Complaints - A Cause for Concern or Simply Inevitable?

We have automated messaging set up on most of our Twitter accounts, so that new followers get a brief DM about Cinnamon Edge and an invitation to call us. We use Social Oomph which is a free service and it seems that recently some of our long-term followers have been getting the message at random, and sometimes twice.

We've had one complaint about it (out of several thousand followers across all our accounts) but I investigated anyway and saw that the messages have been sent to some people who shouldn't have received them. As a result, I turned off the automated 'Welcome DM' on that account.

Then I stopped to think. The only reasons for us as a marketing company to stop communicating are if it either costs more than it returns directly, or if it indirectly harms the business by damaging our reputation in some way. Of course, a complaint on Twitter is fairly public, so it has to be taken seriously, but one complainant in about five thousand followers is hardly statistically significant.

I can imagine, I think, what top copywriter Jon McCulloch might say about this - if nobody's complaining you're not trying hard enough. He doesn't do Twitter but he does advocate emailing your list every day and asserts once again in today's email that no one who's followed his advice about that has failed to make more sales and profit. Some people hate daily emails, it's true, and will unsubscribe, but more people become customers than would otherwise do so and if you're in business you presumably want to sell something...

Keep communicating. As it happens, I don't think we get a measurable return from our welcome DM so it will be no great loss if we stop it altogether, but not just because one person complained about getting the same message twice in three days (and three times in six months).

Meanwhile, we plan to step up our email marketing. I'll let you know how that goes!

Roy

Isn't it Ironic - Twitter Tactics

Well, it's slightly ironic, anyway, as long as you take Alanis Morissette's definition of irony...

... my one-hundredth post on this blog is about Twitter.

Anyway, there are probably a thousand Twitter tactics I don't know about yet, but I've just found the limitations of one tactic that a lot of new tweeters employ, which we might call 'follow you-follow me'.

This is where we build a list of followers by following other people with the tacit understanding that they'll follow us back. Most people will follow us back, and so our list of followers grows almost as quickly as we can click the 'follow' button on all those profiles.

The problem is with the 'most people will' bit, added to Twitter's rules that say you can't realistically follow more than 2000 people (actually 2001). Because there's a percentage of people who don't automatically (or manually) 'follow back', you will always have fewer followers than you do 'followees' (people you follow).

And the ratio between the two is just a bit too much to get you past the 2000 limit that Twitter sets. Using this tactic will get you around 1600 followers. My list stuck on around 1650 each time I reached the magic 2001 followees.

So, what's the solution?

Actually, it's easy and I'm going to prove it! Post more valuable tweets. In other words, build a following because of your contribution to Twitter World rather than by trying to use it solely for your own ends. Then people will follow you first, before you follow them, because you're worth following. Your posts will also get retweeted because they're worth passing on.

And you'll be popular for all the right reasons: people will actually like you!

That will probably be better for your business, too.

You're welcome to follow me, of course, whether you like me or not!

https://twitter.com/Roy_Everitt

Roy

Today's the Day

...I should pass 1000 followers on Twitter. Not bad for one week and only a little automation.

Are you my 1000th?

Let me know!

Roy