Twitter for Dummies - Laura Fitton [96]
To Follow or Not to Follow?
Everyone has their own methodology for whom they follow and how they follow people on Twitter. Some people tend to follow everyone they interact with, but others judiciously control their following counts. Some people diligently review who they follow and trim out users who are no longer relevant to their lives, and others never look through their Following list.
There is no single “right” way to go about deciding who to follow; other twitterers may use the Following tool differently than you — just because they don’t immediately follow you back doesn’t mean they’re not going to in the future. Our rule is simple: Follow someone if you have a reason to follow him, not just because he’s following you. (If you’re on Twitter for business purposes, we have different advice for you in Chapter 11.)
To prevent spam, the Twitter team has limited the number of twitterers that users can follow to 2,000 until they have roughly that number of followers themselves. Once a limited account reaches close to or over 2,000 followers, Twitter once again allows it to go out and follow more accounts.
Every user has a different ritual when she gets a new follower: Some people @reply their new followers to acknowledge the follow; some direct-message their new followers to say hello; and others do nothing at all. Twitter doesn’t have an official protocol about what you’re supposed to do, and you naturally gravitate towards a routine that works for you.
Some people and businesses choose to make first contact with their new followers by sending a direct message. You can write a very personalized direct message to say hello, thank the recipient for the follow, and mention why he might want to keep in touch. Some users enjoy receiving such direct-message greetings, but others might view a direct message as intrusive or antisocial. There’s no hard and fast rule, and it’s not always possible to tell which approach your new follower prefers, so play things by ear and develop your own personal style of what you are comfortable with.
Some Twitterers go so far as to use third-party services to automatically send a thank-you direct message to people who follow them.
If you decide to use that kind of technology, be forewarned that many users hate these automatic DMs. That sort of outreach can be antisocial and irritating; and, if the person doesn’t like receiving direct messages from new people that she follows, sending her a DM can be insulting. So, use these technologies with caution.
As a side note, some Twitter users have rallied around the hashtag #endautodm in solidarity against auto-direct messages. Search for the endautodm hashtag on Twitter Search to get a sense of how unpopular auto-direct messages can be. (We cover hashtags and Twitter Search in Chapter 9.)
If you’re on the fence about what to do to acknowledge someone who follows you, make first contact openly to keep with the transparent and welcoming nature of Twitter. Direct messages are meant for private conversations, which usually happen only after you spend time to get to know someone, both in person and on Twitter.
Getting Quick Answers
Have you ever had a seemingly simple question that has bothered you for days and days? Well, why not ask Twitter?
If you have a solid network of Twitter friends, someone can likely answer your question. People tend to know a variety of things, or have unknown talents and knowledge bases, so go ahead and ask! You might be surprised by the answers you get.
In fact, someone probably knows what you’re looking for or is having a similar conversation somewhere, whether locally or on the other side of the world. For example, if you’re awake at 5 a.m. in California trying (vainly) to remember the name of the fifth Beatle so that you can stop obsessing and go back to sleep already, someone who