Cryptalker

There is no such thing as too much publicity, if you ask me. Not when you are trying to put your ideas and products out there, anyway. Out of all the ways to do that, Telegram marketing is relatively new. And there’s a lot of potential too.

“What’s so promising about it?” you might ask. Well, for starters, it’s not oversaturated and has a simple functionality. And it grows at warp speed.

When it comes to the subject of cryptocurrency and all things related, you know how important it is to get that audience. Telegram might just be the platform you need.

But why? And how? And is it really worth it? Well, buckle up and let’s get down to the nitty-gritty of the problem in hand.

Telegram Benefits for Crypto Projects

Here’s the thing. I could go on all day about how amazing the platform is but it might appear as somewhat disingenuous if I don’t mention the pitfalls:

• it’s not a good place to start. If you never ever tried to promote your product via any existing platform, don’t make Telegram your first choice. The reason is it doesn’t have any built-in advertising tools. This will make you struggle to get every hundred of subs, leave alone every thousand,
• Telegram marketing only makes sense if there’s a chance of finding a large target audience online. More often than not, that’s not a big issue for cryptocurrency projects. They always attract quite a bit of attention. But on the flip side, here lies the next pitfall,
• it’s difficult to make your channel stand out in an environment oversaturated by the channels covering the same topic. To stay afloat in the sea of competitors, you often have to bend over backwards to win those viewers.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not trying to take the wind out of your sails. This platform still has a lot of promise, if you know how to do it right. You just need to see it as the next step on your way up. An added opportunity to increase your audience. And here is how it can help you:

1. Telegram is the most fast-growing platform.

Compared to its direct competitors (such as WhatsApp, WeChat, Snapchat, and others) and social media in general, its userbase grows at a tremendous pace.

2. Extended functionality.

In terms of functionality and tools to connect with your audience, this messenger delivers like no other. Bots, channels, group chats, comprehensive data analytics services, what have you. It doesn’t hurt to mention cool sticker packs that are absolutely free of charge.

3. It’s relatively new.

Unlike social media giants like Facebook or Instagram, it’s not overflowing with ads. There’s not so much of that pesky ad fatigue. This means that when you advertise your channel, you are likely to get more views.

This list of benefits is far from exhaustive, mind you. Odds are you’ll find more as you work on your Telegram marketing project.

First Steps

Where do we start? No doubt, you’ll find plenty of opportunities to be original when your channel is up and running. But right now we’ll start at the beginning.

1. Create a Telegram account

Don’t worry, this won’t take more than 5 minutes of your life. Go to https://telegram.org/ and choose the version you’d like to download.

After that click on the “Get Telegram for Windows” button to download the setup file to your computer. Alternatively, you can go to the App Store (Play Market) on your mobile device and download the application from there.

Following simple instructions, install the application on your computer.

2. Add contacts

Now that you have an active account, you can start adding contacts. That’s even easier and faster to do. Just click on that “New contact” link on the left and then search for contacts by their name or phone number:

Or you can click on the main menu icon (it’s up there, in the top left corner):

Then choose “Contacts”:

3. Create a Telegram channel

Now that you have an account, it’s time to start that new cryptocurrency channel. There’s nothing complicated about that either.

Step 1: Remember that main menu icon in the top left corner? Yes, that’s the one you’ll have to click on again. But this time, select “New Channel”:

Step 2: Choose a good name for your channel and add some description, if necessary:

Step 3: Now choose its status (you want it to be public, of course) and a proper name for the channel’s link. Now hit “Save”:

Step 4: Now all you have to do is invite some new members. They can be your friends, people from your phone contact list, your Facebook acquaintances:

NB: keep in mind that you can only add up to 200 subs this way.

4. Add your channel to online Telegram channel catalogs

Let me get this straight. It’s unlikely that this is where the majority of your subscribers will come from. You might ask “why bother then?” and be tempted to forget about this step altogether, I know.

I’d still recommend that you do that, though. It’s true that all these listings and catalogs don’t send many subs your way, if any at all. But by adding your channel to as many listings as you can, you make search engines notice it and add it to search results here and there.

And since it’s search engines we are aiming at, be sure to add nice and concise descriptions. Don’t be shy to use keywords.

