26 Mar The Story Behind MTLPromos

I will start sharing with you some of my projects that helped me to become who I am today. MTLPromos is definitely one of them and that’s why today I’ll share with you the real story behind MTLPromos! In case you don’t know my page MTLPromos, it is an online platform that focuses on promoting Montreal’s culture. I created it in the summer of 2016 and it now has over 15K followers on Instagram. It is part of a network of pages that have over 60K followers in total. It has been one of my greatest success online and I want to share with you: why I created it, why the name MTLPromos, how I was able to grow it and what I plan to do from here with it.

Why did I create MTLPromos?

I initially created MTLPromos because I was fed up with my 9 to 5. Working in an office wasn’t for me and I wanted to work in the social media industry. To start, I needed a portfolio but my only experience was with a company that sells tickets in Las Vegas. I’ve learned so much from it but I felt that it wouldn’t be enough.  I wanted to show local projects when I would approach local companies to take care of their social media. I wanted to create a local incognito page to show that I was able to engage with a community, get followers and be consistent! My goal was to mention that incognito page as one of my main clients.

The name: MTLPromos

When I thought about this new project, it was important for me to find a name that was not used, that was catchy and bilingual. I wanted something that sounded cool and that could be local. The name Montreal or MTL was a must since I wanted to represent the city. After, I started looking for a bilingual word and it was pretty tough. I was not satisfied with the words that were suggested when I was looking online. I wanted a name that English and French people could pronounce with no problems. A couple of days later, I was happy to launched MTLPromotions… but it was too long so I went with MTLPromos! It sounds cool in French and in English. I checked it on NameCheckr, my go-to tool to validate the availabilities of a name online! This website is key because it makes it easier for you to check if a name is available on all social media platform and domains! Good news, MTLPROMOS was free everywhere and bonus: the #mtlpromos was not used too!

How did it MTLPromos started?

I was ready. I had a name and a simple concept in mind. Since I am a true Montreal Connoisseur (I wasn’t), I will share on Instagram pictures of the beautiful city of Montreal, the shops, and food scene. I would curate content and share it. In the beginnings, I would spend hours on Instagram looking for great pictures to repost. I used to post 3x a day and the community grew fast.

Reposts and Giveaways helped me a lot!

By doing reposts, I was getting respect from local photographers and their community. This helped me grow from 0 followers to 10K quite fast on a page that had 0 personalities. I also started doing giveaways to give back to my community. I gave away over 2000$ of gift cards in my first year! I was contacting companies that were following me and offering them free exposure in exchange for a gift card. After a few giveaways, other companies approached me and I just kept on doing it.

2 years later, I am happy with the way MTLPromos is going. It is a lead generator for my business, it helped me a lot to become an “influencer” in Montreal, meet new people and to discover more the city I was born in. From MTLPromos, I decided to create QuebecPromos, TorontoPromos, LavalPromos and more. I plan to take MTLPromos to new heights in the coming year by creating videos and create offline events. I don’t want to say much but know that I want to be one of the coolest media/blog in Montreal!

Quick Fact: For the first 3 months, only a few people knew that it was me behind MTLPromos. One day, I accidentally connected to my Facebook and my friends received a notification. Now, I personally promote MTLPromos on my personal social media but I don’t promote myself on it.