11 Things to Avoid When Using Twitter

Posted on 27. Apr, 2009 by hilzfuld in Web

Twitter has taken off since my last post. It is all over the place. You can turn on the TV at any given time in any given country and be sure to hear it mentioned. Between Oprah, Ellen, Ashton, and many others, it is safe to say, Twitter is becoming much more mainstream as time goes on. I do not mean to say that these celebrities are mainstream, but their audiences are. Since Oprah joined Twitter, you can be sure that hundreds of thousands of “stay-at-home moms” across America have begun tweeting. There are of course endless debates surrounding this topic and whether this is a good or bad development, but one thing’s for sure, there are now many new people joining Twitter who have no idea what they are doing.

I already wrote a list of reasons explaining why you should tweet, how to tweet, and what to do after you join Twitter, I thought I would tell you what NOT to do when tweeting. Before I begin, let me say two things:

This is of course my opinion only and since there are so many social media experts out there (will address that later), there are going to many of you who disagree with this list.
I do not want to sound like I came up with all this stuff alone. I learned most of them the hard way, when I did them and was virtually stoned (with rocks, not the other kind) by my Twitter community (follow me here).

So here are 11 things to avoid when tweeting:

1: Do not use the following words in your bio, no matter how much you think they will attract followers:

-Social Media Expert: I think it is safe to say these are the three most annoying words on Twitter. What is a Social Media Expert can someone please explain to me? I am of the opinion that very few people can honestly call themselves experts in the field. The remaining 99% are people who have been using Twitter for a few months, have a few hundred followers, and are as much of an expert on social media as I am on Yoga (never done Yoga).

-Guru: The same pretty much applies to the word Guru. Unless your name is Jeff Pulver or possibly Kevin Rose, and you write that you are a Web 2.0 guru, you can rest assured you will not see me on your followers list. Humility is the key.

-Make Money Online: People are mostly on Twitter to participate in dialog. People who write these words in their bio are just like email spammers, and beyond the annoyance, and the fact that they are single handedly ruining Twitter, they are also doing something immoral and wrong. I can safely say that without exception, these words should never be in anyone’s Twitter bio.

-Affiliate Marketing: Now this is a tricky one. There is nothing inherently wrong with affiliate marketing. It is a legitimate way of making money online. However, to put it in proportion, Viagra is also a legitimate aphrodisiac, that does not mean I would ever open an email with the word Viagra in it. So too, most people on Twitter would not follow someone with the words Affiliate Marketing in their profile.

-Increase your Followers: If you are telling me ways to increase my followers, you obviously have very little confidence in my intellectual ability or at the very best, my social skills. I do not want to be told who to follow and as one of my Twitter mentors told me in response to a question posted on Twitter, I do not want to follow random people. I want to follow people that interest me, and the basic assumption is that the people they conduct dialog with, will also interest me. Thank you Ahuva (follow her, she is the cream of the crop.)

2: Do not ONLY answer the question “What Are You Doing” in your tweets: Maybe this is how Twitter started, but I think we can all agree that nobody wants to hear when you are eating, when you are going to sleep, and when (yes this has been tweeted on occasion) you are going to the bathroom. Now let me clarify; I am not saying that it is unacceptable to talk about what you are eating for lunch, and even post a picture of it, this kinda thing makes Twitter interesting and fun. However, I think if that is ALL a person tweets about, they will end up with very few followers, who might be true food enthusiasts. A guiding rule when tweeting is tweet things that would interest you if tweeted by others. In fact, I think it is time to change the Twitter box from “What are you Doing”? to possibly “What Can you Share”? or as a true social media expert suggested, just a simple “What’s up?”

3: Do not ONLY promote your blog/business in your tweets: Once again, the main word here in “only”. In my humble opinion, there is nothing wrong with sharing your blog posts with your followers. If they follow you, they are apparently interested in your thoughts, and your blog can be viewed as an extension of your tweets, so why not share it? However, just like everything else, all in moderation. If I come across someone’s Twitter timeline and all his tweets start with the word “New blog post”, can you guess what my first action would be?

