X (formerly Twitter) is the first stop for information in global tech and cross-border business. This is a complete practical guide covering profile setup, content strategy, cold start, analytics, and monetization.
Why Become an X Creator
Get first-hand information on X → return to the Chinese-speaking market with an information and service advantage.
- X: an early stop for much tech news, AI progress, and product cold starts
- Douyin / Xiaohongshu: mostly second-hand content processed many times
X = the first information hub for global tech and cross-border business
X User Profile: Who Are You Talking To?
There are several main groups in the Chinese- and English-speaking X communities:
- AI / SaaS going global: teams taking AI tools and SaaS products overseas
- Cross-border e-commerce: independent sites, Amazon, Temu, fulfillment, and more
- Web3 / Crypto: on-chain projects, research, and traders
- Tech / big-tech workers: CEOs, CTOs, product people, and engineers
Age & gender:
- The core audience is men aged 25–35
- They are rational, eager to learn, and reasonably willing to pay
They mainly care about two things:
- How to make money?
- Information and opinions with real substance
X Algorithmic Recommendations
The feed now has three main channels:
- Following
- For You
- Trending / Explore
What Changed
Earlier: more weight on people you followed and large accounts
Now:
- Content weight in recommendations >> follower count
- More like Xiaohongshu: good posts get recommended
- Small and medium accounts are easier to discover
X has connected its own large model (similar to “X AI”) to the recommendation system:
- Match content to audiences more precisely
- Friendly to small accounts that can write but have no followers yet
Link policy changes:
- Before: links in the main post were easily treated as external-traffic diversion and downranked
- Now: links can appear in posts, replies, and bios (websites, products, WeChat QR codes, etc.) without being suppressed simply for containing a link
- Very friendly to products, paid knowledge communities, and private-domain acquisition
Better Ad Experience & Higher Creator Revenue Share
Ad experience:
- Before: ad posts could not be commented on and the experience was poor
- Now: normal comments, reposts, and interactions work while the algorithm continues to improve
Creator ad revenue share:
- Related to ad volume in the language and region of your content
- Related to interactions from Blue Check members in your replies
- More interaction from Blue Check users means a larger share
Profile Setup
The path to a follow:
See a post → find it interesting → open the profile → inspect the avatar, name, bio, and posts → decide whether to follow
Focus on four areas:
Display Name
Let people know at a glance who you are and what you do:
✅ Good examples: “Zheng Goes Global”, “AI Office Worker”, “Old Cat of Web3”
❌ Bad examples: “H”, “Alt Account”, “Nobody”
Avatar
- A real portrait is best, especially for AI and business topics
- Web3 and anime communities can use an NFT or illustration, but it must be recognizable
Bio
Answer three questions clearly:
- Who are you and what is your background?
- What will you share here?
- What will someone gain by following you?
Example:
“Former AI algorithm engineer | Sharing AI tools + going-global practice | Helping you earn dollars with AI”
Optional, used to strengthen the visual identity:
- Your slogan
- A product or official-account QR code
- Or a simple, clean image
Blue Check Membership (Premium)
X membership has roughly three tiers: Basic / Premium / Premium+
Open the mid-tier Premium directly; it is enough:
- Easier for the algorithm to “trust” you during a cold start
- Easier for others to trust you because you are willing to pay for the platform
- Unlocks more complete Analytics features
Price:
- US: about RMB 700–800 per year
- Japan and other regions: about RMB 400+ per year, relatively cheaper (region switching can optimize cost)
Practical experience:
Some people recouped the cost in two months through creator revenue share and brand deals.
Content Strategy
The Creator “Impossible Triangle”
Creator content usually cannot maximize all three:
- Depth (professional and substantial)
- Distribution (easy to go viral and repost)
- Monetization (can become consulting, products, or courses)
Four Efficient Content Formats
From practical data:
Opinion
Characteristic:
- Highest traffic and easiest to go viral
Example:
An opinion post about the risks of buying blacklisted accounts reached 1.5 million impressions and gained 1–2k followers.
