23 {{ upvoteCount | shortNum }}
23 {{ upvoteCount | shortNum }}

Twitter, Automation, User Generated Content and RSS

by Kurt
16 replies

Hey All...

Here's something I've been doing recently that is easy to do and sends me about 50 people a day, pretty much on autopilot...It won't work for everyone, but may give some of you some ideas.

First, I (and Mary Murtha) have a forum that discusses politics, religion, current events, etc.

The forum exports an RSS pheed. Note: Our TOS states that any submissions are given to the public domain, so you can use our pheeds too, if you want.

Next, I created a Twitter account, specifically for this forum.

Then, I went to www.twitterfeed.com and set up an account to take the RSS pheed from our forum and post it automatically to the Twitter account.

So now we have Twitter update multiple times a day with our forum posts, all on autopilot.

Twitter also exports an RSS pheed, so I submit (and ping) both RSS pheeds, the one Twitter makes and the one our forum makes, giving us twice the exposure.

Now, I use Twitter Friend Adder (check for WSO) to add and delete friends. Because the forum is targeted to politics, news, current events, etc, I searched for Twitter accounts of well-known liberals and conservatives, such as Fox News and follow them.

For my IM account, if I follow someone, about 35% follow me back. It isn't that way with this niche, as less than 10% follow me back.

However, by adding them I see in my stats that they are not only checking out my Twitter account, but they also check out my "homepage", which is the forum. This accounts for about half the traffic Twitter sends.

The other half of the traffic comes from people clicking on the links in the updates themselves. I can tell because these links use a redirect like twirl, etc, so they are a different "referrer".

I've had plenty of Twits respond with comments about the comment posted, and they've all been 100% positive.

But I'm not done with the automation and re-using the content...

I use my own mailing list software which let's me use RSS pheeds for the content. I believe aWeber does, also.

So I add my forum RSS pheed to a newsletter that also includes RSS from Yahoo for news and entertainment, as well as a custom RSS pheed I made from Wikepedia content that contains what happend on each day in history.

To recap, the newsletter contains:

1. The newsest posts and comments about topical subjects for the day.

2. Yahoo most popoular news stories for the day

3. Yahoo entertainment news stories of the day

4. "Today in history" from Wikipedia

Again, this is all "self writing" and I never have to write a thing directly.

So, if I or anyone else makes a post on the forum, not only does it update the forum, it also updates Twitter as well as my newsletter, and I don't have to lift a finger.

And, this also gives the forum's readers the option of following the forum using email or Twitter.

We haven't monetized any of this in any way, and use it as a demo for automation, so I'm going to post the URLs so Warriors can visually see what is going on.

You can see the forum at:
http://duelz.com/duelz-debate-forum/

The specific RSS pheed is:
http://duelz.com/external.php?type=RSS2&forumids=2&lastpost=1&nohtm l=0&fulldesc=1

The Twitter account is:
http://twitter.com/duelzcom

Email newsletter:
www.Duelz.com/newsletter.html

If you learn how to automate like this and "repurpose" User Generated Content, you can produce high quality content, 100% on auto-pilot, so instead of spending your time creating content, you can spend that time MARKETING AND PROMOTING.

Again, NONE OF THIS IS MONETIZED!!! It is just a demo of how to use RSS, Twitter and User Generated Content, and prove to everyone that automated content can also be high quality content, as well as demonstrate how to use RSS to syndicate across different media.

If you have questions or comments, I'll try my best to answer any and all...
#automation #content #generated #rss #twitter #user
  • Profile picture of the author Tom B
    Banned
    Friggin awesome post Kurt. I will have to look at doing this for my software marketing forum.

    I really like the newsletter idea. I knew GetResponse had the rss feed but didn't know how you could use them when dealing with the autoresponder.

    Thanks again,
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[432422].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author JayXtreme
    Kurt.. you're a flippin genius...

    I've been messing with a few niche twitter accounts and this is PERFECT for the auto tweeting of my niche blog posts etc.. that type of thing... although I may have to twist the method a little because it is all my own content.. I still think it's kewl...


    Beautiful...

    Thanks

    Peace

    Jay

    p.s. Pheed... love it
    Signature

    Bare Murkage.........

    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[432604].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Kurt
    Thanks Thomas and Jay...

    I forgot to add a few things...Like Twitter has widgets for Facebook, Blogger, MySpace and Typepad, so you can update these accounts also via this automation system. I believe these are flash widgets, so the engines may not be able to follow them, but people can. (Google did announce recently they can now read Flash)

    Also, you can use your "main" RSS pheed to feed your WP blogs, if they are "RSS ready".

    And, I can easily set up my email program to create an html page archive of all my newsletters, for even more "reach".

    So, from this one RSS pheed generated by a forum or blog comments, you can easily set it up to automatically update all the following:
    Twitter
    Email newsletter
    Facebook
    MySpace
    Blogger
    Typepad
    Wordpress
    HTML archive
    (Squidoo)

    Since Squidoo also accepts RSS (although it uses javascript for it), you can also add Squidoo to the list of "auto updates" from your single source.

    Bookmark and submit each resource, and if they generate their own RSS pheed, submit and ping it, and you'll have a good foundation for marketing. You have RSS and ping, SEO, social bookmarking, email "squeeze" and more, all on auto-pilot, all from UNIQUE and FREE, user generated content.

