Proof that Twitter IS Useful as a Niche Marketing Tool!
April 6th, 2009 | 45 comments
Just a quick post to show some really cool stats and to introduce a technique I’m using to actually promote one of my hobby sites primarily through Twitter!
As you know, Twitter is widely recognized as a powerful networking tool. It isn’t a direct traffic or sale generator in most cases, but as I explained the other day, Twitter could have direct sale/lead/traffic generation potential!
In that post I didn’t mention a current “case study” (I guess you could say) I’ve been doing with a Geocaching hobby blog of mine. A little while back I thought of a way in which I saw (in my head) Twitter as being a powerful traffic generator.
So I spent about an hour implementing it and so far I’ve accomplished the following directly from Twitter:
1. 69 unique visitors directly from Twitter (See screenshot below.)
2. An upcoming interview with the IndyStar (a very large Newspaper publication in Indianapolis.)
3. $20.75 in sales through the phpBayPro shop I have on the blog.
4. Found and got acquainted with a Geocaching shop owner who is going to set up a custom affiliate program just for me!
5. Received at least one blogroll link from another Twitter user, who geocaches and owns a geocaching blog!
None of that is extremely impressive until you consider the amount of time and effort I’ve put into that twitter account, which you can see at http://twitter.com/MadCacher.
Here’s what I did
I created about 10 random Tweets about Geocaching then I went to Twitter Search, did a search for “Geocaching” (without quotes) and for about 1 hour I added every person who mentioned Geocaching.
After that I just updated with questions every now and then… updated when I went out and found some geocaches etc. The traffic came mostly through the link in my bio… in other words I probably could have plugged my blog a bit more and drove more traffic! But I’m trying to build authority and trust in this niche, so I don’t plug my site too often.
As you can see, I only have 92 updates at the time of writing and each update takes about 20 seconds, so the time investment is very minimal, especially when it’s in a niche I love talking about.
I invested a total of about 90 minutes in that Twitter account. So, is 90 minutes worth 69 unique visitors, an interview with a big newspaper, which WILL indirectly drive much more traffic and exposure, $20 in sales (so far,) at least one sitewide link pointing to my blog and a custom affiliate program set up just for you? I know my answer!
Will this work in ANY niche? I seriously doubt it! Twitter users tend to be more technically inclined (Geocaching is a GPS game,) so if you go searching for people talking about vacuum cleaners you probably won’t get very good results.
BUT if you’re open minded about Twitter in general, I think you’ll find that it has far more benefits than just networking!
img credit: splorp
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6th April, 2009 at 3:51 pm
Wow, Josh. This is really cool. Thanks for sharing the result.
Regarding whether or not this works for your niche, I guess you can easily determine that with a quick search, right? If you search for “elvis bobbleheads” and you see lots of tweets about that, then I guess you can apply this, right?
Very interesting ideas here. Thanks again.
6th April, 2009 at 3:51 pm
Excellent idea Josh. Twitter is just another way to get traffic and customers if you do it right. I think it’s also a work that can easily be outsourced.
Gunter
6th April, 2009 at 3:53 pm
Josh this is awesome
…. I really need to start using twitter a little more… I have tried but I get bored with it very quickly!
6th April, 2009 at 3:55 pm
That is very very cool. I have been thinking about how to use twitter to my advantage and this will help me out alot.
I think many people use twitter all wrong and try to force themselves down peoples throats, you method is much better and so simple i wish i would have thought of it!
6th April, 2009 at 3:58 pm
Hey Josh,
I have used this. It has become pretty effective and people are pretty keen to get involved with re-tweeting. After just checking analytics I can see it is the 5th largest traffic source.
6th April, 2009 at 4:02 pm
Great post as always, Josh. I really need to pay more attention to Twitter. Thanks for the reminder.
6th April, 2009 at 4:05 pm
Crap, now I have to (and I do have to) go out and learn about another piece of technology. Thanks Josh
6th April, 2009 at 4:06 pm
Not bad at all, Josh. It gives me an idea on applying this strategy to a few of my niche blogs.
6th April, 2009 at 4:24 pm
I’ve been secretly watching your blog now for awhile. This is my first comment…
I have to agree with Josh, that Twitter is more beneficial with those that have sites that are technical in nature.
Flowers and candy probably won’t do well.
6th April, 2009 at 4:27 pm
@ Mark Mason – Yep, very true… a quick search will tell you.
@ the other Mark – Thanks for the support. True, but at the same time techies still go fishing, eat candy, own shoes etc. etc. etc. Just do a search on Twitter for your niche and see if people are talking about. If they are then you can certainly do this.
6th April, 2009 at 4:31 pm
Josh, these are great results for the time you spent hanging out on your twitter profile.
Whenever I make time to participate on Twitter, I usually get a few leads to my business which is exciting.
Some people really have no idea how powerful Twitter can be. If they are disciplined enough, just dedicating a few hours a week offering valuable tweets will give them great results such as yours.
6th April, 2009 at 4:54 pm
Thanks for sharing your case study – I love seeing information on actual results, not just a wild-a** guess!
