When creating a signal channel, your aim should be to provide real value to your end users. The content on your channel needs to be relevant and solve your subscribers’ problems. Once you’re able to deliver on your channel objective, you’ll become trusted by your audience and your channel will become credible. 

For your subscribers to engage with your content, your channel needs to have a single focus. Consistency is key to keeping subscribers, so once you settle on something that is working you need to do the same things, in the same way, over time. If you follow these steps, before long, you’ll have a small channel with a low churn rate and a consistently high ERR. 

When it comes to monetizing, you have four main options. Premium signal channels are simple to implement but you need to be good at marketing your free channel. Broker referral channels offer all their insights for free, with the aim of making money from referral fees. 

With account management channels, either the client sends funds to the provider directly, or they fund their own account and provide the access details on a trading platform. You can also cross sell other services within the context of your audience’s needs.

If you’re looking to automate your trading signals and effortlessly monetize your Telegram channels, join signalDP today.

About signalDP

SignalDP helps traders, educators, mentors, and market participants effortlessly monetise their Telegram channels with the world’s only de-centralized Signal Distribution Platform. We’ll help you save time and money with automation, going from a trade idea to distribution in your own Telegram channel within seconds. 

After inputting your signal once, signalDP does the rest. Your signals are monitored in real-time against third-party market prices and your audience is updated as each one progresses through its lifecycle. 

Our platform helps you build credibility using financial technology to ensure your signals will never be out of tune with the market. We offer independent market pricing, instant messaging and simple inbuilt controls, so you can offer a signals service that your audience trusts.

Sign up for your signalDP account.

Useful resources

• 5 tricks to promote your Telegram channel faster
• How to promote a Telegram channel
• How to advertise a Telegram channel for free

If you followed our advice from Section 1, then you’ll already have spent some time developing a small telegram channel with a solid, consistent ERR and churn. This is important because you need a set of baseline statistics from which to measure different models. We’d suggest that you need at least one month of stats before you’re able to work out the best ways to monetize. 

	No paywall barrier	No trust wall barrier	Share in benefit to the client
Premium signals	X	✓	X
Broker referrals	✓	✓	✓
Account management	✓	X	✓
Cross-selling	X	✓	X

Similar to the trial-and-error process that has got you to this point, your job now is to test each model you can offer. Test each in isolation, measuring the overall impact on ERR, churn and profit per subscriber. At this stage you are trying to optimize the profit per subscriber vs any drop off in your engagement stats. 

This is too complicated to do this in your head, or on the back of a napkin, so it is probably time to dust off your excel spreadsheet skills and model it properly. Make sure your excel model accommodates new subscribers, churn, and an estimate for cost per new subscriber (these are all from stage 1), then add this to the revenue per subscriber from the new offering. 

Measure this for real in your channel with 100-200 new subscribers, then use the spreadsheet to project what the total profit for the channel will be if you added 1,000, or even 10,000 new subscribers.  

What this technique will show you, is the importance of churn. A low churn, even with a fairly low revenue per subscriber, is likely better than a high one with a high revenue per subscriber. Churn is the rate at which your snowball melts. 

You need to be super careful here, but there’s nothing stopping you from offering more than one monetization option. For example, we’ve seen broker referrals, account management and a premium signals channel all being offered by one provider.

We recommend starting with the order ticket linked broker promotion that only signalDP offers. This is because it does not come with a paywall, a high trust wall, it has automatic tracking, and is highly relevant to the problem the subscriber is seeking to solve. It also helps your clients access the financial markets seamlessly and faster. Instead of increasing churn, we’ve seen this technique actually reduce it while adding revenue.

When you settle on the right model, your engagement stats have settled down, and you know your profit per subscriber, you are ready to scale your business by focusing on marketing. We’ll save marketing strategies for another guide, but we’ve included some useful links at the end of the summary that will help.

Similar to broker referrals, some signal channels cross sell other services. This can be anything the audience might be interested in purchasing, including trading education, bots, market research and strategies.

In our experience, selling these extra services requires a lot of messages and content space for promotion. When it is not the primary focus of the channel it can take away from its relevance and reduce ERR significantly. Most of the time, it’s better to create a new channel that solely focuses on promoting that particular service.

The key to making this model work is to promote services within context. For example, if your analysis has just picked up on a particular chart pattern and you use it to generate a signal, then instead of spending valuable message space explaining the pattern, you can link to a course that provides the details.

The pros of cross selling other services:

• Might increase total revenue from the channel.
• If you are offering your own courses or research services it can add credibility.

The cons of cross selling other services: 

• Requires lots of channel space to sell something.
• Makes the channel less relevant and drops ERR.
• The revenue is likely not to be proportionate to the value you add a client. 

This is probably the most commonly attempted business model to monetize signals channels – it’s also the hardest one to make work.

There are two types of account management. The first type is when the client sends funds to the provider directly, although it’s incredibly difficult to make this work for the provider because the level of trust needs to be very high. It is often linked to scams which makes it hard for genuine account managers to stand out. 