    PS. Jay, I use "pheeds" cuz I own www.pheeds.com . Now, if I can just get everyone else on the Net to use "pheeds", I'll have a million dollar domain. LOL
    Signature
    Discover the fastest and easiest ways to create your own valuable products.
    Tons of FREE Public Domain content you can use to make your own content, PLR, digital and POD products.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[433795].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Glenn72
    Great post Kurt! Thanks for sharing.

    I'm guessing you could even incorporate ebay, Amazon or even Clickbank feeds somewhere in there too? Well, in the newsletter perhaps. This is definitely something I'd be interested in experimenting with.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[433878].message }}
    • Profile picture of the author Kurt
      Originally Posted by Glenn72 View Post

      Great post Kurt! Thanks for sharing.

      I'm guessing you could even incorporate ebay, Amazon or even Clickbank feeds somewhere in there too? Well, in the newsletter perhaps. This is definitely something I'd be interested in experimenting with.
      Hey Glenn,

      Yep, as a matter of fact, I have another newsletter (pet related) set up similar to what I posted above, that rotates through different Amazon books/reviews each issue.

      It adds relevant content to each issue and is a small revenue stream. And again, the whole thing is on autopilot.
      Signature
      Discover the fastest and easiest ways to create your own valuable products.
      Tons of FREE Public Domain content you can use to make your own content, PLR, digital and POD products.
      {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[434401].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Tim Dixon
    Thanks Kurt.

    This is some great stuff and a brilliant example of thinking outside the box as far as automated content goes.

    The way you have set up your newsletter to gather content like that is something I have never thought of.

    Thanks again.
    Tim
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[434912].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Jeffery
    Add this to one more reason why I have kurt bookmarked!

    Thanks for all of the fish,

    Jeffery 100% :-)
    Signature
    In the minute it took me to write this post.. someone died of Covid 19. RIP.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[435248].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author mmurtha
    Hi Kurt,

    This is some great info, plus it works fantastic when you take the time to set it up. I know I applied the feeds in this way for 3 different markets, and got the best results I've gotten in a very long time.

    Jay Extreme:
    I've been messing with a few niche twitter accounts and this is PERFECT for the auto tweeting of my niche blog posts etc.. that type of thing... although I may have to twist the method a little because it is all my own content.. I still think it's kewl...
    Jay,

    Lol it'll work with any and all content. Try it, it really does work well.


    Mary
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[435408].message }}
    • Profile picture of the author LEAPresearch
      Kurt,

      I'm Tweeter illeterate. LOL Reading the above gave me an idea. Tweeting LEAP and Reform RSS data. What do you think?

      John
      PS...I hope you're writing an indepth manual for this operation!
      {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[437347].message }}
      • Profile picture of the author Kurt
        Originally Posted by LEAPresearch View Post

        Kurt,

        I'm Tweeter illeterate. LOL Reading the above gave me an idea. Tweeting LEAP and Reform RSS data. What do you think?

        John
        PS...I hope you're writing an indepth manual for this operation!
        I don't see why you couldn't use RSS news pheeds for this topic or just about any topic...It's probably better to use your own RSS, but use whatever resources your have.

        My only concern would be adding friends and expect them to follow such a controversial topic. However, if you can find targeted friends to add, you should be in good shape.

        I really don't think you need an "indepth manual". If you know how to find and work with RSS pheeds, you're 95% home free. Just create a Twit Feed account, tell it what pheed(s) you want, how often, your Twitter log-in info, and it does the rest.
        Signature
        Discover the fastest and easiest ways to create your own valuable products.
        Tons of FREE Public Domain content you can use to make your own content, PLR, digital and POD products.
        {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[438651].message }}
        • Profile picture of the author LEAPresearch
          I realize that Twitter has a limited number of characters. Is there a "More.." icon to folllow?

          John
          {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[443641].message }}
        • Profile picture of the author Jon Alexander
          Originally Posted by Kurt View Post

          I don't see why you couldn't use RSS news pheeds for this topic or just about any topic...It's probably better to use your own RSS, but use whatever resources your have.

          My only concern would be adding friends and expect them to follow such a controversial topic. However, if you can find targeted friends to add, you should be in good shape.

          I really don't think you need an "indepth manual". If you know how to find and work with RSS pheeds, you're 95% home free. Just create a Twit Feed account, tell it what pheed(s) you want, how often, your Twitter log-in info, and it does the rest.
          Kurt, as always, your stuff is AWSOME, man.

          using free / cheap components to create something valuable is a great lesson.
          Signature
          http://www.contentboss.com - automated article rewriting software gives you unique content at a few CENTS per article!. New - Put text into jetspinner format automatically! http://www.autojetspinner.com

          PS my PM system is broken. Sorry I can't help anymore.
          {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[443712].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author ragstworiches
    Love the post dude, been wondering what the hell twitter is useful for. Nice automation system you got there!

    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[443938].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author FindItFree
    Well... clearly you have scored a win with this one.

    Since I use Blogger and have FeedBurner setup as my RSS feed distributor I'm wondering if there is a way I can fit FeedBurner into this puzzle.

    If anyone has ideas about that I would be very interested.

    No matter what the case I'm going to complete this above process for my own healthy chocolate blog. It just makes sense.

    Thanks so much.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[443957].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Mark Dulisse
    Great post and great content. Thanks for adding value.
    Signature
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[519228].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Michael Mayhew
    Awesome post!
    Signature

    IMO Partnership. A National Insurance Marketing Alliance.
    http://www.imopartnership.com/

    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[519298].message }}

Trending Topics