I’m using this as the landing page from Twitter for a while. Feel free to skip over to read about me.
I started using twitter in September of last year, and I intuitively followed everyone back who followed me. This seemed polite, and as a new user, I knew that I was appreciating every follower.
Once some of the Twitter big shots linked to me, I gained several hundred additional followers quickly, and I dutifully followed all of the non-spammers back in return.
I Was Doing It Wrong
Once I was following around 900 people, the signal-to-noise ratio had taken a turn for the worse. I didn’t recognize anyone, most of the tweets weren’t relevant to my interests, and the sheer volume was obnoxious.
Mixed into that crowd were some people I wanted to get to know, but it was a challenge to try to keep tabs on them. I used TweetDeck to create some smaller, more selective groups, but that workaround was limited.
The benefits of Twitter as an easy way to connect to people were lost because there were too many people too fast.
How I’m Doing Twitter Now
Having come to the realization that I needed a smaller-scale approach to Twitter, I began unfollowing people, striving to trim down to only a couple hundred people. I did this despite knowing that some would have their feelings hurt, and I don’t like hurting anyone.
Most of these people are great, and I’ve exchanged messages with more than a few of them. Understand that there’s nothing personal in that decision; it’s just a question of how relevant your updates are to me. Note–I did not say how relevant you are to me.
To Follow Or Not
Whether or not I follow someone is often a matter of whim. If the person’s tweets are just the right kind of funny to me, if we have something interesting in common, or if their updates strike me as particularly compelling, I may follow.
If there are too many updates or I discover that I was mistaken about our common ground, I might unfollow.
In the end, it was a question of too much too fast. I may get back to 900 people at some point only more slowly and in the future. For now, I’ll almost always respond when someone talks to me with an @reply, because while it may be that not everything you say is relevant, that doesn’t mean that nothing you have to say is. And my email is in plain sight for anyone who wants to connect that way too.
Make sense? Nothing personal at all, and if you need anything, just @ me.
{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
This is why the number of followers means nothing to me. It’s much like blogging, I would rather have five fun followers who really give a shit what I say and respond than 500 who may or may not read and who I will never know. I’m there to make some friends and have some fun, I’m not selling anything and I don’t need “followers” to feel important.
Good for you Chuck for seeing that, although I should have checked first to see that you didn’t dump me first.
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Did you see that interview with the Twitter CEO on CSPAN Sunday? He said 900 followers (his number) was too many. I am really beginning to understand Twitter so much. Not to sound pompous, but I’ve always understood it to a degree, but it is so difficult for me to explain it’s value to the few clients I have in my humble PR shop. One thing the CEO said was that he was more interested in what the coffee shop tweeted once a day - than 15 tweets about nothing from someone he knew.
I have started to follow a 90-10 rule. Have you heard of this? 90 percent of your tweets need to give something of value to the Twitter community - and 10 percent can be about what you had for breakfast, etc. Since I’ve been doing this - for just a week or so, my Twitter experience has become much more interesting.
I was following over 200 people. I pared it down one day to 68. Now, I’m up to 83. People who issue 15 tweets in a row - I usually stop following them. It’s annoying. I also like peeps who are funny. Today, a high level exec I follow tweeted: “It’s time to make the donuts.” Stuff like that makes me laugh - and stay. But, I really love valuable links and tidbits of helpful info.
One more thing - I hate the language of “followers” - I wish it said “People who are interested in what I might say” (too long, I know) - b/c followers has always implied kool-aid drinking souls…i’m weird, though. hahahah
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also - he said there was probably going to be an ipo - and CHUCK! I’m getting in on this one, b/c I missed out on Google. I only had $2,500 to invest and declined - if I had, I’d have about $50,000 today. =(
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Heh. I was wondering why you stopped following me, and thought I might have offended you with my opinions about Ford’s twitter efforts. Thanks for sharing - I’ll be interested to see how this experiment turns out. And I will try to remember not to unfollow you, but I sometimes use Twitter Karma to clean up my profile. Best!
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@Ben We have almost nothing in common in many respects, but I feel like I know you because you’re just after friends and fun. It shows because we talk back and forth, so of the 900 people, you are one of the ones I am most familiar with.
@Jen Thanks for relaying the interview. The idea of delivering value through Twitter is interesting. I don’t just toss out updates, but I don’t go for hard value either. I try to amuse, entertain, and interest, and that’s what I look for in return. That’s value for me on Twitter. Good luck with the Twitter IPO
@Monica It definitely wasn’t because of what you said about Ford, and it’s most emphatically nothing personal in your case. Your approach to Twitter is a bit high-volume for me right now. I hope we can keep talking through gchat though.
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