Madalyn Sklar

Using Twitter to Grow your Reach

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Most brands on Twitter only want one thing: to grow their reach and attract a new audience. Though it sounds simple, it’s far from reality. Every day we see so many new and upcoming brands trying to decode Twitter, and not always succeeding. So what’re they doing wrong? This week on the chat, we invited science teacher and podcaster, Jason Zackowski to talk about how brands can use Twitter to grow their reach. A #TwitterSmarter regular himself, Jason manages the Bunsen and Beaker brand handle on Twitter. Over the last several years, Jason has helped the brand reach hundreds of thousands of Twitter users. He was the perfect candidate for this week’s topic. Here’s a summary of our chat.

Guest: Jason Zackowski
Topic: Using Twitter to grow your reach
Format: Eight questions directed at the guest. Everyone’s welcome to share.

Q1: What’s the best way to streamline content generation?

Everyone’s lifestyle and work schedules are different. Our guest, for example, told us that on a typical workday, he only gets a couple of hours to organize social media content for the next few days. It’s important to note that what works for one person may not work for everyone. For instance, as Jason explained, he used to try and prepare social content earlier in the day, but it wasn’t as effective as he wanted. This is why it’s crucial to experiment with your content planning and strategy to find a routine and rhythm that works best for you and your brand.

Jason also told us he allocates time on Saturdays to come up with Twitter threads—two brand relevant threads and another that shows off the brand’s personality. In Jason’s case, these threads also serve as scripts and ideas for well-performing TikTok content. It’s a great way to repurpose your content across different social platforms.

Rebbetzin told us about her spreadsheet of ideas and social media content plan—something many of us can relate to. It’s a handy way to track your plans and progress, but as Rebbetzin also pointed out, sometimes the best content ideas are spontaneous. Try and find a balance between the two.

Q2: Name some tools that can help with content streamlining.

Jason vouched for Hypefury.

He also shared a few tips for using Hypefury. If you paste a document full of content on the tool, it’ll automatically convert it into a Twitter thread, complete with a finisher. You can then customize it to suit your branding. The tool also allows you to set criteria for each of your tweets and has a great reoccurring posts scheduler. Give it a shot.

Our friends from VirtuDesk tagged a whole bunch of other tools such as ClickUp, Asana, Trello, SEMRush, eclincher, and Hootsuite. All of these tools can help you throughout the content planning and strategy processes.

Other community favorites included Canva, LatelyAI, Notion, Agorapulse, Camtasia, and of course, TweetDeck.

Q3: How can you hack the Twitter algorithm to grow your account?

Our guest’s advice is to actively encourage engagement. A tweet shows up on the feed more if and when it gets a lot of replies. For the Bunsen and Beaker brand, our guest shares tweets with open-ended questions or calls to action so that more and more people would want to reply to the tweet.

Lance‘s tip was to observe what others are doing and replicate whatever they do well. If you’re inspired or influenced by someone else’s idea, give credit where it’s due. Identify well-performing, relevant hashtags, and incorporate them into your own tweets.

Q4: What can you do to increase engagement and follower count?

Unless you accidentally go viral or are a meme site, chances are you won’t see overnight growth. Growing your reach on Twitter is painstakingly slow work. It requires a lot of attention to detail and listening skills. As our guest suggested, focus on posting what people want to hear from you. Run a poll if you’re not sure. Ask your audience directly. Experiment. Post all forms of content and consistently engage with your audience.

Jason told us he identified the brand’s most popular type of post. He then created a series of those posts and scheduled them as re-occurring so that Hypefury, the tool he uses, will continue to recycle those posts for a long time. That way, Jason ensured that the audience gets what they want, while also giving him more time to focus on other content.

Madalyn reiterated the importance of showing up consistently. Although it’s helpful to automate most of your content, your account won’t grow unless you’re engaging with your audience regularly and genuinely. Post helpful content and stick around.

Q5: What are some of the best-kept secrets of Twitter?

Twitter Blue, according to Jason. He told us how the premium option allows you to categorize your tweets into folders so you can find and reuse them quickly.

If you host a Twitter Space, encourage more people to join you as speakers. That way, the followers of all your speakers will get notifications, giving you and your space a broader reach. A great way to get speakers without diluting the purpose of your space is to start with an ice-breaker question and invite people to respond, as Jason said.

It’s also worth keeping an eye on what’s trending and whether it’s relevant to your brand. If it is, then ride the wave. If it’s not, don’t force it. Wait for your turn—your wave will come.

Twitter’s free analytics is comprehensive and a bit underrated, as Lance pointed out. You’ll see a 28-day summary of your activities on Twitter, including details of your popular tweets, profile visits, and engagements.

Q6: What can you do to take your Spaces show to the next level?

Jason gave us three great tips: Let your audience determine the course of your spaces show. Involve them when deciding what content to create, and encourage them to engage with you during your space. Second, come up with cool prizes and work with sponsors to deliver them. Your sponsors will love the engagement and they’ll always be willing to return the favor. Third, record your space and repurpose it as a video or a podcast.

Madalyn shared a few of her top tips. Invite guest speakers to your space. They will promote your space to their audience, and help you reach newer audiences. Be consistent as well. Madalyn does three spaces every week, apart from the other things she consistently does on Twitter. But it’s also important to pace yourself. Before you dive into doing multiple spaces, make sure you have the capacity to handle that. You don’t want to start too many spaces enthusiastically and burn out too soon.

Q7: How can you use AI to generate content effectively?

You’ve likely heard of ChatGPT by now. If you haven’t, give it a try. It’s an interesting way to use AI to generate content ideas. You can sign up for free and start by asking the AI any question you want. As Jason explained, it’s not perfect, but it’s a brilliant way to get your ideas and first drafts down. You can then use what it’s offered, and give it a human touch.

Jason also told us about his ChatGPT use case. He was looking for ideas for what kind of advice a dog would offer humans. The AI spew out a list, and that became a good starting point for tweets.

As our friends from VirtuDesk pointed out, you can also use language and grammar checkers like Grammarly and Hemingwayapp. They’re not perfect either, but they’re handy.

Q8: Are ‘good morning’ and ‘good night’ tweets important?

Subjective. Not every brand needs to do ‘good morning’ and ‘good night’ tweets. In fact, it can even get annoying if such tweets aren’t overly relevant to the brand and its personality. That said, for the Bunsen and Beaker brand, they make a lot of sense. As Jason pointed out, his primary focus is to make the brand the first and last thing North Americans see on Twitter on any given day. He has clearly defined his target audience.

For others, like Pavel, such tweets aren’t relevant because his audience is in different time zones. If you cater to an audience across the globe, ‘good morning’ and ‘good night’ tweets may not be the best idea for your brand.

Well folks, that’s all from me this week. Thanks for reading through and for more great insights from our chat with Jason, have a look at this Twitter thread. If you like this summary, you’ll love the real-time chat. Join us next Thursday at 1 pm ET for #TwitterSmarter. We also have an after-chat on Twitter Spaces at 5 pm ET. See you there!

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About me, Narmadhaa:

I write all the things—marketing stuff to pay the bills; haiku and short stories so I feel wholesome. A social media enthusiast, I hang out with the #TwitterSmarter chat crew, and am always happy to take on writing gigs.

Say hello: The Opinionated Copywriter | LinkedIn | Twitter

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