4: Do not tweet the same thing more than twice in a day: There are some people on Twitter who I actually look up to and respect, but feel it is OK to tweet the same article ten times throughout the day. Now, there is something to this technique. After all, the people reading it in the morning are generally not the same people reading it in the evening. This is true, but there is one little problem. When you tweet the same article or link many times throughout the day, you are not taking the heavy Twitter addicts into account. There are enough people who will see all those tweets and get annoyed fast. If you MUST tweet the same link more than twice, at least change the lead in sentence. I must give props to yet another one of my Twitter mentors on this tip. Thanks Ezra.

5: Do not tweet about your followers more than once a week: OK, here I must stress something. I was an offender of this rule for a little while when I was new to Twitter. I was put in my place by another fellow Twitterer, who by the way, happens to be one of my favorite bloggers. Check out her Twitter here and her blog here. So thanks Talia, I still think you need to publish a book from your blog. What I mean to say here is do not tweet things like “I have 5,000 followers, and I really want to get to 6,000, please RT this”. This is really annoying especially if you do it often. It is not the end of the world if you are at 99,999 and you tweet “Free iPhone for my 100,000th follower”, but beyond that, please refrain.

6: Do not tweet exclusively in another language: OK, this one is gonna spark some controversy, and rightfully so. I strongly believe you need to speak the language that most people understand. I am not saying if your mother tongue is Spanish to NEVER tweet in Spanish, I am just saying to be considerate of your followers and the fact that as of today, there are still a lot of applications that only support English text.

7: Do not tweet sensitive/private information: Once again, I am speaking from experience and learning from my mistakes. As recently as yesterday, I tweeted something that was not for certain eyes, while thinking “Eh, they wont see it anyway”. Mistake, big mistake! Tweets now show up in Google searches and anyone can easily access your tweets. So if you want to keep something private, probably not the best idea to share it on the fastest growing social network on the Web. Additionally, and I am not going to elaborate on this, being as it is a very controversial topic, and I am actually not completely sure what I believe, but I do think Twitter should be treated like a work place. Just like you would not share extreme political views, sexist, or offensive views of any kind at an office event, so to Twitter. It is all about sensitivity. I am sure a lot of you disagree, feel free to share your opinion in the comments.

8: Do not Auto DM people who follow you: Well, this has got to be one of the bigger annoyances in the Twittersphere, thank the Lord, many of my friends taught me how to disable this inconvenience. If someone followed you, they did not do it for you, they did it for them, so no need to thank them. Do not DM them saying “Nice to meet you and thank you for following”. I get one of those messages and you better prepare a goodbye reply too.

9: Do not Auto Follow: Once again, just my humble opinion. Unfortunately, there are too many bots, spam accounts, and just annoying people on Twitter. Just because someone follows you, does not necessarily mean you have to or want to follow them back. In fact, I would say that maybe 30%-40% of the people that followed me over the past month were real people, with quality tweets on topics that interest me. Follow people that interest you, otherwise you will end up with an uncontrollable amount of people in your stream, which will eventually detract from your ability to use Twitter effectively.

10: Do not consistently make spelling, grammar, or punctuation mistakes in your tweets: This is consistent with my general philosophy on Twitter specifically and social media in general. Just like I would not follow a person who could not be bothered to upload a picture to his/her profile, post a bio, or tweet at least a few times, so to I am not quick to follow someone who constantly makes elementary mistakes in their tweets. Now, I know this sounds a little harsh, but I think your followers deserve that extra effort. I am not saying you need to be a professional English writer, but c’mon, what interface does not include a spell check? Use it and be careful how you tweet.

11: Do not use Twitter like you use Facebook: I think it is an acceptable practice to check your Facebook once a day, week, or even month. Twitter needs more effort. It is true that you can use Twitter effectively even if you only tweet once a day. However, in my opinion, if you really want to maximize the tremendous potential that is Twitter, you need to keep your audience on their toes. Keep your followers interested.

