promote it on many places as possible (suddenly their audience doesn't seem enough).
    1. 1

      True with artists as well. Just monitor how an artist behaves after a new song is publishes. He'd give the time of the day to people he wouldn't ordinarily do because they give him temp exposure.

  2. 1

    @zerotousers Thanks for putting together your guide, really useful stuff for SAAS products, but I'm in the B2C space, specifically Insurance Leads: think Geico commercials.

    Our goal is to target users right when they're in the market for our product, to get the highest conversion rate. Right now we're all over Facebook/Google, but I'm wondering where can we find organic channels? SEO is our next logical step, but it'd be great if someone knows about 'lesser used channels'.

    1. 1

      Oh, I don't have much data in this niche. Seems like you're in a "reactive" niche so doing channels where people type something (i.e. Google organic/AdWords) will make sense. Have you tried search engines like Bing/DuckDuckGo?

      Also pay attention at YouTube Shorts (they'll launch in the US in March and people are already reporting some wild results with them), as well is IG Reels. I also did a post on Google Web Stories (in one of my acq. channel opportunities posts 2-3 weeks ago) and how one person was able to get some pretty nice results with it.

      Still, I'm really not familiar with this niche :/ Feel free to DM me on Twitter with more info if you want me to take a deeper look at this.

  3. 1

    Darko, thnx again! That twitter bio app might be a game-changer.

    1. 2

      Yeah, was surprised how often some people seem to change their Twitter bios.

  4. 1

    Pinterest as big as TikTok was a revelation!
    I wonder whats your take on Clubhouse as an opportunity platform to connect with people that could potentially have need for your/a solution you sell! Or maybe a solution that you're just developing.

    1. 1

      Well I'm really not sure. I've talked on one Clubhouse event with 150 viewers, and got a few Twitter DMs and followers, but not many email subscribers (2 or 3 maybe?) So it seems to be great for building your personal brand (Twitter followers, etc). Still this is just one experience, would be interesting to read more experiences of IHers here.

  5. 1

    Interesting, thank you for sharing

    1. 1

      Glad you liked it :)

      1. 1

        I'm reading right now your ebook, good stuff here!

        1. 1

          Glad you liked it, hope to come up with an enhanced version of it somewhere this year.

  6. 1

    Thanks for sharing 1. makes total sense 🤙

    1. 1

      Thanks, which of these 3 do you think are most relevant to your business?

      1. 1

        I'd say (1) but you never know what might come in handy 😁

  7. 1

    pure gold this first one!!!
    What's your opinion on Microsoft approaching Pinterest for a potential acquisition? How will that change the SMM landscape in the US?
    Keep it up Darko!
    cheers

    1. 1

      I hope it doesn't happen :))

  8. 1

    This might be an unpopular opinion, but I'm noticing that almost every acquisition channel where females are the primary audience is "under-utilized". Maybe because there are less women entrepreneurs than men, so on these channels, demand > supply. We guys don't hang out on places like Pinterest or Etsy. Which is great if you're a woman entrepreneur and you're targeting other women IMO.

  9. 1

    Instagram is literally saying f* you to people posting posts and promoting Reels like crazy. I'm seeing Clubhouse rooms talking about it all the time.

    1. 1

      Own your channels.

      1. 1

        You mean, try to migrate people from a rented channel to owned? You can't get much new users if you start from an email list.

    2. 1

      Same here. Seems like they've taken TikTok's competition quite seriously.

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