Grow Your Ghost Newsletter with Twitter
One of the tricks with starting a newsletter, particularly as a smaller creator is getting it in front of the right set of eyes.
This is particularly important if you don't have a following on any platform yet. You want to provide as many options as possible for someone to see the sign up. But you don't want to have multiple newsletters you have to update.
That's where this week's video and article comes in, you can add a newsletter to your twitter and connect it to Ghost!
This process sounds complicated, but is actually very easy.
To do this we will need to integrate two other tools. First we need Zapier (the free tier works as long as you don't have too many transactions). We also need Revue (again the free version works). For Ghost, if you're using Ghost.org you will need to be on the "Creator" tier to use Zapier with your site.
Connect Ghost to Zapier
To get started, open your Ghost settings. and click the little gear icon down on the bottom left:
From there click Integrations:
From here, click Zapier:
After this, you will see an API key and API URL. Open a new tab (leave this one open).
Head to Zapier.com and login to your account or sign up if you do not have an account. The free plan allows for 100 tasks a month. Once signed in, you will need to connect to Ghost.
You can skip the setup or search for ghost there. If you skip the setup, click "My Apps"
Search for Ghost and select it from the list. Then click Add connection if it doesn't start one automatically for you.
After clicking add connection, a new tab will open asking for the Ghost API Key and Ghost API URL. It will also have some placeholder text, this will go away when you paste your API key and URL.
Return to the tab with your Ghost API Key and API URL. Copy the key and add it to the field marked "Admin API Key" in Zapier then return to the Ghost API tab and copy the API URL and paste it in the "Admin API URL" in Zapier.
Once that is done, click Yes, Continue.
Connect Revue to Zapier
You'll now need to add your Revue account. One easy way to do so is to login to your twitter account and click on More > Newsletters. Alternately, go to Revue's site.
If you don't have an account, you can create one using your twitter account if you like.
Request Revue API Key
From there, click your user icon and select "Account Settings"
Click the Integrations tab and scroll all the way to the bottom. You will need to request access to your API key. There should be small notice about API key and a link to go request access. (You can see more about this process in the video if you need to).
After this, you will need to wait for an email from Revue stating you can now use Revue.
Once you get this email, refresh or return to the integrations page and scroll down to the bottom, you should see the request link replaced with an API Key.
Send Revue subscribers to Ghost
From here, this ghost page has a handy link to the Zap you need to connect Ghost and Revue. Open that page and click "Use this Zap"
A tab should open and start walking you through the process. First you need to connect Zapier to Revue. Simply copy your Revue API key and paste in the field provided by Zapier.
You then will need to connect to Ghost, which if you have been following along, this should already be done.
Advacing to the next step, if no one has signed up for your newsletter via twitter yet, you'll need to do so so Zapier can test the sync.
If you need to add somone, the easiest way to do this is in Revue click the Subscribers tab across the top:
You can add your own email address here or click manually add.
In Zapier, you should be able to test again (or if you already had a subscriber on Revue Zapier should pick up the member.
For my video, I accepted the defaults in each step, I would encourage you to do so as well unless you have specific reasons not to. (you can see this process in the video if you want to see what each screen looks like).
Zapier will then send the Revue newsletter sign up to Ghost. Check your Ghost dashboard or members and confirm the email was added there. The best method to do this is to click the members item on the left-hand side of the admin panel.
You will need to complete the process for the Zap, once it's complete you can close the Zapier tab if desired.
One last step you may want to take is to update the welcome email and email address in Revue > Account Settings > Profile. This way you can advise them about any email your Ghost site may send out too.