How to analyze Telegram channels before buying ads

 We explains how to choose the right channels, analyze the audience and not get hooked by scammers.

In the summer, we were struck by the collision of two worlds. In the first, our readers have invested in good ICOs after reading the reviews on the channels. And in the second, they found out in personal correspondence with managers of other projects, how they “got burned on advertisements in Telegram channels with bots”.

This prompted me to write about the other side of the life of crypto channels in the CIS and share our experience gained during 10 months of work in Telegram. Trust us: we have a lot to tell.

Despite the decadent mood in the market this summer, the number of projects in the blockchain industry is steadily growing. And in this competition, the winner is the one with the stronger product and... marketing.

To promote projects, teams use all possible platforms, including our beloved Telegram. Agree, this looks reasonable: at the beginning of 2020, the messenger reached 400 million monthly active users. It is quite logical that the first step in communicating with such a huge audience, projects choose advertising in Telegram channels on crypto topics, of which there were more than 550 in mid-August.

How to choose channels, analyze the number and activity of subscribers, check promises of high ROI and not get hooked by scammers - we at Coin Post decided to share our experience and warn readers: not everything is as fair and rosy in the world of crypto channels as it might appear on the screen of our smartphone.

Where to analyze Telegram channels before buying ads?

In addition to personal monitoring of channels, we use two well-known services for fast and deep analysis:

• free TGStat , in which you can view the rating of Telegram channels and their publications, see the statistics of the project, the dynamics of its development, etc .;

What to consider when analyzing channels?

We have identified a number of criteria by which you can quickly determine the quality of a potential placement. This includes:

• the dynamics of the growth of subscribers;
• dynamics of unsubscriptions on the channel;
• the number of times the channel was mentioned;
• number of views of publications;
• the relationship between channels;
• the origin of the content on the channel.

Subscriber growth dynamics

There are several ways to develop channels, depending on the goals and advertising budget: organic growth, paid advertising in Telegram, mutual PR (VP), participation in selections / TOPs of channels, channel advertising on other resources (website, social networks, Google Ads, etc.) ).

Based on this, the growth on the channel without specifying the traffic source looks suspicious:

• 100+ subscribers every hour at night;
• 200-2000 + subscribers hourly during the daytime.

Seeing such "consistency" in the channel's history, it is better to bypass it.

For the sake of fairness, we note that there are Telegram channels after advertising in which 1000+ people subscribed to the crypto channel in the first hour (for example, “Transformer” during its former glory and high involvement of Dmitry Portnyagin's followers). But this is more an exception to the rule than a system.

What do we recommend? If you are interested in any channel to promote your project, do not hesitate to ask the administrator for proof of honest audience growth. These can be screenshots of advertising posts in Telegram channels and other sources, screenshots or forwarded messages about an agreement to advertise a channel in a Telegram bot, etc.

If the administrator refuses to provide evidence during communication or constantly evades the question, then everything is not so clean.

Channel unsubscribe dynamics

Few people think about this criterion, although in moments it can be very indicative. Especially during the period when the channel stopped active purchases and is developing organically.

The unsubscribes are influenced by various factors: both the loss of readers' interest in the cryptomarket or specifically in the channel, and the "cleaning of rows" by the messenger itself or by the channel administrator using a bot.

What do we recommend? Do not miss the opportunity to analyze the unsubscriptions on the channel - sometimes you can see a lot of interesting things here that will affect your decision to buy ads.

By the way, many subscribers can leave the channel in a short time if they came there with a specific purpose - participation in a competition / drawing for a brand new car or another Bitcoin check. Some channels are organizing prize giveaways, rejoicing in the quick effect of this promotion method. This mechanic has been known since the days of VKontakte, when a subscription / like / repost was a condition. Then a separate category of participants came to the competition - “freeloaders”, who now migrated to Telegram. After the winner is announced, they can unsubscribe, or they can stay awaiting new prizes. But you must admit that advertising on a channel with such an insolvent audience is worthless.

