How to be a Twitter Bad Ass: #4 Targeting

So, you've businessed-up your Twitter profile ( #1). You started a follow/follow-back/unfollow program( #2). You learned how to promote posts with tweets and how to schedule your tweets (#3). You even learned how to build cool "tweet this" links with an image (#3.5).

You've built up to about 4,000 followers. Things are going great! Then...

BAAAM!

You slam into a Twitter wall. Things grind to a screeching halt. The torrent of new followers becomes a depressing trickle. 

You are in the Twitter Twilight Zone

Twitter has rules. Both apply all the time. They sort of trip over each other. Once you hit about 4,000 followers, you will also hit your follow limits. Adding new followers will slow to a crawl.

Rule #1: You are allowed to follow 1,000 people a day.

Rule #2: You can follow a maximum of 5,000 people total. Well, that's not strictly true. You can follow more than 5,000 people. It's just that a different rule is now in play.

Let's re-state rule 2. You are allowed to follow 5,000 people or about ten percent (10%) more people than follow you, whichever is greater.  Perhaps an example is in order.

Say I follow 4959 people. I also have 4,540 followers. Under rule #2, I can only follow a maximum of 5000. My follower count plus 10% bring it to 4,994 so it doesn't help. 

Our follow/follow back/unfollow system is dependent on following 1,000 new people every time. I can no longer do that. I am in Twitter limbo.

Even if I unfollow everyone who isn't following me, I would only have room for about 460 new follows.

I will remain in Twitter limbo until I cross the 10,000 follower mark. At that point, 10% will be the 1,000 I need to continue the growth.

Until then, I'm stuck.

We have two choices to get unstuck.

• We can buy 6,000 Twitter followers to get over the hump. Understand that those followers will be complete bullshit. They are only a means to an end. They will allow us  to continue our follower growth program. That will be their only purpose. 
• You can take this opportunity to breathe. You can look over your followers and start fine-tuning your targeting. 

Caveat: I have heard of bought followers disappearing after a few weeks. That would leave you right back where you started. You have been warned.

I chose option 2. I can see why someone may be tempted to go with option 1. To be honest, I was tempted. It's annoying to zoom up to 4,000 followers then stop dead. 

I think the first option will cause issues in the long run. I should point out that this series of posts is what I did with Twitter. It isn't what you must do. It isn't even what you should do. It's just what I did.

What you do is up to you.

Back to it

Once I hit the brick wall, my strategy changed. I put following other people's followings on the back burner. I focussed more on following active users. I wanted those few new followers I can get to have a greater effect.

I continue to follow the unfollow process, but I modified it somewhat. In fact, I wish I had started off doing this in the first place.

The new process looks like this:

• Unfollow anyone who unfollowed you.
• Unfollow anyone not following you back. If you are using the premium version of unfollowers.com, (now statusbrew.com) set it to filter out people you followed within a couple of days. If you aren't, scroll down and start from there.
• Go to your notifications tab and follow anyone who is mentioned there. Sometimes, people will tweet something like, "Thanks to <list of tweeters> for being my most active followers." If you are mentioned, it will pop up in your notifications. Follow the other people mentioned in those too.
• If there's any follow room left, go ahead and follow someone's followers.

Twitter will notify you when someone likes or retweets one of your tweets. It will let you know if someone mentions you in a tweet. It will also let you know if someone adds you to a list. It will even let you know if someone retweeted or liked a tweet you were mentioned in.

The idea is that if they show up in the Notifications they are active. If they are active, you want them in your network. 

People who aren't interested in what you do will mostly leave on their own. That's fine. Let them go. As they go, or you cut them off, your list will get more targeted. 

That's the goal.

A note on Direct Messages

Most of the Twitter tools will allow you to automatically send a direct message to new followers. Don't do it. It is so annoying it isn't even funny. It's true that direct messages will go to a separate notification feed. It's also true that you have to delete them one by one.

Save direct messages for actual discussions. Using them to welcome people is like following up a new LinkedIn connection with a sales pitch. AGHHHH!

Send a welcome tweet if you like. At least, you won't be forcing people to do a lot of extra work to get rid of your inane pitch.

A word on True-Twit

This is a perfect name for a silly service. Basically, it auto replies to any follow with "<handle> uses True-Twit validation." and messages you a link to a captcha. We all know how much we love captchas.

Now you know how much I love automated direct messages. That's two strikes before we even start.

I used to go through the whole rigamarole. Now, I just ignore them. 

If you insist on using True-Twit do us all a favour and mention that in your profile. That way we can ignore you without getting your DMs.

Next up - A Long Word on ROI

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