Best for: rapid exposure and establishing a position
Lists / Resources
Characteristics:
- High traffic + high saves
Example:
After a corporate training, one list post organizing the AI tools used reached 200k+ impressions, with likes and saves in the 1,000+ range
Common forms:
- “20 AI tools that can make you 10× more efficient”
- “10 AI globalization cases to read in 2025”
Story
Characteristic:
- Highest follower-growth rate
Example:
A story post on July 27 received 250k views and contributed about 2,000 followers on its own
Packaging:
- “30 days from xxx to xxx”
- “How I earned my first RMB 3,000 with AI in two days”
Tutorial / Step by step
Characteristics:
- High saves and strong trust
- Users may not need it immediately, but they save it
- Very friendly to converting consulting and courses
Examples:
- “Step by step: open a Hong Kong bank card”
- “Open an X Blue Check and receive dollars from zero”
Practical advice:
Try all four formats within one week and see which one produces feedback most easily.
Cold Start
Borrow the “electricity” of big creators
Choose one broad direction first (you can adjust later):
- AI tools / AI monetization
- Going global / cross-border
- Web3 / research
- Digital nomads / remote work, and so on
Follow major Chinese- and English-speaking creators in the field:
- Chinese: AI and globalization creators such as Qiaomu, Guizhang, and Baoyu
- English: leading accounts in AI, SaaS, indie hacking, and Web3
Under large creators:
- Comment seriously (not just “boost” or “lol”)
- Summarize in Chinese or English and add your own practice
- Quote posts often, writing a translation + your understanding + your case
Cold-start secret:
Do not talk to yourself only on your own profile. Become a knowledgeable passerby under big creators.
Wrong approach: only warming the account / only posting junk
- Warming an account without posting content → no positive feedback ever
- Working behind closed doors, polishing one post for five or six hours → wasted time
- Copying or rewriting without attribution → the circle is small and people will remember you quickly (in the bad way)
The right approach
Early stage: completion > perfection
Post 3–10 times a day, practicing as you go:
- Original short opinions
- Quotes of big creators
- Simple tutorials / resource lists
Tested on X:
Posting 13–15 times a day is normal and does not trigger the kind of throttling seen on some domestic platforms.
Mid-stage growth: topics, sources & benchmarks
Do not only consume translated domestic content; learn to drink directly from sources:
- Chinese X: quality creators in AI, globalization, and creator operations
- English X: AI companies, indie developers, and SaaS founders
- YouTube: tutorials, retrospectives, and product-building processes
- Reddit: like overseas Zhihu, with many first-hand experience posts and failure records
- Podcasts: VCs, founders, and engineers sharing their thinking
Your topics should come from sources you understand and can turn into Chinese or local practice.
Find benchmarks: do not stare at accounts with 100k followers from day one
Prioritize:
- Benchmark accounts with 2–5k followers
- They are close enough to you that their playbook is more reproducible
Find them through:
- Keyword searches
- Recommendation feeds
- Third-party tools such as Super X and yangyi’s XAI Create
Analyze them:
- Which posts have high impressions, likes, or saves
- Analyze the structure: opening → development → CTA
Then do not “copy and paste”.
Use their structure + your language/experience + your perspective → produce “variant content”.
Post daily: a break means another cold start
X is like other platforms: stop posting for a long time → the algorithm loses its sense of you → distribution weakens.
Suggested pace:
- At least 3–5 posts every day
- Write 1–2 more carefully; the rest can be:
- comments / quotes of big creators
- passing ideas, screenshots, and resource recommendations
Review the data: understand how users follow you
Break down the follow path
The full path to a follow is roughly:
- See one of your posts in the feed
- Find substance → open the full post / thread
- Like the content → tap your avatar to enter the profile
- Browse your:
- avatar and display name
- bio
- pinned post and recent posts
- Decide whether to click “Follow”
Your job is to improve conversion at each step:
- Increase discovery → topic and expression
- Increase profile visits → put a hook in the opening
- Increase “visitor → follow” → polish the profile and keep the content direction consistent
Which data should you watch?
