Angry Twitter Bird sketch by Aaron Riddle. www.acriddle.com

Book promotion coach and social media expert Lynn Serafinn shares her 5 most disliked behaviours on Twitter.

This week I felt I had to express myself. I love Twitter. I love what Twitter has done for my business. I love the people I have met through Twitter over the past year.

But I have been grumbling a bit this past week. My Twitter following has increased a lot over the past month, and there are a few things I’ve noticed in the way some Tweeple  (fortunately a minority) behave on Twitter that really puts me off.

So let me vent just a bit… and let me know if these “Twitter Turn-Offs” ring true for you as well.

Turn-Off Number 1: True Twit

True Twit is a service that allows you to see if the people who want to follow you are “real” people and not “bots”. I HATE it. This is really sending an a-social message to your followers. I’ve made a vow not to bother with people who use True Twit anymore. I’ve got almost 11,000 followers on my main account (nearly 20,000 if you count all 4 accounts I have), and am following over 11,000. I’m tired of having to verify I am a real person. Hello?!

Another reason why I hate it so much is that half of the people who are sending me these True Twit requests are because I auto-followed them in the first place! In other words, I gladly allowed them the “privilege” of following me, but they are asking me permission to follow them. It’s really twisted.

My policy on Twitter is an open door. I would much prefer to weed out the spammers by hand rather than put off new networking friends by making them “work” to follow my tweets.

Turn-Off Number 2: Protected Tweets

Geez zowie, how I hate it when people protect their tweets. From whom? What are they talking about? Are they really using Twitter for sensitive, personal communication?

Basically when I see someone with protected tweets, it sends the following 2 messages:

1)    They don’t really WANT me to follow them and

2)    They don’t trust people very much.

Neither of these messages is very welcoming.

Whenever I go to http://justunfollow.com to see who isn’t following me, the first people I unfollow are the ones with protected tweets.

Turn-Off Number 3: Not following back

People are not OBLIGATED to follow you back on Twitter. However, when I have been following someone for a long time, and even had different @ conversations with them, and they don’t follow back, that’s a turn off.

Again, I prefer to have my account on auto-follow (I use http://socialoomph.com for that) to give the courtesy of following people back who follow me. I think it sends an open message of trust and willingness to connect.

Disconnecting from an unwanted connection on Twitter is far easier than re-establishing rapport with someone who has disconnected from you due to your aloofness towards them. Be open. Be reciprocal. Be trusting.

The only Tweeple who have a valid “excuse” for not following back are

1)    application bots, e.g., @ListNotify

2)    info portals, e.g., @Mashable

3)    large companies that do not represent the thoughts of one particular person, or

4)    Twitter accounts that were set up to send news to fans about celebrities who never (or hardly ever) use the Twitter account themselves.

Turn-Off Number 4: One-Way Tweeting

Ok, I use Twitter for business—a LOT. And I tweet about my business—a LOT. However, I also RT others’ tweets and engage in 2-way conversation—a LOT. I look at people’s profiles and try to address them by first name as much as possible. I recommend them on Follow Fridays. I share the things they post that I think others would like to know about. I meet and make new networking partners, clients and friends on Twitter.

I hate, hate, hate it when someone (unless they are in one of the 4 categories mentioned above) only ever tweets about their business (sometimes the same thing over and over) and never interacts with other people. It tells me they are only there to “get” and not to connect. It’s such a turn-off.

Ugh!

Turn-Off Number 5: Playing the ‘Celebrity Card’

All right, now this one sometimes goes hand in hand with some of the others. In other words, the kinds of people who do some of the above things also frequently ‘play the celebrity card.’

What do I mean by ‘playing the celebrity card’? I mean when people have like 1000 followers and follow less than 10% of these back. Come on! Do you think 1000 followers makes you in SUCH demand that you can actually turn your back on 900 of them and send the message that they are not worthy of your attention? Do you think they will stay following you?

When I go to weed out my non-followers, these are the ones that go next, after the protected tweets.

If you are NOT a ‘legitimate’ celebrity (or, frankly, even if you are), the most inviting Twitter ratio of followers to following is ALWAYS as close as you can get to 1:1. By legitimate celebrity I mean someone whom millions of people want to follow, not because of your tweets, but because of who you are outside of Twitter. You know. Like Oprah. BTW, Oprah has almost 5 million followers, follows only 20 people (all of whom are industry people) but has sent out fewer than 200 tweets. Clearly Oprah does not use Twitter as a business building tool (she doesn’t need to!), but rather as a connection point for people who want to know about what’s happening behind the scenes.

If you are in a similar position with your fans, you can play the ‘celebrity card’ too. But if you are using Twitter to grow your business, don’t play the celebrity card or you will lose your audience fast.

