![Welcome Message example](../articles/welcome-message.png)

The biggest problem every creator faces on this earth is, “Is my content resonating with my audience? Am I going on the right path?”.

Social Media is a fickle thing because of its algorithm. You can send out 1000s of posts to gather audience feedback, and there’s still a high probability that only 10% of your audience will see your content. Yes, even if you retweet your post ten times a day.

We’re missing out on feedback from a big chunk of our audience every time we send out a tweet. Precious feedback that could help us become better creators.

So why not ask the audience themselves?

I know what you’re thinking, “Are you expecting me to knock on everyone’s door and ask why they follow me?”. Of course not!

That’s why we introduced hivoe to automate your DMs to all your new followers! Apart from saving tons of your time, here are some points to consider:

# Most people on Social Media are lurkers.

They will see your posts and notice what you’re doing, but you’ll never know about it because they will never come forward. You need to realize…social media still does not have an excellent reputation in the real world.

Often, even extroverts in the real world will not reach out to you online because of a lack of trust. And this personalized, genuine DM that you send surprises them and makes them want to respond most of the time.

Now you’re not this influencer or creator or entrepreneur who exists only in their feed. Now you’re welcoming them into communicating with you through DMs.

And that makes a humungous difference.

# A genuine DM is an excellent conversation starter.

The subject of automated DMs has been controversial from time immemorial. When someone brings these two words, automation and DMs, together, it’s like heaven has fallen to earth.

You ever wonder why?

Because DMs like emails are a personal space, and you need to respect it. Your audience does not want you selling them stuff every single time they refresh their messages page.

Crafting an audience-focused, helpful DM when first inviting your followers into
your circle has never been more crucial. Ask them about their day, how they found
you, or how can you be of help to them.

Remember, people are waiting to be heard. You just need to give them that chance.

Now off you go (after reading this article) to craft your perfect personalized DM
using hivoe.

Here’s a perfect example of how a follower became a friend over time. (Photo taken
with permission from both users)

![Conversations started with a welcome message](../articles/dms-wm.png)

Thus, bringing me to my next point.

# You will probably go through these four scenarios in your journey

1. People will be ultra-sweet and give way to fantastic conversation or feedback.
2. They’ll stick to one-word or one-line answers. How much ever you try to make it move forward, you won’t be able to move it ahead. Leave them.
3. They’ll spam you with their links or products, asking you to give immediate detailed feedback. Or asking you to buy basically. Again, ignore them.
4. They won’t respond at all. Best case scenario!

 
Now how can you increase the probability of scenario 1️⃣?

**By making a fantabulous first impression, of course!**

**How can you do that? By considering the best practices for DMs below 👇👇**

 

> 💡 Tip
>
> 50% is a good response rate on a typical day. It’s slightly less when your post goes viral and you have a massive influx of followers on a single day.

 

Also, remember, hivoe already has multiple templates to choose from if your brain feels blank 😉

![Conversations started with a welcome message](../articles/hivoe_wm_template_enable.gif)

<center>
 _Choose a welcome message from the templates_
</center>

# Automated Direct Messages Best Practices

The following will ensure that you keep your new followers once they receive your welcome message and not generate a lot of negative feedback.

- Don’t try to sell new followers anything in your welcome DM. Period.
- Don’t try to get your new followers to sign up for your mailing list.
- The most successful direct messages I’ve tried do not have any links. These are seen as more trustworthy and can open the door to further communication.
- The second most successful direct messages I’ve used are ones that simply link to Twitter threads that my new followers would be interested in. If you know that you have an audience following you for development advice, then your latest thread with 10+ great tips for new developers might be well received.
- Check your direct messages regularly and respond to them when necessary. This is a huge trust-builder and will lead to more engagement in the future.

**One point to consider:**
Sometimes, you might get a huge influx of followers, thus getting multiple responses. Do not get overwhelmed. Take your time, breath, and start responding individually. No one’s keeping a gun to your head asking you to respond.
Try to delete the DMs where you don’t get the response from time to time because they clutter your inbox.

 
<hr />
 
Remember that the person on the other side of the screen is human too. Treat them
with respect and care…and slowly, you can make them your **super fans**.

Over time, they’ll guide you by giving feedback on your work, especially when they see that you’re providing
extreme value, are genuine, and trying to help people around you.

hivoe is only meant to supplement and enrich your social media experience. It's not, by any means, meant to replace the most critical part of social media networking, which is the human side of you interacting with your followers. Use it as a first step to ignite the connection to create your own path.

_Luca_

Understand your audience, and get the most of your Twitter account by learning about automated DMs in this one-stop-shop guide.

Best way to get your Twitter follower's feedback? It's the automated DMs!


It is not easy to build a Twitter audience until you truly understand their needs.

Every time I tweet, I ask myself, am I posting the right content?
What problem am I solving for them?

By posting in public, I did many experiments.

Some of them worked poorly, others received high engagement, but it's a long-term process until you figure out what works and what doesn't.

# An alternative strategy

However, there is another approach, complementary or alternative.

**Direct messages** allow you to **interact with people directly**.

I created a scheduled job, that automatically sends a Welcome Message DM to all my new followers.

It is as simple as saying "Thanks for following me! How can I help you?".

