Comments on: Twitter Etiquette: Should You Follow Everyone That Follows You?

By: tomnagle

tomnagle — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 01:41:28 +0000

Great post - and I still don't know what to do.

Is there a service that allows you to follow hundreds of people, but sifts out the tweets of the people you REALLY want to follow?

Thanks,

Tom

By: tomnagle

tomnagle — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 19:41:28 +0000

Great post - and I still don't know what to do.

Is there a service that allows you to follow hundreds of people, but sifts out the tweets of the people you REALLY want to follow?

Thanks,

Tom

By: Rebecca

Rebecca — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 05:25:35 +0000

I follow back a good portion of people who follow me. My problem is with those who either wish to sell me something or are simply trying to collect followers like one might collect stamps–I do not follow these people. Both of these categories of twitter users are getting worse, not better. I miss the old twitter days where banter flew back between members and there were less “ads” to distract our attention. As a person who works to help others build community, do you find that the “collectors” and the simple “sellers” are polluting social networks? How can we work to have a stronger community outside of selling ourselves or products?

By: cagrabek13

cagrabek13 — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 18:29:06 +0000

I definitely do NOT follow every person who follows me. Of course it is obvious that you don't want to follow someone who appears to be a spammer or a pornographic twitter-er but at the same time, you have to follow those you want to learn from. If you find someone who follows you to be interesting and relevant to you, then by all means give them some love. However, be weary and smart. Like all things on the internet you never know who is good and who is bad

By: Jason Yormark

Jason Yormark — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 19:08:04 +0000

Dorothy, while I agree there are tons of spammers and salesy folk out there in the Twitterverse, some people (including myself), do value as large of a following as possible. Of course I try to ensure that those I follow and who follow me are as relevant to me as possible. Laurel Papworth couldn't have said it better in her comment on this same story re-posted at Social Media Today (http://socialmediatoday.com/blog/JasonYormark/s...). There are plenty of tools that allow me to sift through the garbage and focus on those I care to actually glean information from. I personally use Tweetdeck which fits the job perfectly.

By: dorothybeach

dorothybeach — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 13:33:21 +0000

Don't agree. Too many follow you to sell stuff you don't want. If you have a focus and goal for a particular Twitter account and the person following you does not tweet with that goal in mind why would you follow them? I do have exceptions to the rule though – my husband follows me and I follow him for example and some friends I follow back. That said I do follow a lot of people – over 800 of them – but they are mainly to serve the goals I set for myself. I do go into those who follow me to see if there is someone I would want to follow back, again, if they might tweet in line with what I need to hear and can engage with. Some times I make mistakes and Unfollow and let's face it 800 people can tweet a lot. I am always honing that list.
Now if you are a celebrity – I would say you must follow back anyone who follows you. After all you are there to gather and entertain fans. It wouldl work against your fame to NOT follow those who follow you.

By: Jason Yormark

Jason Yormark — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 16:15:38 +0000

True, these people are out there. I think the fundamental difference is if you are someone that has something to promote vs. using Twitter for information and collaboration. If you are promoting products, services or a website/blog, I believe that it makes sense to grow your following as large as you can (of course in a strategic, relevant way).

By: ToddAllison

ToddAllison — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 16:54:10 +0000

I've had to block people because they follow me then drop me, follow me then drop me – they do this over and over in an attempt to get me to follow them.

I guess this fits into your spammer category, but this type of action is very prevalent. I don't follow people just because they follow me. Too many people follow others just to get followed back – that seems to defeat the purpose to me.

I follow people that I actually care what they have to say – those are the kind of people I would want to follow me.

By: Twit

Twit — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 17:22:56 +0000

I started out following everyone that followed me, then my twitter stream became just noise and i started using a 2nd account to follow the people whom i didn't want to miss updates from. Eventually I got tired of switching between 2 accounts and cut back who I was following on the main account. I like having a stream of only what interests me.

I'm not really promoting anything on twitter right now, so perhaps my approach will change as i get more commercial with my account. I have unfollowed people that I used to follow when they did a mass unfolllowing, because it does give the impression that “my ideas are important and yours aren't”. It seems to me that if you're not famous from the media, or already an established blogger, adding targetted people and hoping they follow you back is about the only way to grow your twitter audience if you have ideas you want to spread.

By: Flavia

Flavia — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 12:56:53 +0000

Be more selective !!