Twitter’s CT Bans should scare you. Here’s how I’m defending against them.
Relying solely on Twitter is the biggest risk as a creator.
One change is all it takes for our audience to vanish overnight:
Algorithm tweaks
Twitter suspending our account without warning
Suddenly, the entire audience you’ve built becomes completely useless.
No matter how many followers you have:
There’s no point if you can’t reach them.
This is exactly what happened to @crypto__kermit when his account was suspended in May:
And what’s even worse is how Twitter won’t accept your appeal.
(Even if you’re a paying customer).
A wave of suspensions is happening right now for accounts that only post crypto-related content.
This gave me a big wake up call that I could lose everything I’ve built over the past 2 years.
It’s a good thing that I started this pivot last week, and there are 4 options I considered.
Here’s my take on which is best for you:
Telegram
I started a Telegram channel right from the start of my creator journey:
I saw the need to de-platform my audience, and saw many creators using Telegram.
Though most that I’ve followed at the start were all part of Ardizor’s cabal (lol).
Telegram is great to get extra eyeballs on my content, and it doesn’t rely on any algorithms either.
One more bonus is being able to get some ad revenue based on impressions:
I’ve earned a small amount of TON from my posts, but I don’t want to spam on my channel just for the ads:
So I’d wait for those big posts before sharing.
But Telegram alone is not enough, so I’ve explored other options too:
Decentralised socials (Farcaster/Lens)
I’m still on the fence with this, as I have no motivation to post more on these platforms.
Farcaster could likely reward you for being active, but I’m being fed tons of typical airdrop posts.
Maybe it’s because they associated my account with airdrops:
So the algo is feeding me with airdrop-related content.
And I’m too lazy to train another algo to serve me what I want to see.
The airdrop channel is pretty spammy and I’m not getting much discoverability.
Hey (on Lens) is not much different and I’m barely getting any engagement there too.
There’s not much content discovery, and I can’t see anything on my For You page.
In this current state, I don’t see decentralised socials as a viable alternative.
But if @typefully integrates the Farcaster or Lens API:
I could start posting more content there.
Since I’ve already scheduled all of my Twitter posts with Typefully.
I started building out another traffic source, but it hasn’t been working out yet:
Email list
The common Web2 advice for anyone who wants to grow an audience:
Build up an email list.
So I decided to try that, but with varied results:
I created multiple lead magnets, and they’ve helped me build a decent number of subscribers.
But I just didn’t have the motivation to write emails daily (or even weekly).
I’m paying for a ConvertKit subscription too, and I feel it’s a waste right now.
Especially since I’m pivoting away from lead magnets and more towards long-form content.
This changed the game for me when I realised how I could combine email with content discovery:
Substack
I decided to lean into Substack because it combines the best of these factors:
Content discovery with Notes (short-form)
Sending long-form posts through email
Substack’s Notes feature lets me send mini posts that I can repurpose from my tweets.
This helps me get seen on the timeline (beyond just my long-form posts).
And here’s what I like the most about Substack:
It has less noise than Twitter (no thanks to InfoFi), and the competition is way lower.
So as an early adopter, the algo could promote our Notes to a wider audience (vs Twitter).
I’m barely getting any engagement with my posts, but I believe they’ll eventually come once more people shift away from Twitter to Substack.
At the same time, I can write long-form posts that are shared with my audience by email.
There’s no algo that I need to worry about, except for getting my emails out of the junk mail.
And even if Substack closes down or suspends my account:
I still have access to an email list of all my subscribers that I can communicate with.
This is why I decided to use this strategy to convert my readers to Substack:
Write long-form posts first on Substack
Repurpose as an Article on Twitter one week later
This gives my Substack subscribers early access to my posts, which entices them to subscribe.
While my Articles still get seen by my Twitter audience which increases the distribution of my posts.
So I'm able to convert more of my followers to Substack.
And this change in strategy helped me gain 50 new subscribers in the past week.
It’s not much, but I plan to promote my Substack harder to convert more of my audience from Twitter.
Relying just on Twitter is a death sentence
No one is safe from Twitter bans.
Anyone can be suspended at any time, so it’s better to diversify our audience.
So here’s my strategy:
Content discovery through Twitter
Convert my followers to subscribers on both Substack and Telegram
My strategy for Substack is still new, and I’ll share more results over the coming weeks/months.
Twitter is still great at being discovered, but I can’t rely on it forever.
De-platforming is the only way to retain the audience we’ve worked so hard to build.
Whenever you’re ready, there are 2 ways I can help you:
Audience to Airdrop: Steal my playbook to build trust fast and earn social airdrops
Secure Airdrop Hunter: My flagship Web3 security course, learn how to protect your assets and onchain footprint while stopping hackers from draining your funds