I’m going to try this with one of my niche sites – I’ll let you know how it works.
Steve
6th April, 2009 at 5:02 pm
Josh you’re right man! I was just explaining this to someone last week. Twitter is awesome for niche networking, and the search tools are outstanding.
I use it for most of my niche stuff, but it definitely takes the right niche, stuff that is more hobby related tends to do well, as well as actual career stuff.
Like you said, not sure how well vacuums would work but it’s worth a try!
good post dude.
6th April, 2009 at 6:08 pm
I hope this is the right format to ask this question – I’m still very new at twitter. I started following your Geocaching twitter, but as I look at the geocaching updates, all I see is your side of the conversation. It’s like listening to someone talk on a telephone – you only get half of what’s being said. Is there an easy way to get both sides of the conversations – see your questions and see the replies? I’m poking around but it doesn’t seem very obvious. Thanks!
Thanks for the post, still trying to perceive the value of twitter, it’ll sink in one day…
– Tony
6th April, 2009 at 6:15 pm
Hey Josh,
Thanks for sharing…
I didn’t know that Geocaching existed….sounds fascinating.
Do you know if there are any Geocaching addicts in South Africa?
Regards
Greg
6th April, 2009 at 6:31 pm
I tweeted your blog post, because it seemed like the thing to do.
6th April, 2009 at 6:57 pm
Hi Josh,
Thanks for the info on Twitter. I really should get involved in this but I just haven’t been able to justify spending a bunch of time reading blurbs of other people’s lives. I see now that you really need to niche-ify your tweeting and your audience. It is starting to make sense.
6th April, 2009 at 7:06 pm
Hi Josh,
Liked your case study, so much that I ended up reading the posts to figure out what exactly you were talking about.
Loved the theme too. looks perfect.
p.s:You had misspelt “releaving” at http://www.madcacher.com/geocaching-beginners/what-is-geo-caching/
6th April, 2009 at 8:18 pm
Great results Josh.
I agree with you that Twitter is great for some niches (deals seem to work really well for me) But not others i.e vacuum cleaners….no luck there
Thanks for the info, I’ve got some searching to do.
Steve
6th April, 2009 at 9:11 pm
Thanks for this Josh. I’ve been umming and ahhing about joining Twitter for a few days now and this may just swing the balance…
6th April, 2009 at 9:13 pm
If you open a new Twitter account for every niche, I guess your strategy could work well. However if you use one account only, just to show huge amounts of followers, I think that tweets “get lost” in the noise that eveyone is making. BTW today was the first time Twitter did not let me log in because it was “too busy” with too many tweets goign on at the same time ?!?
6th April, 2009 at 9:46 pm
ACK! I can’t stop playing with this twitter thing — OK, *NOW* I get it – once I found a topic I was truly interested, I couldn’t stop clicking…
I think that “server busy” thing was me clicking around too much. Sorry…
– Tony
6th April, 2009 at 9:59 pm
Hi Josh,
Well, you learn something everyday and not necessarily about internet marketing!
Geocaching, very interesting sport/hobby, can see how it could become quite addictive. Great “case study” with Twitter, goes to show the sky’s the limit, well, maybe not for vacuum cleaners.
Suellen
6th April, 2009 at 11:43 pm
That’s brilliant! I am not an “Internet Marketer” in the traditional sense of the word. I have an online marketing firm for my business clients.
However, I’ve always found the best online marketing ideas to steal (no offense) from Internet Marketers. And most of the best ideas that are applicable or adaptable to more traditional businesses come from you and Terry Dean.
Thanks for all the help.
6th April, 2009 at 11:54 pm
Not having had time to investigate Twitter yet, I’m wondering, is this the type of thing that needs constant maintenance?
If you were to stop taking the time to post on Twitter, would you also stop receiving traffic as a result?
Are your posts indexed in the search engines, too, like Yahoo Answers or is it strictly a Twitter community thing?
I get the feeling I ‘should’ be using Twitter because ‘everyone else’ is, but I’m not sure if now is a good time to add something to my schedule that is going to need regular upkeep.
7th April, 2009 at 12:30 am
Good grief! I knew nothing about geocaching, so I figured it was some coastal fad from far east or far west.
But I went to the site and found many, many caches within 30 miles of my house. Now I’ll have to have friend-husband lend me his GPS. It’s only been used for farm work at this point. I think it needs a little recreation, too.
7th April, 2009 at 3:06 am
Geo caching sounds like fun, I have a niece and her husband that are adicted. It is great that you can turn a new hobby into a making money operation.
Rick
7th April, 2009 at 4:17 am
Awesome Josh.
Thinking out of the box is where many fail…
Franck
7th April, 2009 at 8:51 am
I agree with the comment about multiple Twitter accounts. It seems like what you suggest has potential, but your tweets will get diluted and probably lose effectiveness is you cover to much ground with one account.
7th April, 2009 at 5:53 pm
Thanks for that post. How long do you think I should spend time tweeting initially as a marketing tool?
