The Threads and Instagram to Telegram funnel

Four stages, one leak at a time

An organic acquisition funnel has four stages, and each one has its number.

Seen. The number of times your posts are displayed. This is the most visible level and the least informative. Many operations optimize this one and are surprised that nothing changes further down.

Followed. The number of people who follow you after seeing you. This is the first stage that expresses real interest.

Clicked. The number of people who open your link. This level depends almost entirely on the bio and on where the link is offered.

In conversation. The number of people who write a first message. This is the only level that counts, because it is the only one that feeds module 5.

The diagnostic rule is stable: only one stage leaks at a time, and it is almost never the first. If you have views and no followers, the problem is the content. If you have followers and no clicks, the problem is the bio. If you have clicks and no conversations, the problem is the destination or the first message. Optimizing at the wrong level is the most common waste of time in this trade.

What Meta publishes, word for word

Threads and Instagram share the same public rules, Meta’s Community Standards, published in its Transparency Center. Two of them directly concern this trade, and you have to read them as they are written rather than in the version summarized by the industry.

The policy on sexual solicitation states as its principle: “we draw the line, however, when content facilitates sexual encounters or commercial sexual services between adults or when content asks for or offers pornographic or sexual content”. It explicitly prohibits “Content that asks for, offers or provides methods of contact to acquire pornographic material, or contains usernames or links to pornographic websites”.

The policy on adult nudity and sexual activity prohibits, among other things, photorealistic imagery showing “Visible genitalia (including when obscured by pubic hair or digital overlays)”, “Visible anuses and/or close-ups of visible buttocks” and “Visible female nipples”, outside of breastfeeding or protest contexts.

Three practical consequences, and none of them is a trick.

First, these rules apply to what you post, not to what you sell elsewhere. Acquisition content must be designed for these rules, period.

Second, the link is the sensitive point, not the photo. It is the sentence about usernames and links to pornographic websites that explains why the industry sends people to an intermediate channel rather than directly to the content platform.

Finally, and this is the most important: nobody can guarantee you compliance. No tool, no vendor, no method. The platform enforces its rules, it changes them, and it has no obligation to give notice. Any course that sells you a method “with no risk of getting banned” is selling you something that does not exist.

Choosing the destination

The link can lead to two places, and the choice is not cosmetic.

Straight to the content platform. The path is shorter, so the loss between stage 3 and stage 4 is smaller. In exchange, you own nothing: if the account closes, the audience disappears with it. And you immediately inherit the messaging volume, which brings you back to the cost of conversation.

To Telegram. The path is longer, but you get a channel you control, and one in which you can sell directly. Since March 2024 Telegram has published a business offer that allows, among other things, greeting messages for new contacts, quick replies, away messages, and the connection of bots that “process and answer messages on their behalf”, with a choice of which conversations the bot has access to. Module 4 details what this makes possible.

The difference boils down to this: the content platform gives you a sale, Telegram gives you a list. A list survives the loss of an acquisition account; a sale does not.

It is not a permanent choice. Many operations do both, with different acquisition accounts for each destination, precisely so they can measure.

What really makes the difference at stage 1

Three things, in this order.

Consistency beats intensity. A modest volume kept up every day produces more than a week of massive posting followed by three weeks of silence.

Native format beats imported format. A post designed for the platform it appears on travels better than content recycled from elsewhere, and draws less attention from moderation systems.

Off-topic interest beats the hook. A post that works only because it is suggestive does not travel beyond an audience that is already won. The open topics defined in the persona sheet exist exactly for this.

The lesson Account hygiene and measuring acquisition, which closes this module, deals with what happens when all of this works, and the accounts start to fall.