There are so many more things you will learn as time goes on, and you will be amazed at how much you can learn about Twitter from the supporting applications to the lingo and the etiquette. I hope these are some useful tips that, in conjunction with Top 5 Reasons to Tweet, Top 5 Steps after Joining Twitter, and Ten Things you Must Know before Joining Twitter, are sure to get you on your feet, help you start tweeting, and assist you in starting to build your Twitter network. Once you have done that, the possibilities are literally endless.

Would love your feedback in the comments or better yet, reply to me on Twitter here!

-Hillel

Tags: Facebook, twitter

148 Responses to “11 Things to Avoid When Using Twitter”

Bob Williams

18. May, 2009

I agree with most of your points, however I see nothing wrong with sending an auto DM with a nice thank you message as long as it does not contain a commercial. I feel that a sincere thank you is not only OK, but warranted, irregardless of the follower’s intentions.
AboKevin

18. May, 2009

Thank you for a great post. I think you have nailed the 11 worst mistakes (many of which I myself are/have been guilty of).
Leslie

02. Jun, 2009

Terrific post for a Twitter newbie like me. I had followed some questionable advice and used Social Too (which I think is a good app) to autofollow. I stopped when I started following someone called something like “Your Man” (not that there’s anything wrong with that).

Thanks for the helpful post.
jenniewhite

09. Jun, 2009

Addressing Rob’s comment. If you kept on reading you would of realized he said the exact opposite of what you “paraphrased.” He went on to comparing his expertise in social to media, to his expertise in yoga (which he has none).

Terrific article, I learned a lot. I definitely agree with updating people on how many followers you have and want. No one really cares! Thanks for the tips, you’re a fantastic writer.
hilzfuld

10. Jun, 2009

Thanks for all your comments, I really enjoyed reading them. As for Rob’s comment, if you followed me on Twitter, you would know that the LAST thing I consider myself is a Social Media Expert. jenniewhite, thanks for having my back! Glad you all liked it! Keep reading and of course commenting!
SeeboldMarCom

10. Jun, 2009

Terrific tips on what “not” to-do! – there are a lot of how-to articles out there and for a newcomer like me it can get overwhelming – glad I clicked on yours because it was clear, concise, well-written and makes a ton of sense! Will share it with key clients who are also recently using Twitter – we are on the journey together!

thanks for such a helpful post.
hilzfuld

10. Jun, 2009

SeeboldMarCom, glad you liked it and thanks for your nice words. Keep reading, I hope you will like my future posts just as much
Lyndon

14. Jun, 2009

Great tips on twitter busage. This is very helpful as now all corporates are getting into the twitter vehicle!
Daria

15. Jul, 2009

Great tips that actually come from common sense, when you get to using Twitter regularly. Very helpful for twitter beginners.
aansa

09. Aug, 2009

These are some useful tips to use twitter without annoying your followers.
Ernie Schell

23. Sep, 2009

Great stuff for the “professional crowd.” But Twitter is a “big tent,” and when you search on some topic outside the professional realm (by itself a big tent, of course), it’s amazing to see “how the other half lives.” There are Tweets out there in massive amounts that are crude, rude, with major ‘tude. I’m not advocating it. It’s just how it is. Put another way – those into music or sci-fi or chatting about TV shows or shoes or you-name-it are probably playing by slightly different rules (each “realm” with its own set of implicit rules). Bottom line — there’s nothing wrong with creating more than one Twitter account, if you run in more than one social circle. Am I right?
hilzfuld

23. Sep, 2009

Ernie, thanks for the comment, I think it is ok, but that is just my opinion….
Roger

25. Sep, 2009

Nice list/post. It’s interesting to see how these have changed every year since Twitter first launched. I think it will continue to change as we all figure out how this “social media” thing really works.