Here’s an example of an account manager’s channel info:

The second type of account management is when the client funds their own account and provides the access details on a trading platform like MT4/5 (but not withdrawal permissions) to the account manager.

The account manager takes a fee, normally by way of a share of profits. The manager’s trading signals channel is the way they showcase their ability and build up the credibility required for someone to part with their money or account details. 

One of the problems we see with this model is that it’s hard to develop the level of credibility required for someone to trust them and allow them to manage their money. We tend to see very low ERR rates on these channels.

Here’s an example of very low ERR in an account manager’s Telegram channel. The engagement is approximately 1%, with 12 views from 1,045 subscribers;

Another problem is that the fees are normally a percentage of the profits made. Every trader has bad runs where they lose. If this happens, then the model delivers zero revenue.

The pros of account management:

• Because the fee is a function of account size, account managers do not need a lot of accounts to earn a good living (assuming they are profitable).
• There is no upfront fee to pay for the client.
• It is the ultimate time saving option for a client that wants to be involved in the forex markets but doesn’t want to spend the time trading for themselves.

The cons of account management:

• It can be very challenging trying to convince someone to part with their money or provide their account details. The level of trust needs to be exceptionally high. 
• In most developed jurisdictions, the provider needs to be regulated to provide account management. 
• The fee structure normally requires the account manager to be profitable.

The likelihood is that your audience will want to trade your signals for themselves. To do this, they have to open up a trading account at a brokerage, which is free. Brokers want clients, and most are prepared to pay you for the referral. 

With this model, Telegram signal providers normally offer all their signals channels and their insight for free, with the aim of making money from the broker referral. In this model, the focus is on delivering the best free channel possible, so users don’t have to jump over a paywall.

Here’s an example of broker promotion in the channel information section:

This is a well-trodden path. Most brokers have partners or affiliate programs you can apply to join. You’ll get access to links and marketing assets that send the clients to the broker’s website. Any referrals will be tracked and you’ll be able to access your statistics in an affiliate portal. 

There are several different types of payment model, and ultimately it is all negotiable if you can bring the broker enough business. The most popular payment models are: 

• Cost-per-acquisition (CPA). This is when you are paid a fixed amount if the client meets some conditions. For example, you are paid $300 if the client deposits $100 and makes 5 trades. 
• Spread share. This involves sharing all client volumes at a pre-agreed percentage, normally around 20%. If they trade in large volumes your commission will also be large. For example, if a client you’ve referred trades Wall Street 30 three times a day and stakes $2 a point, over a year this adds up to a total spread of $1506. At 20%, you’ll receive $301 per year. If they carry on trading, you carry on being paid, year after year. 
• Hybrid deals: A combination of the two models above.

Most deals require exclusivity, which means you can only promote one broker. A word of warning though – don’t go for the best commercials, go for the best broker. Because you are promoting them, you need to do your research to make sure they’re trustworthy. If you refer your clients to an unregulated broker with questionable practices, it will damage your reputation. 

If you don’t know where to start when picking a broker to work with, get in contact with us at support@signaldp.com, we would be happy to help you, even if you don’t use the signalDP platform. 

Once you’ve signed up and agreed to commercials, it’s then up to you to promote the broker in line with its guidelines. Most people approach promotion by simply pinning a post in Telegram that recommends the broker and outlines the reasons why.

The channels that promote brokers the most effectively are the ones that do it with context. Constantly posting a referral link to the broker, hoping your subscribers will click on it, isn’t going to work very well. The best promotions happen in context to the scenario. For example, if you get positive slippage on a trade with that broker, mention it. If you have some great customer support, mention it. 

SignalDP has a useful contextual feature that allows you to link your signal through to a pre-populated order ticket with a broker, which is a great example of promoting in context. The link captures all your details, so you get credit for the referral and your subscribers get a seamless link through to the financial markets. Because it’s in context to the signal being entered, and saves your users time, conversion and engagement rates are high. 

Here’s an example of a telegram message with a link through to an order ticket on mobile:

In our experience, the spread share model is by far the most profitable for signal providers, so long as you have a high-quality signals channel that subscribers keep coming back to. All the large signal channels that make serious money apply this model to some degree.

The pros of broker referrals:

• If you are on a spread-based referral model, you can share in the upside of large accounts. 
• There is no paywall to convince the client to climb over – they will trade your insights anyway with a broker so you might as well help them connect to one.
• Spread share agreements can give you a large tail revenue, where you earn commission for years after referring the client. 
• Under most arrangements, even if the client stops following your signals but continues trading, you’ll get the commission. 
• No upfront investment required to enter a referral agreement.
• There are some very clever tools on signalDP to help connect your subscribers to the global markets.

The cons of broker referrals:

• If not managed correctly by the signal provider and broker, spread share deals might result in a conflict of interest through over trading.
• Your clients can still choose to trade with another broker, which means they might be getting your insights for free.
• You have to adhere to some promotion rules and conditions if you work with a well-regulated broker. These are not onerous and are in place for good reasons.