8th April, 2009 at 1:42 am
This has got me thinking. I never thought of approaching Twitter in just this way. In fact, I’ve been a little anti-twitter lately, but this is showing some real good application.
I use Facebook, so I find it tedious to have to maintain my status and tweets, so I’ve just been sticking with facebook.
I’ll have to give this a try.
Jonathan
8th April, 2009 at 2:47 am
I don’t know Josh…this sound like alot of work for soooo a few vistors etc….Especially from someone who cares nothing about geocaching!
Paul
8th April, 2009 at 4:18 am
Josh,
your posts on Twitter have been so helpful lately. I noticed that with this test you set up a separate account for the mini-site. That seems like a sensible thing to do. Mixing it up too much would just dilute the audienc.e
8th April, 2009 at 5:57 am
Very interesting case study and proof that twitter can indeed by useful as a niche marketing tool. Even though my people will beg to disagree, you have strong proof here showing that you are right. Interesting indeed. I have to agree with you and I think it’s time to get twitting. Thanks for this interesting and revealing case study once again. So – all those twitter sitters on the fence, it’s time to start twitting (or is it twittering,
)
8th April, 2009 at 11:25 pm
Here’s a related tip that you might like. Tweetdeck allows you to set up columns – one for those you follow like you get on the traditional Twitter site, and then you can create a column next to that on your search term. So you could set up a column that would pull in all of the “geocaching” tweets. Good stuff – especially when you’re trying to see what people are talking about or looking for in your niche.
9th April, 2009 at 10:24 pm
It seems a lot of people agree with this. I may as well give it a try twitter.
10th April, 2009 at 8:18 am
Please delete my comments from the above. I wonder why you left the comment but removed the backlink. I didn’t leave a spammy comment but took my time to read your post and leave a comment, so why did you remove my backlink? Please delete the entire post if you won’t leave the backlink.
10th April, 2009 at 1:03 pm
@ Prostate – Don’t wonder, just read the comment policy and you’ll know for sure.
@ online money – you may want to read it as well.
http://www.ethicalim.com/comment-policy/
10th April, 2009 at 1:17 pm
Bridget: Thanks for the info on Tweetdeck – that was a great tool. I also found I could set up a column for “Tweeters” that I really like. I now have one column for everyone that I follow that moves by very quickly (like snatching conversations at the airport on your way to a plane) and one that I can focus on more carefully (like hanging out with them at a coffee shop.)
Also, I discovered that changing my “@replies” option of the Settings|Notices tab to “all @replies” allows me to view more of someone’s conversation. That gave me a lot more insight into the conversation taking place with others for someone that I’m following. I got a few great article ideas that way.
– Tony
10th April, 2009 at 5:45 pm
@ Tony Tester – If the tweet was a reply to someone elses tweet, you’ll see a link “in reply to…” beneath it. Click that and you’ll see the tweet that was replied to.
@ Greg – Its fun
I’m sure there are… there are geocaches hidden all over the world! There are probably several within a mile or two of you!
@ REP – Thanks, greatly appreciated.
@ Chris – Thanks, I went to that post and noticed I had misspelled many other words too
@ Meirav – Of course you would want to open a new account for each niche.
@ Angie – Twitter is a networking tool, so if you stopped using it, it would not be every beneficial. Tweets are indexed in Google though.
Twitter takes very little time. It takes about 30 seconds to post a new tweek. Do that a couple times a day and the total time investment is 1 minute.
@ Judith – lol yep, they’re everywhere!
@ Charlie – I never suggested someone should use the same twitter account for multiple niches… of course you need a new account for each niche. It takes about 1 minute to create a new account, so not sure how that is an issue.
@ Amulekone – Just update your Twitter status a couple times a day and think of it as a networking tool.
@ Paul – ok, then don’t do it
I’m not twisting your arm.
14th April, 2009 at 2:35 pm
Twitter is one of the biggest sources for getting extremely relevant traffic because of its following theory. You would follow someone related to your niche and would someday visit their site which gets them relevant traffic.
So simply, your post says the truth and I use Twitter for getting relevant traffic related to my niche and they convert very well too.
Good post.
Regards
Laksh
15th April, 2009 at 6:03 pm
That post was awesome Josh, thank you.
I will look into this strategy and use it for my website. Will give you feedbacks as soon as it starts rolling.
thanks again
22nd April, 2009 at 11:35 pm
Josh,
It seems like Twitter is full of people marketing one thing or another. The idea that I have found so far to get enough followers is to be more social at first, gaining trust among your followers as somebody who is interesting and can provide valuable insights to a variety of issues. Once you become more established as more than just a continually pushy ad writer (boring!) you can slipping in a tweet or two with a link to your site or blog to draw followers in.
Bob W.
24th April, 2009 at 2:42 pm
twitter is like an online business universal chat room
6th May, 2009 at 5:35 pm
I’m sure that the comments about twitter were not addressed to me directly, But since I’ve always been confused about it, I’m thankful to find them here. THANKS A MILLION!