And thanks so much for calling out the so-called social media experts/gurus that only exist in thier own worlds. This technology is WAY TOO NEW for any of the unemployed marketing types or wanna-be people, to claim such BS. Just because you spend 10 hours a day using it, doesn’t make you an expert.
Tamahome Jenkins

30. Sep, 2009

My biggest pet peeves are with 2 and 3. Sometimes people get so caught up with talking about themselves or their business that it feels like your standing in a crowded room, and everyone is just shouting in different directions, with no real audience.
mayasagi

30. Sep, 2009

Thanks Hilel, these are great tips!
I wish everyone would use them, especially the autu DM tip…
I must say I enjoy your writing, you make everything sound so easy and fun.
Looking forward to your next posts, it seems to make me smile !
Ahuva

30. Sep, 2009

I thought this was a great list for newbies.

Just a thought- but shouldn’t another rule be not to tweet links to one’s own material after it is already 6 months old? I mean don’t we have fresher, relevant material we could be sharing?

(Not aiming to be argumentative)
hilzfuld

30. Sep, 2009

Tahamome, I feel that way too sometimes, thanks for reading… Mayasagi, that was really nice of you to say, thanks a lot, you made me smile back. Ahuva, I hear that and I always think twice before posting old things, but if they are relevant and I have 2000 new followers since then, why not give them the chance to read it, dontya think?
Ahuva

30. Sep, 2009

Fair enough

Sorry, I just couldn’t hold myself back there..
Elaine

14. Oct, 2009

Hillel,
This is so sensible and I thank you for putting all of the guideposts in place here. I do think of you as a respectable Tweeter.

Relating to Ahuva’s comments, perhaps tweeting links to older material is good for your newer followers or those who do not yet follow you, but may find you because of it. Just a thought . . .
hilzfuld

15. Oct, 2009

Thanks Elaine, appreciate your feedback!
Josh

16. Oct, 2009

I would add:
“Don’t use URL shorteners that frame pages.” (e.g., ow.ly, su.pr)
Framejacking is obnoxious.
laurawalker86

17. Oct, 2009

Great tips. worth the read. I need to work on spelling and grammar but otherwise think I follow pretty much thank you.
Michael B. Del Camp

17. Oct, 2009

I remain quite shocked at how intelligent you are. Your likes, your opinions, your real personhood and personality come through on your tweets. Astounding. I guess the show biz, celebrity, Hollywood culture serves as a screen, as well as a window, into your own world of acting in roles. Again, congratulations on your new ABC television series. I am happy for you, as well as your new Beau or Husband, who I discovered existed, through your Twitter Tweet.
hilzfuld

17. Oct, 2009

Michael, not sure who you are talking to u, but if it is Alyssa Milano, she didnt write this, I did, she just helped me distribute it, but thanks for reading anyway…
m

18. Oct, 2009

“I am of the opinion that very few people can honestly call themselves experts in the field.”

hahahahaha
i think you wrote this article assuming that “social media expert” is just a useless tag and does not refer to an actual field in cultural studies, marketing, business, communication studies, linguistics (just to name a few )

“have a few hundred followers, and are as much of an expert on social media as I am on Yoga (never done Yoga).”
what the hell does that mean? so if someone works in marketing, or for some business/social/ or political think tank, they cannot be considered experts unless they have “a few hundred followers on twitter”?

“I am of the opinion that very few people can honestly call themselves experts in the field. ”

truth is you dont even know what the term refers to.
if professor of social science had less than 100 friends – would you attack criticize the university they work ? serious question

“i am of the opinion”—–its like saying “after considering…”
or “i come from the school of thought”======pointless cliches that reflect a person trying to sound articulate and knowledgeable without actually knowing what that does.
hilzfuld

18. Oct, 2009

OK M, identify yourself, then we can have a real conversation… Judging by your comment, you are a 14 year old high school kid… Thanks for reading…
Elie

18. Oct, 2009

You treat Twitter as if it’s a popularity contest, or a marketing tool, or what not. Maybe for some people, but I’d said most of the actual people on Twitter (so, excluding the spam accounts) are just there for the fun of it.

“you need to keep your audience on their toes”
Oh, please! An “audience”? This is crap. It may be true for celebrities, but that’s it. Not everyone want to have a million followers. Newsflash, having followers on Twitter doesn’t mean you’re more loved.
I personally use twitter to keep up with my friends and I follow a few celebrities as well that I find interesting. But mostly, it’s for my friends.