At first, I was concerned that this message would be perceived as cold and automated, and I wanted to be genuine.

After a while, I realized that a lot of people replied back!

When they reply, I jump into the conversation.

# Amazing results 🤩

I got to know what my followers need, why they are following me and which kind of content they are interested in. And I made a lot of friends too.

It would have taken hundreds of public posting experiments for me to understand that.

Thanks to this experience, I decided to make the Welcome Message DM automation **available for everyone** through hivoe.

You can easily [create your Welcome Message](../welcome-message).

Pick up your favorite message from the templates list, or write your own. Enable it, and see it working 🤓

More then 50% of my followers replied back.
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Happy DMing!

_Luca_


Learn how to use the Twitter DM automation to understand your audience and get the most out of your Twitter account.

How to use DMs automation to understand your Twitter audience


Social media is all about **engagement**.

But engagement requires a lot of effort and time.

hivoe's mission is to provide you with the right tools to show up yourself, while also remaining productive.

How?

We will send a welcome message to your new followers on your behalf via Twitter DM (Direct Message).

# How to setup a Welcome Message

Log in to hivoe with your Twitter account first.

The first page after you log in is the **Welcome Message**, otherwise you can navigate to the Welcome Message page by clicking on the Welcome Message button (or by clicking [here](/welcome-message)).

Then you can choose a welcome message template from the list, or write your own and experiment with it.

![Welcome Message creation](../articles/enable-welcome-message.gif)

A DM is sent when someone follows you.

This occurs every hour on a scheduled basis.

Here is the outcome from the user perspective 👇

![Welcome Message example](../articles/welcome-message-example.png)

# Pros of using Automated Direct Messages

If done correctly, you can make your new followers feel very welcome and open a good line of communication with them right off the bat.

Additionally, I have discovered some great discoveries about the content I should post through direct messages I send to my audience.

# Cons of using Automated Direct Messages

If done incorrectly, you can put off users who are anti-automated direct messaging.

I have tried out a few variations of direct messages, and unfortunately have had some that did not generate good feedback.

My latest has been all positive though.

# Automated Direct Messages Best Practices

The following will ensure that you keep your new followers once they receive your welcome message and not generate a lot of negative feedback.

- Don’t try to sell new followers anything in your welcome DM. Period.
- Don’t try to get your new followers to sign up for your mailing list.
- The most successful direct messages I’ve tried do not come with any links at all. These are seen as more trustworthy and can open the door to further communication.
- The second most successful direct messages I’ve used are ones that simply link to Twitter threads that my new followers would be interested in. If you know that you have an audience following you for development advice, then your latest thread with 10+ great tips for new deveeloper might be well received.
- Be sure to check your direct messages regularly and respond to them when necessary. This is a huge trust-builder and will lead to more engagement in the future.

hivoe is meant to supplement and enrich your social media experience. It's not, by any means, meant to replace the most important part of social media networking, which is engaging with your followers and fans on a regular basis.
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Happy growth!

_Luca_


Learn how to use hivoe to set a welcome message.

How to automate a Twitter Direct Message for new followers


# Why Paddle?

Every SaaS needs to collect recurrent payments from their customers. At hivoe I had the same need.

I opted for Paddle because they act as a [Merchant of Records](https://paddle.com/blog/what-is-merchant-of-record).

It means that they collect sales tax, ensure payment card industry compliance, and honor refunds and chargebacks.

Being a solopreneur on the side, I don't have much time to spend on taxation, so Paddle is the perfect solution.

# Get started

First of all, you need to create a Paddle account on paddle.com. You need to declare your domain in the web console, and it takes a few weeks to be approved by the Paddle team.

They go through a [manual verification process](https://paddle.com/help/start/account-verification#what-is-domain-approval). My recommendation is to have a landing page and a product to sell.

When the approval is received, you're ready to configure your checkout! 🛒

# Checkout configuration

The configuration is done using the Paddle web console:

- Customize your brand color
- Define the payment methods
- Select _Include taxes in the price_ or not

Next, you need to define your **Catalog**.

You can configure a single product catalog (ebook, course, etc) or a subscription plan, with a recurrent payment, and eventually a free trial period.

That's perfect for your SaaS product, right? 😉

Finally you're ready to integrate the real checkout!

- Include the paddle JavaScript bundle directly from their CDN
- Configure the SDK with _your vendor ID_
- Add the anchor tag with the `data-product` attribute

![Paddle JavaScript checkout](../articles/paddle-checkout.jpeg)

When you click the button, the magic happens 🚀

![Paddle checkout modal](../articles/paddle-checkout-modal.jpeg)

Obviously, you need to know which subscription plan belongs to a logged in user.

To do that, create a Webhook (a server side endpoint) that Paddle calls every time an event happens.

The most important events are:

- Subscription created
- Subscription updated
- Subscription cancelled
- Payment failed

Save the useful information in your database, linked to the correct user.

You'll receive information like the _update payment method url_ and the _cancell subscription url_.

Provide those URLs to your customers in your SaaS product ⛑ so that they can manage their subscription easily.

I hope that this article will help you to get started with Paddle.
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Happy product building!

_Luca_


Receiving payments has never being so easy. Here's how to do it.