After enabling Premium:
Account-level Analytics:
- Total impressions
- Total interactions
- Profile visits
- New followers
Post-level Analytics:
- Impressions
- Interactions (likes, reposts, replies, saves)
- Profile visits and new follows generated by the post
Third-party tools (such as Super X, formerly free and now paid):
- Export all post data by period
- Sort by impressions/interactions, find the Top 10, and analyze them
How to tune based on data?
- High impressions and profile visits but few follows → your persona/bio is not clear; improve the profile
- Low impressions → poor topic choice or a weak opening
- One format (list/tutorial/story) keeps performing → increase its share
Positioning & account matrix: do not mix everything
Do not post “AI + Web3 + gray industries + relationships” on one account
Different audiences tolerate and enjoy very different content:
- AI people usually do not want your Web3 “airdrop farming”
- Web3 people may not follow AI prompts
Suggestion:
- Make AI / globalization / digital nomads one main account
- Put Web3 and grayer topics on a separate account
Overseas content has wider boundaries, but keep your own line
X includes:
- political conflict
- gray and black-market industries
- adult, sensual, and pornographic content
These fields can make money, but:
- evaluate legality, ethics, and risk yourself
- this guide recommends first doing the healthier AI, globalization, and creator-monetization fields well
A full map of monetization
Consulting / advisory (high margin)
You sell: experience + a plan + hands-on support
Steps:
- Define your field: AI tools, X operations, globalization strategy… 2. State in your Bio: “1:1 consulting / corporate training available; DM me” 3. Dare to price yourself: for example, RMB 999+ per hour
In practice:
Someone saw a Linktree link on an X profile and booked two hours of corporate AI training for RMB 5,000+.
Corporate training / B2B projects
You display expertise on X, and many B2B clients will approach you for:
- AI enablement training
- recruiting beta users
- consulting projects
These engagements usually have higher ticket sizes and are an important part of a personal IP.
Suitable when you do not yet have your own product: sell someone else’s product for a commission.
Typical products:
- SaaS / AI tools such as AI recording, editing, and writing tools
- knowledge communities / courses / ebooks
How to do it:
Use it yourself and get results → write a case or tutorial post 2. Add your unique link in the replies or at the end 3. Someone buys → you receive a commission
Your own products / courses / communities
Once you have enough content and followers’ trust, launch:
- recorded courses
- bootcamps
- private communities / groups
The niche can be very narrow:
Someone sells Daoist breathing exercises on X and still gets three or four orders a day.
The key:
If you are an indie developer or SaaS founder:
X = your global product showcase and user-feedback center
Ways to acquire traffic:
Put the product link in your Bio
Write case studies in posts and put the link in replies
Add your WeChat or Telegram QR code and move people into your private domain
Typical process for a brand finding a creator:
- Use internal tools/search to inspect your audience 2. Check whether recent content matches the brand 3. Ask for your rate 4. Confirm the plan, draft, review, and post 5. Pay as agreed
Common rates (experience-based):
- Entertainment / broad-traffic creators: deal price ≈ 3% of follower count (10k followers ≈ RMB 300 per post)
- AI / high-ticket niche creators: 20–25% of follower count (10k followers ≈ RMB 2k+ per post)
Currently advertising on X:
Baidu, Tencent groups, ByteDance, and many global-facing products are all increasing budgets.
Official creator revenue share (ad revenue share)
Revenue source:
Interactions from Blue Check users under your posts + advertising spend.
Actual data:
- Someone received about US$100 for the first payment from July 27 to September 27
- Later payments were around US$50 per settlement period, about US$100 per month—essentially platform subsidy money
Positioning:
Do not treat it as primary income; regard it as an extra bonus.
A grayer kind of monetization
Adult content on X is highly profitable (portraits, intimate products, and so on), but it involves legal and risk issues. This guide does not elaborate; decide for yourself whether to touch it.
Some content in this article is based on the X creator @GoSailGlobal. Thanks for the valuable sharing.