(For the record, M so did not look like and high schooler. I’m not saying I agree with what they said, but that was not the words of a 14 years-old kid.)
Dave

19. Oct, 2009

Just to expand the rule about Facebook:

Please do not tweet with a link to Facebook, forcing me to login (if I have a FB account) to see the expanded information. Using another social media site for information is bad form and annoying.

Instead, post the information on your website or blog… which is where it probably should be anyway.
Ashley Wirthlin

19. Oct, 2009

Amazing, some of the comments you got here, Hillel.

I think your post was very appropriate, and touched on some topics that we need to consider when using Twitter for professional reasons, which is very different than using it for “popularity”. Twitter is in fact a marketing tool, and I (as well as many other people on Twitter) follow others to hear what they have to say, read what they blog about, and get tips that they share. I would, then, consider myself a member of their audience, and them a member of mine if they followed me. (That being said, Elie, you use Twitter for a different reason. You may not have an audience, but the comments here and the number of followers of some marketing and PR folks may suggest otherwise.)

I found these tips helpful (though already implemented, for the most part) and a nice reminder that Twitter should be used professionally, as it can be seen by anyone and everyone. I especially appreciate your call for proper grammar, spelling, and punctuation; it shows a lack of effort and care to leave these sort of mistakes that take seconds to correct.

PS. I think there are some points that need to be considered when thinking about the “social media expert/guru” title a few people found issues with. For example, social media is changing, every day. The uses of Twitter, Facebook, etc., are ever evolving. I really don’t think there is anyone that can call themselves a “social media expert”. Also, comparing an expert and a professor is no where near an appropriate comparison.

Thanks for sharing these!

-Ashley
Farah

19. Oct, 2009

Thank you so much. This is a wonderful post.
hilzfuld

19. Oct, 2009

Farah, Ashley, and Dave, thanks so much for reading and commenting, really appreciate your feedback.
Creative1943

20. Oct, 2009

A good article, with lots of advice. I’m new to Twitter and need to know these things. I don’t generally “do” social networking sites as it can all get a bit much keeping in touch, replying, then replying to replies. But – 140 words – reply if you wish, don’t if you don’t – I’m getting to quite enjoy it really.
hilzfuld

20. Oct, 2009

Thanks Creative1943, appreciate the feedback, and the fact that you told me about this comment on Twitter, shows you are on the right track in my opinion…
farbige kontaktlinsen

20. Oct, 2009

Thanks for sharing this, it will really improve my use of twitter.
CBCollection

20. Oct, 2009

Thanks for this, I thought this was very helpful especially if you are new to twitter, like me. I find it irritating when people do several tweets at the same time, one or two are OK but some do 5 or 6 it really puts me off reading them what’s your view?
Is it bad etiquette to unfollow people and do they know if you do?
Susan Frank-D'Ambrosio

31. Oct, 2009

Perfect! This should be in a Common Sense and Good Manners Guide to Using Twitter. Very well grounded tips and good understanding of what I consider acceptable behavior when using Twitter. This is like an Emily Post Guide to Twitter manners. Twitter, facebook and My Space really do serve three different functions. Your explanation of what Twitter is and isn’t is great! Good Job there hilzfuld!
(Spell check would be nice addition to Twitter!)
hilzfuld

01. Nov, 2009

Thanks so much Susan, so nice of you to comment and leave me such positive feedback. Glad you liked it, are we connected on Twitter? http://twitter.com/hilzfuld
Kuba

03. Nov, 2009

I have to disagree with the non-English Tweet comment. First, not everyone is on Twitter to get the maximum number of followers, but rather follow people that are either friends or truly interesting to them, and are likewise followed by either friends or people who find them interesting. So, if you don’t speak the language of a Twitterer, don’t follow them, just like you won’t go to pravda.ru to read news in Russian (yes, I know they have an English version, but that’s beside the point). Also, did you ever consider that not everyone speaks English? And you expect them to learn it so that they can send Tweets? And what about their friends who may also not speak English? Your comment on this point seems very Anglo-centric and marketing oriented at the same time.
Pam Moore

04. Nov, 2009

Good Insight… I guess I should finally turn off auto DM…..
drew

11. Nov, 2009

I liked almost everything but really don’t understand what you meant about “other languages”.

