I am not a Twitter snob – really – but there are some people who have been using Twitter and think that it’s just a matter of tweeting random musings and links to their own website – or feeding from their Facebook status updates! Those people haven’t gotten the point of Twitter yet. Really there is no point following someone if they don’t know how to use Twitter properly – unless you know them in real life and are planning to gently help them along the way.

Here are the 6 things to look out for

1. Have they filled out their bio? You get 160 characters to do so – and it’s often the first impression. If someone doesn’t fill this out then they aren’t giving you much information about themselves as a framework.
2. Look for @replies on their page. If they haven’t got any all the way down their Twitter stream – eg they havent talked to anyone on Twitter for days – perhaps they don’t know how to use this all important feature of Twitter – to talk to other people!
3. How long has it been since their last Tweet? And how often are they Tweeting? If they only tweet once every few days – well – we all know Twitter isnt an “occasional habit”!
4. Look for how they tweet links – do they shorten their urls? Do they use Bit.ly? Or an automatic shortener from the app they are using? (you can see a screencast of how to use Bitly here)
5. Are they RTing? Do they use both types of RT – the old fashioned way and the new “Twitter Retweet” button way? Use of the RT shows they know how important this activity is!
6. Do they use hashtags? Does it seem like they know what it is – if not, explain the rules of a hashtag to them – and let them know they should not be OVERUSED either!
7. What Twitter “avatar” or profile picture do they have? A close up of their face is best – but you may find they have a full length shot – this isn’t great as it only shows up as a thumbnail. So if they have a full length shot then they need to redo their Twitter avatar. And if they are an EGG (ie the default picture) – well – don’t bother! Or if you know them and they are nice you can do them a favour and say “don’t be an egg”

You can of course point them to this blog if you want to – as a way of giving them a little bit of guidance! If there is anything else which makes you decide NOT to follow someone – or if there are any points above that strike a chord – please comment below!

Tags: following, Twitter, Twitter avatar, twitter followers

This entry was posted on Sunday, July 10th, 2011 at 7:25 pm and is filed under Social Media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.