TIP: Ok, so if you are concerned how you can possibly FOLLOW the tweets of all the people who are following you, the answer is: “You don’t have to.” There is an easy solution to the information overload you might experience from following thousands of people on Twitter:

• Make yourself a private Twitter list of your “VIPs” so you can make sure you are catching the updates of your best friends, colleagues, inspirational leader, movers/shakers or whomever else you wish to follow closely.
• Then, create a column for this list in TweetDeck so you can be sure to catch the tweets of your VIPs.
• Then, just scan the “All Followers” column for new people and interesting tweets. Maybe someone new will catch your eye. It’s the easiest way to build your network without going into Twitter overwhelm.

Bonus Turn-Off: SPAMMERS

I almost didn’t bother to mention this because it’s sort of a ‘given’. Spamming isn’t merely a turn-off. It’s grounds for getting you banned from Twitter. DO NOT ever @ someone unless you are engaged in a conversation with them. Sending an @ or a DM message to someone on Twitter (apart from a welcome DM) directing them to click a link is spam. End of subject. I have no tolerance for spammers and feel no guilt whatsoever for reporting them. If I know you, that’s different. If we’re friends, you can send me all the links you want.

Some dead giveways that someone is a spammer:

1)   Their profile pic us usually either the Twitter default pic or a picture of some unknown sexy girl

2)   All their tweets are the same

3)    They have no followers

4)    They @ everyone the same message and it always contains a link. Do yourself a favour and DON’T click these links no matter how tempting they may be. Very often they are phishing for your Twitter password.

So what do you think? Do you agree? Disagree? Do you have others to add to the list?

Let’s connect! Here are my Twitter IDs:

• @LynnSerafinn - tweeting about everything I do, business or otherwise
• @SpiritAuthors – tweeting about writing, self-publishing, book promotion, especially for mind-body-spirit authors
• @7GracesMarketng - tweeting about healing our fragmented society by changing the way we do business, and info about my upcoming book, talks, etc., “The 7 Graces of Marketing”
• @GardenOfTheSoul - tweeting about my radio show and book of the same name
• @TeknochikUK - tweeting about cool techie innovations that help you develop your social media platform.

And, if you want to see some “positive” tips about using Twitter, subscribe to my Spirit Authors blog. I’ll be posting my article “My Top 5 Twitter Apps” there very soon.

While you’re there, check out my Spirit Authors course “100 Days to Build Your Online Promotional Platform” (Module 2).

About Lynn Serafinn

Lynn Serafinn is transformation coach, bestselling author, radio host and promotional manager for a long list of #1 selling mind-body-spirit authors. She is the author of the bestseller The Garden of the Soul: lessons from four flowers that unearth the Self as well as the upcoming book The 7 Graces of Marketing: how to heal humanity and the planet by changing the way we sell (http://the7GracesOfMarketing.com )

Her membership site Spirit Authors (http://spiritauthors.com) offers training, coaching, business-building and inspiration for mind-body-spirit authors, whether established or aspiring. Contact Lynn about YOUR book project at at http://spiritauthors.com/contact.

Sign up for Lynn’s bi-monthly newsletter Creative Spirit (fill in form BELOW) packed with inspirational articles, online networking tips, broadcast guide to her radio show, and news about upcoming spiritual author book releases.

Throughout the year, Lynn also hosts large-scale telesummits with world-class speakers on a range of mind-body-spirit topics. Your subscription to Creative Spirit will ensure you’ll be the first to know how to attend these free events.

The grand prize is a book contract from Hampton Roads Publishing, one of the top Body-Mind-Spirit publishers in the world, along with a promotional package worth over $50,000.

There are 3 rounds of voting. The first round starts MONDAY March 29, 2010, and ends May 3, 2010. I could REALLY use your vote to help me advance to Round 2.

Here’s the video I made for my contest entry. I poured my heart and soul into it! If you cannot see it on your screen, view it on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8P92UVYwCQ.

If you think The Garden of the Soul deserves to go to a wider audience, please help me by:

1) Watching this video to help you decide whether you think I deserve the prize AND THEN
2) Voting for me at http://tinyurl.com/TopAuthorLynn between March 29 – May 3rd.
3) Help yourself to a THANK YOU GIFT on that page (it’s a collection of audio excerpts from my book)
4) SHARE the page via Twitter or Facebook (you’ll see the buttons right there on the page).

And there is NO pressure to choose only one author to win this contest! There are hundreds of great authors for you to consider, and you can vote for as many authors as you like (but you can only vote ONCE for each author per round).

I you can help me advance to Round 2 of this exciting competition, I will be EXTREMELY grateful!

My motivation is fuelled by your encouragement and comments. I’d love to hear what you have to say about the video, my book and whatever else, in the comments box below (if you are reading this in your email inbox, click HERE to leave a comment).

Thank you everyone!

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