Twitter Talk
Everyone has some crazy idea about how to best use twitter. Most of these people have little to know idea what they are talking about and as usually very poor marketing professionals, or those claiming to be marketing professionals, are leading people down the wrong path.
I am going to explain the truths about twitter, how recent changes in the rules and terms of use help marketing more then it hurts it, and how to use these changes to your benefit. First of all, there has been a common misleading rumor that their is money in numbers. The belief was if you could get tens and hundreds of thousands of people following you, then you will make money. That is true, but its bad practice.
Here’s the problem. People started logging into twitter and setting up spam bots. These are programs that basically just post links to various products and services all day long. The averages of bots/spammers on twitter is through the roof. This means when you get 10,000 followers, there is a good chance 6000 to 7000 are nothing more then spammers and bots not interested in what you say or what you market. The real trick is getting 3000 to 4000 people who are actually real, talk, chat, converse with others, etc.
In the past programs like hummingbird software (WHICH I WARNED AGAINST USING!!!) were used to automate the task of following a mass amount of users, removing a mass amount of users, and returning follows from those who follow you. Recent changes in the spam policies at twitter make the use of such programs no longer allowed. If you have followed and unfollowed people in a short time period, particularly by automated means (aggressive follower churn) The creator of hummingbird software had his account closed (the irony) for using it.
Also twitter changed a lot of things so that most automation software no longer works. There are some that do still work like the catfood follower which mass removes people who don’t follow you back and mass returns follows of those who follow you. However if you get caught using these software packages you will lose your twitter account.
It is also now against the rules If you repeatedly follow and unfollow people, whether to build followers or to garner more attention for your profile. This is actually a great rule! This means chose your followers wisely. What I do is I mass follow a lot of people by targeting a search on the twitter search. Last night for example I targeted the term “started a new business”. This means anyone who said the phrase “started a new business” showed up in the search. I started following everyone who made the statement.
This method can be done over and over to gather more and more people to follow. After following the daily limit just wait (Note: This daily limit is percentage based in the beginning and can be frustrating). The following day you can do the whole process again. Now after a time you will realize you have done exactly what I advised against. You will have a list filled with spammers and bots.
The new updates in the twitter interface make handling this problem a snap. You want to log onto the twitter site and click on “following”. This shows a list of everyone you follow. Their are two types of views for this, “expanded view” and “list view”. You want to ensure you are viewing in expanded view. Expanded view shows you the most recent posts of the people you follow.
Now just scan through the list and click on anyone who posted a link. Its best to view their profile to ensure they are spamming because many non spammers do also post links. After confirming a bot or spammer, remove them from your following. By doing this you ensure all the people who YOU follow are real. You want to pay attention to what these people say and start conversations with them. These are people who spend money online. The more you talk to these people the more they trust you and your products and services.
Its okay to toss advertising and links to your blog posts to people on twitter just be careful how often you do it and make sure you are not just posting link upon link. That is okay for news website owners to do, not bloggers. Also just because you follow someone does not mean that they will follow you back! That is okay. Despite claims you shouldn’t return a follow just because someone follows you. If you do, you will not use twitter to its fullest potential because you’ll be spammed!
However, at the same time every now and again you do want to clear out the people who are not returning follows. If they NEVER return your follow its because you don’t interest them, therefore conversation with them will be fruitless. For this you shouldn’t use automated software! However there is a service called friendorfollow that tells you who you follow and who follows you back! You can use this to unfollow people who don’t return your follow.
I strongly suggest everyone check out the updated rules at twitter http://help.twitter.com/forums/26257/entries/18311
Article Written by Bruce Bates of Blog Advertising
Other article resources: Friend or Follow