This is when signal providers charge to access their signals. Normally this is done through a subscription. With this model, signal providers typically have two channels. A free public one that’s used to showcase their skills, results and offering. From this channel, a private one is then promoted. 

Depending on the strategy and timeframe, the premium private channel typically contains half a dozen signals a day, alongside analysis and the non-signals content. The signal provider then forwards one of these premium signals to the free channel as evidence of performance. They also fill both channels with engaging and relevant content. 

This type of model works if you are good at marketing the free channel to clients that do not know or trust you yet. There are Telegram membership bots, like TG Membership that manage access to premium private channels.

Here’s an example of a free channel promoting a premium signals service using a pinned message:

The pros of premium signal channels:

• Simple proposition, access for payment. 
• Easy to set up and manage if you use the right tools. 

The cons of premium signal channels:

• It can be challenging to convince people to pay for access. Any time you add a paywall to a business, you have to spend a lot of time convincing people to take the plunge and pay. This takes up channel real estate and ERR drops. 
• You don’t really earn much money per subscriber as premium channels tend to have a ceiling of $25-30 a month. 
• Revenue isn’t proportionate to the benefit to the client. A client with a large trading account will benefit more than one with a smaller account. You can’t share this upside because of the fixed price subscription model.

At this stage, you want to work out how to maintain your ERR and churn rates while monetizing it.

Your motivation for running a signals channel is likely to be profit, so here are all the main ways we’ve seen channels make money.

• Premium Signals
• Broker Referrals
• Account Management
• Cross-sell Other Services

Now you know what a good channel looks like, it’s time to put it into practice. If you already have a client base and are considering adding a signals channel to what you already offer, then all you need to do is promote the channel to your existing audience. 

While it is a little harder, if you don’t have a client base, we’d recommend approaching a signals promotion channel and paying a small fee for some exposure. If you can, try to recruit 100-200 subscribers in order to add weight to the statistics.

Every time you try something new, write down what you think will happen, measure it, and if it improves your channel, keep doing it.  The aim at the end of stage 1, is to have a small channel with a low churn and a consistent, ideally high, average ERR24 (20-30%). 

This is unlikely to happen overnight, and it will take time to get to this stage, but with a little application, it’s entirely achievable. You should not be worried about the number of subscribers you are attracting, the cost of doing so, or your bottom line – this will all come later, after you have developed an offer worth growing.

If you decide to use signalDP, then integrate it into your channel and start adding signals before any subscribers even show up. The signal messages produced by the platform will form the backbone of your channel. Then, it’s over to you to experiment with the non-signal content.

After putting in the time to create an engaging signals channel, the next step is to ensure you post consistently. This means doing the same things, in the same way, over time. 

Consistency is important because it ensures that subscribers continue to engage with your content regularly. Consistency comes in many forms, including in tone of voice, the frequency of signals, the markets that signals are in, the timing of your posts, the purpose of your content, and the frequency of your posts. 

Here are some tips to keep your channel consistent:

• Send your signals messages in the same format each time.
• Send the same signal stages messages. For example, new signal created, trade triggered, trade exited and so on. 
• Don’t miss a signal level or event. 
• If you send a weekly report, make sure it is sent every week.
• If you need to take time away from the channel, and you don’t have anyone to cover, communicate this clearly in advance, so your users expect it.

For your subscribers to stick around, they need to connect with your content, which brings us back to the importance of having a single focus for the channel. Relevant content engages. 

If you track and analyze your channel using a tool like TGStat’s top posts, you’ll start to see what posts engage your audience the most, as measured by ERR, reactions, links clicked, and shares. Watch this like a hawk. 

One of the most important, often overlooked, factors in engagement is the timing of your messages. Ideally, you want to make posts when your subscribers are online and active. A good stats package will tell you when your subscribers are online. People don’t normally engage with something when they are asleep!

The signals messages you send need to be succinct, delivering only the crucial points. If someone is copying your signals, they don’t want to have to read between the lines to find the important information. 

Here’s an example of a good signals message:

Here, you can see that the direction, market, target price, take profit and stop loss are all clear. 

By comparison, here’s what a bad signals message looks like: 

This might have been a genius trading signal, and although charts are a great way to communicate in some scenarios, in this case, this is not a clear signal. The direction and market are clear, however, it’s very difficult to work out the target price, take profit or stop loss.

When it comes to creating non-signals content, there’s no generic checklist to follow. This is something you need to experiment with. However, when writing non-signal messages, you should keep the following in mind: 

• There are humans at both ends, not just signals and subscribers. Your personality must shine through to connect on an emotional level.  
• Try to eliminate unnecessary words. You’re looking for short and snappy content.
• Write using an active voice to maximize engagement. 
• Try using the second person and addressing the audience directly, i.e., using the word ‘you’.
• Try to make your content actionable. Encourage people to act on the information you post.