Proven Marketing Tactics

Are you ready? If you are not excited at this point, you should be. We are getting to the meat of the matter and nothing can stop you now.

So you are finally a proud owner of the cryptocurrency Telegram channel. You probably added some members. Started posting some incredibly compelling content. But most likely, the number of subscribers is not nearly close to the numbers you see in your mind’s eye.

This is where you start thinking of marketing tactics, ways to promote your channel to a larger audience. The good news is there are quite a few methods to market your channel. The bad news is it will take some time, effort and probably money. But it’s not that you weren’t prepared for it, right?

Speaking of money. While paid advertising always makes sense (and seems like an easier option), don’t underrate the efficiency of tactics that won’t cost you anything at all. They can prove to be just as reliable in the long run.

So let’s see what basic ways to promote your channel are there, shall we?

Free marketing methods

1. Use other platforms to promote your channel. Your website(s), social media, discussion boards and forums, blogs, anything. This doesn’t mean that you have to just mindlessly stick that link wherever possible. Create a piece of content that happens to have a link to your channel and that will make people want to visit and hopefully subscribe.
2. Cross-promotion. This is a sort of a quid pro quo arrangement you make with another channel. They advertise your channel on theirs, you advertise your channel on yours. Here’s a tip for you: when you reach out to owners of other channels, try to establish a relationship that will work for both of you long-term. This might be greatly beneficial, much more so than a one-time arrangement.
3. Online catalogs and listings. This is something I already mentioned. Again, while this method will hardly attract massive audiences, it creates some nice online presence.

Paid marketing methods

• Buy ads. Now there are a few recommendations I’d like to offer:
• • • think well of your ad content before you do this. An unimaginative, standardized to the point of being boring, badly spelled and composed ad will scare off potential subs. Even if your cryptocurrency wisdom is what they live for.
    • no matter how tempting it is to advertise on big channels with massive membership, don’t do that while your channel is still small. First of all, because it will likely cost you arm and leg. Second of all, because subscribers of Telegram giants are rarely interested in smaller channels.
    • be very careful about who you contact to set up ad campaigns. There is a chance you can come across some scammers who are after your hard-earned money.
• Join contests or promotion campaigns launched by other crypto channels as a sponsor. These events are not uncommon for cryptocurrency channels, which means you will often have a chance to advertise yourself. Inquire channel owners about partnership and participation options and give it a go.
• Use paid services designed specifically for advertising Telegram channels for money.

Now with that out of the way, let’s have a closer look at specific options for Telegram marketing.

Telegram Channel Directories

And we are back to channel catalogs and listings, aka directories. These websites aggregate channels, bots, and groups available at the moment. They also offer some statistics on the entries, as well as some information on what kind of content you can find there.

Why are they important? Well, first of all, they can help you analyze data and dynamics of other cryptocurrency channels. When Telegram’s in-built search might be problematic, using directories is a great asset.

Second of all, they enhance your channel’s online presence. Besides, it won’t cost you anything and won’t take much time.

Here are a few directories you can use:

1. https://telegramchannels.me/

This is probably one of the biggest catalogs of channels, bots, and groups on the web. It features a user-friendly interface and a nice in-built search engine. There are over 500 bots, groups, and channels related to the Cryptocurrency topic at the moment.

2. https://en.tgstat.com/

Another fairly large directory. What I like about it is you can tweak your search options for more relevant results.

3. https://telegramcatalog.com/en/channels

A smaller directory with only over 70 Cryptocurrency channels on display.

Chances are you’ll find more of these. It makes sense to make use of as many of them as you can. Unless you can see a directory that’s at its last breath.

Airdrops

When it comes to Telegram, there is always an option of buying subscribers. It’s when you pay a certain amount of money to a certain number of people to subscribe to your channel.
Now I’m sure you can see all the downsides of this method. While it does guarantee some inflow of subs, the benefits are minimal. This kind of subscribers aren’t interested in your channel, they won’t take part in any of your events and won’t pay much attention to your content. And let’s admit it, they’ll likely unsubscribe after a short while.

Here’s the great news: as an owner of a cryptocurrency channel, you can use airdrops! This will both maintain your subs’ interest on a decent level and attract new members curious about your project.