Is it because you are assuming this article will only be read by those who consider English to be “the language”? Or this designed to be for a US audience only?

With any luck an informative article such as this would be read by those in charge of Twitter feeds around the world, but what would be the point in news services like the well-established @at5 of Amsterdam or the nascent Brazilian events portal @speventos tweeting in English?

I wouldn’t call your suggestion controversial, but hope you can add some substantiation to show it isn’t misguided!
hilzfuld

11. Nov, 2009

Thanks for the comments guys, appreciate it. Drew, I am not going to say I disagree with you, but I just think that if the majority of your followers speak English, that is the language you should be tweeting in. Obviously, if they do not, it is your choice…
Liz

13. Dec, 2009

I have read that U.S. users are less than 50% of Twitter’s users. It’s an international communication tool. You choose who to follow, it’s up to you to follow only English speakers if your language skills are limited to English. It’s too bad you won’t be able to converse with people from other countries by learning their language.
Urzay G

15. Dec, 2009

Very informative.
In regards to #8 though, I answer as many of the new followers by way of DM so are you saying that this is wrong? My words actually are varied for each follower. I say things like thank for the follow “their name” if they’ve listed it, and I usually check out their W/S or Blog and make a comment about it, again only if they’ve provided this information. On the other hand I just say thanks for following and leave it at that because I believe that those people are only there for themselves.
I have just followed you in Twitter too BTW.
Cheers
TakeThe_Plunge
AKA FreshRoasted
AKA Urzay G.
David Reese

15. Dec, 2009

I admit that I have broken probably 9 out 11 of these rules above when a newby to twitter. I agree with most, but feel I get very ample results from my Auto DM on new followers, but want to add that it only works if you send them something meaningful and not a sales pitch.
Tom Pick

15. Dec, 2009

Very nice list and excellent advice. What amazes me is how so many people can break all of these rules and still appear to be Twiterati. You might want to take a look at my recent most on the same topic, How to Suck at Twitter (and Still Look Successful): http://webmarketcentral.blogspot.com/2009/12/how-to-suck-at-twitter-and-still-look.html
Ryan Beale

15. Dec, 2009

Great information here for Twitter Newbies! I have definitely broken a few of these rules and have been on twitter for over 1 year now. I recently wrote a blog post that compliments yours: “How To Identify Quality and Relevant Twitter Users:” http://rbeale.com/social-media-marketing/twitter-followers-how-to-identify-quality-and-relevant-twitter-users/

I would love your feedback if you have a few minutes.

Best,

Ryan
PLANETwebfoot

15. Dec, 2009

This is a great list you have compiled, it should be a must read for newbie Twitterers.
Eva van Herel

15. Dec, 2009

I agree with all of the above except for the language one.
That point can only be valid in an environment where the dominant language is English.
Although bilingual, I live and work in the Netherlands, and our daily language is Dutch. So we tweet in Dutch mostly, unless communicating internationally.
The point should be, therefore, perhaps not to mix languages in your twitter. A seperate account for each language? If I wanted to go international and Tweet in English I think that is what I would do.
evavanherel
Charles Flemming

15. Dec, 2009

Loved the list. Very useful advice. Even if I don’t adopt one or more of the points, at least it educates me on some of the dynamics involved in choosing.

Sorry, but I am deeply amused–because of its context–by a spelling error in #10.

It’s like stuttering over the word inarticulate.
Sandy Fivecoat

15. Dec, 2009

Excellent list! Good reminders for us all. Interesting to see “Twitter Protocol” beginning to emerge.

11 Things to Avoid When Using Twitter

148 Responses to “11 Things to Avoid When Using Twitter”

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