Channel mentions

Mentions and reposts of publications from the channel testify to the active life of the project itself within Telegram. In the TGStat analytics service, this is also called CI - citation index, that is, an indicator of the authority of a channel, calculated on the basis of its mentions. These include:

• link to the channel in advertising posts during promotion (including VPs and selections / TOPs of channels);
• link to the channel in any posts in other channels;
• repost the publication of interest to another channel.

The number of mentions depends directly on the number of subscribers on the crypto channel. There is no single system for assessing the quality of references, only personal observation, logic and analysis will help you.

What do we recommend? Be careful when analyzing channels with an audience on a fairly large scale and at the same time with a small number of mentions in Telegram itself. It is hard to believe in the true authority of such a channel in crypto-mathematics.

Number of views of publications

The number of views is, of course, an important indicator that speaks about the level of engagement of subscribers on the channel (also called the reach of publications). After all, the more views the posts have, the higher the trust of readers / potential advertisers in the channel. Therefore, the owners of bot channels are additionally engaged in cheating views in order to create activity and show off those who want to buy ads.

The number of views is difficult, but it can also be analyzed. Here, analytics services will tell you only quantity, but not quality. Also keep in mind that the audience engagement metrics (abbreviations: ER or ERR) in TGStat  and other softwares differ due to different calculation methods. Therefore, here it is best to personally observe the channel and view its publications in a few weeks.

Here are the nuances you should pay attention to:

1) the dynamics of the growth of views during the day

You should be suspicious of views that are growing identically to each other throughout the entire time. For example: a published post gets X views every 30-60 seconds. And you see this picture for a couple of minutes: 31 views, 61, 141, 211, 271 (remember that +1 view is you, the only real reader of the post at this moment). If a similar situation repeats with the next publication on the channel after a while, then there is no doubt that the views are being promoted.

2) the dynamics of the growth of views during the week / month

Also, not everything is clean in the channel, whose publications are gaining the same number of views all the time, regardless of the growth of subscribers, the time of year and the hype around crypto-topics. We will not publish examples of such views so that the article does not drown in screenshots. Just remember that 100% of posts on a channel cannot have the same number of views. There will always be a difference, even a fraction of a tenth.

3) the ratio of the activity of subscribers' participation in polls, reactions under the post to the number of views of such publications.

What do we recommend? Do not be lazy and flip through the channel before buying ads on it. It will also help you understand the channel format, authoring style, see projects that have been previously advertised, etc. It is possible that someone's content will be to your liking and you yourself will become a reader of one of the channels.

The relationship between channels

It often happens that a crypto enthusiast may have multiple channels in which you can find the target audience for your product. For example, in addition to "Coin Post - Crypto News", the Coin Post editors are also actively developing channels "TON - News" and "ICO by Coin Post".

Compare the contacts indicated in the description of several channels, or directly ask the administrator about his other projects in crypto-topics. This will help both find additional high-quality channels and protect yourself from buying advertising in other projects of the same "bot lover". After all, if he decided to upload 50+ thousand bots to one channel, then what will prevent him from doing the same in others? An especially strong signal in this case will be if the content on such channels is constantly duplicated.

What do we recommend? Always look for and build logical relationships between Telegram channels on crypto topics. This is easy to do in one go when you get started with analytics and channel selection to advertise your project. It can take up to 10-15 minutes to analyze one large crypto channel.

Telegram is full of fraudsters. They create an account for themselves with a similar username as the channel administrator (it differs by only one character, which is visually difficult to distinguish), and offer advertising. Therefore, always (hear, ALWAYS!) Apply for promotion only to those managers whose contacts are indicated in the channel description. Follow these links and thus check the validity of your account. This can save you unnecessary waste and frustration.

Origin of content on the channel

It has long been an open secret that not all participants in the media market respect copyright when publishing content. In the world of Telegram channels, this is especially noticeable.

We also often find content, post formats, ideas from our three channels in other crypto channels, of course, without mentioning the original source. As they say, you need to know the heroes by sight!

While browsing, pay attention to the texts, the number of subscribers (or bots?) In the channels that “borrow” our content, the date and time of publication.