In simple terms, crypto airdrops is a cryptocurrency giveaway event. That is, you share some tokens with lots of cryptocurrency wallets as a kind of a freebie. Why would you do that? Well, to increase awareness about your project, of course!

Unlike the very flawed method of paying for disinterested subscribers, airdrops create a very enthusiastic member base. What’s more, they allow connecting with your audience on a deeper level and pump up their involvement in your projects.

Bounty Programs

Every crypto channel is only as strong as its community. If you do not plan to reach out to people and/or engage them in events, programs, and activities, you might as well forget about starting a Telegram channel.

Bounty programs (aka referral programs or partnership programs) are all about giving your subs a strong incentive to put the word out on your project and all its nice perks. And what is the strongest incentive ever? That’s right, money. Well, in your case, it’s tokens.

Bounty programs are a great tool to motivate people to subscribe to your channel, to invite more members, to take part in certain activities.

Here’s an example of a bounty program by ProBit. Note the list of activities members have to participate in to win tokens:

Source
Make sure that you spread the word about your bounty programs wherever you can: your Telegram channel, your website, or social media.

Paid Ads

When it comes to cryptocurrency and all that jazz, advertising is a tricky subject. Because crypto marketing got way too attractive to all kinds of scammers, cryptocurrency advertising is now banned on the biggest online platforms.

This might mean that you’ll have to resort to unthinkable jugglery in order to make your cryptocurrency ads not look like cryptocurrency ads. Or, which is a far better choice, post your ads in places where this won’t get you banned for life. Think blogs, Reddit or Telegram itself. Yes, Telegram allows posting paid ads on other channels. That’s a relief and a nice opportunity.

Influencer Marketing

Did you know that people are more willing to learn something new and hear the latest news from social media than standalone blogs and broadcast media? There is no reason why you can’t use this to your benefit. Consider partnering up with YouTube influencers.
Why YouTube? Well, because it’s a massive learning platform with an unparallelled impact on audiences. It’s where people go for all kinds of how-tos, including cryptocurrency tutorials.

Community Outreach

If you want to blow up, look far beyond your channel. The cryptocurrency community is huge and offers massive opportunities. And I don’t just mean the opportunity to promote. Reaching out to wider crypto communities, engaging in communication, offering and requesting feedback is a great chance to learn. Trust me, the knowledge and experience you get will almost instantly prove to be extremely useful.

Where to go? For starters, not too far. Look for crypto-related Telegram groups:

GoodTradingCalls
CryptoSoul Official ENG
Bitbns Community
Tachain
Agate Community

Another great place to touch the real crypto community is subreddits:

CryptoCurrency
CryptoCurrencies
CryptoCurrencyTrading

It would be silly to exclude Facebook as the biggest social media platform:

Cryptocurrency Investing
CRYPTOCURRENCY
Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency

And last but not least, visit the Bitcoin Forum. It’s probably one of the biggest crypto-themed discussion forums out there. So if you are not a complete newbie in all things cryptocurrency-related, odds are you know about it already.

Stickers

It might sound crazy but Telegram stickers are actually a great marketing tool. Anyone can add them and they are absolutely free of charge. More importantly, they can be a great visual representation of your project that’s easy to remember. Especially if you make your own sticker packs.

You don’t have to, though. You can easily use existing packs. For example, this nice
ChangeNOW pack:

Or this equally cute Above the Sky pack:

Or this Mr. Trader pack:

To add the pack you favored, click on one of the links above and hit the “Add to Telegram” button on the left:

You’ll be redirected to your Telegram window and all you’ll have to do is click on “Add Stickers”:

That’s it, your new crypto stickers are in your sticker library now.

Telegram Content Plan and Ideas

I’ll tell you upfront. You might be armed with perfect marketing strategies. Your channel design might be top-notch. But without a proper content plan, your channel will quickly fall apart. Here are some things you have to keep in mind before drawing up a plan:

• Telegram content must be unique and relevant. If all you do is repost stuff from your website and social media, your subscribers will leave,
• Make your posts short and well-structured. On this platform, they don’t really favor longreads. But if a long post is absolutely necessary, you can either divide it into several parts or post it via the Telegra.ph service,
• Think of a compelling visual component for your content. Videos, infographics, pictures,
• Make your channel an interactive experience for your audience, as opposed to a one-sided information dump. Use polls, initiate discussions, ask for feedback,
• Don’t post too often. 1-3 posts a day should do the trick.

