This post is aimed at people I don’t know IRL who initiate our Twitter “conversation” by starting to follow me on Twitter.
Dear Stranger,
Thank you (I hope) for deciding to follow me on Twitter.
My mamma raised me right and, if she knew what Twitter was, she would have brought me up to at least consider whether I should follow you back. (Mamma might even have thought it would be polite to follow back everyone who chooses to follow me, but mamma liked to drink.)
Stranger, I use Tweetlater to review new followers. Have you tried it? It gives me a snapshot of you. Not the kind you gave to your boyfriend that one time at band camp: a data snapshot. I get to see your description of yourself, your most recent tweet, and your stats (how many people you follow, how many are following you, how many updates you’ve posted and when you joined).
Mamma always said “more haste less speed” but mamma didn’t have the internet. When it comes to Twitter, I’m giving myself five seconds to make my decision about you.
With Tweetlater I can choose to “accept” you. Accepting in this case means I follow you back, not that you’ve finally found someone who understand why you wear women’s clothing, sir. I can also ignore you (you follow me, I don’t follow you), or block you (it just wasn’t meant to be).
Mamma would at least want me to tell you what’s going to make my mind up so here it is.
- Your description of yourself: Can I see from that why you might be following me? You’re in Australia, you’re interested in social media, you have a sense of humour. Or are you peddling something — God, SEO, weight loss, sex. It’s not necessarily fatal if you are selling something but it has to be something I might want to buy.
- You have followers. It’s social proof (as the PUAs say), if you’ve got a healthy number of followers. And that number needs to be in proportion to the number of people you’re following. If you’re following 10,000 people and only 20 are following you, Stranger, you’re Norman No Mates and no friend of mine.
- You’re following a believable number of people. If you joined Twitter a week ago and you’re already following 1,000+ people, you’re obviously undiscerning and haven’t chosen to follow me because you think we might have mutually interesting things to share (I know one of us is interesting of course, so I’ll probably still let you follow me).
- Your most recent tweet is interesting. This is the least important. You might have heard of the woeful @Scobleizer. I know he’d to think you have. He thinks every tweet should be about business but I respect a work/life balance. Your last tweet knocks you out only if it confirms a doubt arising from the other information. I might forgive you putting your religion up front in your profile (unlikely) but you’re out if your most recent tweet is about letting Jesus into your life. I’m sorry but we’re just not going to get on.
That’s it, Stranger, simple as that. I hope this isn’t goodbye.
Jack
p.s. If I do follow you and you auto-DM me, we’re through.
