Know thy followers!
December 10th, 2008 |
You just can’t give or get enough Twitter advice these days, so here is yet another piece of sage wisdom: Know thy followers! I posted a rant yesterday about not being able to e-mail a blogger and hating Fast Company’s onerous registration and sign-in process. As it turns out, the blogger, DJ Francis, was already on my Twitter friends list where I could easily have DM’d him! His handle on Twitter is @MarketerBlog, so I didn’t make the connection. Excuses, excuses. If my followers list is so large that I don’t know a little something about each person on it, that’s a problem.
Maybe it’s age. I attended a high school with 2000 students and I knew at least 80% of them by name. So at one time in my life I could recall more than 1000 people. Now, at close to 3000 followers on Twitter, I’m no Leo Laporte, but I certainly don’t need any more followers, and the more I add, the less I will know about each one.
The threshold for how many people to follow varies depending on how you use Twitter, but for me, I think I’m close. I like that people want to read my updates. I follow first in many cases, but I also follow back anyone who follows me.
One of the things I promised to do in my Social Media Love Manifesto is “Take time regularly to leave a supportive comment on a blog or acknowledge someone positively in a public forum,” so I do make a point of going through my entire list once a week, clicking on a few profiles and a few blogs I have never looked at, and leaving a supportive comment. It’s also a nice way to remember all of the great people who have devoted some amount of time to getting to know me.
Tags: DJ Francis, Fast Company, Twitter, followers, Social Media Love Manifesto
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Joel, an excellent post. I think your most critical point is the number you can follow depends a lot on how you use twitter, but I think anyone who uses social media owes it to their network to reach out from time to time to each individual. You do that very well.
Comment by IdaRose Sylvester — December 10, 2008 @ 11:58 pm
Great post Joel! Just wanted to mention that the practice of going through your list of friends and making a point of engaging with them is a fantastic idea. After all, the real value of social networking sites (like Twitter) only becomes apparent with an active community around you; and to build that active community, it is important to stimulate conversation.
Comment by Tim Kadlec — December 11, 2008 @ 7:38 am
fantastic post! I agree…engage and get to know our followers. Thanks for sharing!
Comment by Mark — December 11, 2008 @ 10:52 am
I also worry about not knowing my friends on Twitter which is why I’ve kept my list relatively small. I’m going to try and touch base with people on my list every once in a while. That’s a really good idea.
I don’t know how you do it with over 3,000 followers Joel. That’s incredible.
Comment by Bukola Ekundayo — December 11, 2008 @ 11:02 am
Insightful post into the mind of Joel. I agree, it is time consuming but when not tweeting, I make a point of reading their blogs also (since I don’t have one myself I have more time…lucky me!)…that and I have a vacuum cleaner mind for information.
Comment by Suki Fuller — December 11, 2008 @ 11:09 am
Great post - I have had the same thing happen to me on more than one occasion!
Comment by Margaret — December 11, 2008 @ 12:15 pm
Thanks Joel. You raise some great points (and I’m tempted to say, ‘amen’). While I don’t have nearly as many followers as you, I’ve adopted a similar approach to followers as I have with my other ‘contacts’. Once or twice a year is I go through my outlook and if I come across someone I can’t remember at all (after wracking my brain), I usually remove them from my list. That’s what I’m planning for Twitter - so feel free to check back with me in a year to see if that works.
Comment by Martin Waxman — December 12, 2008 @ 9:16 am
[...] see this rule on this post and also here: on Twitter you have to give and give and give before you get. Giving (in the form [...]
Pingback by Want to crowdsource answers on twitter? You’ve gotta be famous first… « heleana quartey — December 16, 2008 @ 6:52 am
Rock on, Joel!
Comment by Peggy Dolane — January 1, 2009 @ 2:51 am