Here’s an example of what your content plan might be:

Day 1: promo posts/news on trading, your projects and/or company
Day 2: crypto & investing lifehacks
Day 3: video reviews and ads
Day 4: useful tips, infographics
Day 5: promo campaigns, airdrops, bounty programs
Day 6: requesting feedback, communicating with your members

This should go without saying, but I’ll say it anyway. This is just an example out of the top of my head and you can absolutely come up with what you think is more suitable. It’s up to you whether your channel will be all about in-depth reports and analytics or short updates on trading markets. Or just tasty airdrops, freebies and bounty offers.

And here is an example of what cryptocurrency channel content looks like. This is AlphaTradeZone, one of the biggest cryptocurrency channels to date, if not the biggest. It has over 80 thousand subscribers. They post 2-5 times a day, sometimes repost articles from their website and make their content 100% useful information.

Note the number of views on their posts. They post updates and infographics on a daily basis and promo campaigns at least once a week:

And they have a separate channel for their subs feedback:

Here is a much smaller channel, Deal with a little over 6k subscribers, that still has a decent level of viewership and members engagement. They mostly focus on news and analytics, with some updates and bounty programs from time to time:

Not much of a visual component on this channel:

Still another one, MyBitcoin Cryptocurrency News is, as the name suggests, about news and reports. It has around 24k subscribers, although the amount of views on their posts is lower than what channels above have:

Their posts often feature infographics and pictures and there is some promo content in a form of giveaways and bounty programs. There is a fair amount of posts that allow members to leave comments:

You get the idea. There are more channels out there, so feel free to seek them out! Analyze their content, consider their ways of communicating with their audience and make compelling content based on the data you’ve collected.

Leverage Telegram Bots

Do you know what’s especially great about Telegram? You guessed it, bots. You don’t have to stay glued to your computer/mobile device screen for hours. There are lots of tasks bots will happily perform for you with infallible efficiency. Besides, it’s one of those few places where using bots isn’t frowned upon. If anything, it’s strongly encouraged!

Telegram bots offer some unique options:

• search,
• notifications,
• contacting other users and services,
• schedule updates,
• polling,
• statistics.

and many others.

There are many pre-made bots you can make use of and you can create your own. How awesome is that? Of course, you’ll probably need someone with IT expertise to create a bot that can perform complicated tasks. But you can make more simple bots yourself: the platform does everything to make the process nice and easy for all users.

1. To start, add @BotFather to your contacts. It’s literally the father of all Telegram bots that will lead you through the bot creation experience. Just follow the instructions:



Voila! You’ve named your bot, got a link to it and a special code to control it.

2. Another bot you’d want to check out is @ControllerBot. It’s an absolute must-have for any channel owner. It’s not shy about how great it is:

This multi-functional robot will schedule your posts, monitor your channel stats, add emojis and do many other insanely useful things.

3. If you need to manage your feedback (and you will need that a lot), there are bots for this too. Of course, it depends on what kind of feedback you have in mind.

There is, for example, a @RobomizBot, another multi-functional bot that will be quite handy to you as a channel owner:


Or you can use @LIkeBot to get emoji-based reactions to your posts:

Use @DiscussBot to add comment option to your posts:

Or you can use a very helpful @LivegramBot:

4. Polling is yet another way to get useful feedback. It’s also great for reaching out to your channel members. People love polls and eagerly answer questions and you get valuable information that benefits your channel. It’s a win-win situation.
One of the best polling bots is @VoteBot:


This is just a tiny number of all bots available on the platform. Look for new ones, create your own, use them to enhance your Telegram experience.

Conclusion

As far as the promotion of cryptocurrency projects goes, there are no easy ways. Especially if it’s Telegram we are talking about. It will most likely take a while to grow your channel and build a loyal member base. But if you do everything right and respect your community, the payoff will be worth it.

So if you are still asking yourself “Should I start a Telegram channel?”, ask yourself another question: why not? If nothing else, it will at least be a great learning experience and another step up on your way to the top.