Is Twitter Dead?
ByAbout a year ago, I got pretty involved in Twitter. I was meeting some really great people, networking and connecting. It was fun, and I was even getting leads from it. There was always some new course being offered, and new “twitter celebrities” were popping up all the time.
The active people on Twitter were also very good at policing things….too many marketing messages were frowned upon, and for the most part, things worked pretty well. There was a communication frenzy going on that was almost intoxicating.
Then, about 6 months ago, the bottom fell out. The cat was out of the bag. Many pseudo-marketers looked at it as a forum for blasting their messages. People got onto Twitter in droves, and just started spamming the entire community. Twitter did ban a lot of offenders, but they simply could not keep up with the people who insisted on littering the community with blatant marketing messages.
Back in the “good old days,” I had about 3,500 followers. If I put out an article, or a thought-provoking post, I could get about 40-50 eyeballs on it in a 24 hour period. Now I have 23,000 followers, and I am a better marketer. I am putting out better quality material. And now, I am lucky if I get 1-2 looking at my posts.
For most of the people who’ve been following me on Twitter, you’ve noticed (or have you?) that I don’t spend as much time on Twitter anymore. I find it much more difficult to make real connections, as there is so much litter to wade through. So, I now do most of my networking on Facebook.
I recently UNfriended (yes, UN) about 4,000 people on Facebook, just to get back to a manageable number of people that I was really connecting with. It has proven to be a really good move for me. I am now really connecting with the people that I really want to get to know. Isn’t that what Social Media is all about?
So, is Twitter dead? You tell me.
Shecky
4 Comments
February 26th, 2010 at 12:48 PM
You seem to have hit a nerve with this statement, I too used to really enjoy twitter and yesterday all of a sudden my ebox overflowed with marketing scams, 110,000 seeimingly ways to make money and all I had shared was that I was not working, haven’t worked in nearly three years due to illness, I didn’t ask to be inundated with ways tomake money. Now what really bothered me the most about the whole thing is this: The guys selling this junk are the only ones I am certain that ever make a dime from such tripe.
So I am now seriously reconsidering my participation in what was a wonderful new way to connect with others of like mind. Thanks for sharing what happened with you, made me feel a bit better and not such a traitor to be thinking about leaving twitter.
February 26th, 2010 at 12:52 PM
Interesting. I don’t think Twitter is dead, I think it is reverting to what it is designed to be, a conversational medium. I have a much smaller follower base, but the engagement percentage is actually growing as those relationships continues to get stronger — not via just RTs and blanket #ff posts, but with knowing about their lives and work. It was never going to be a quick fix.
February 26th, 2010 at 1:31 PM
Twitter is not dead (even though that fail whale tells me differently some days!) However, there is a group of people who abuse it and ruin it for the rest of us.
I set guidelines for my social media accounts – if I’ve never met you in person (or you are not a good person) you are not my friend on facebook. If I’ve heard of you via #ff a RT or an @ by a personal friend on mine on twitter then I’ll start following you. If your tweets are lame – I’ll unfollow you the next day. I also check my follower list once a week. Anyone from the UK or anyone I have no connection to I block. It may be cold hearted, but I bet 90% are spam and for the 10% who want to get in touch with me, they’ll find a way.
I use twitter as a way to build relationships in real life. Anyone I follow on twitter I look forward to meeting in real life – or maybe I know them in real life and need a way to communicate with them while I’m at my desk all day. Similar to Dawn’s comment – it’s my conversational medium.
July 20th, 2010 at 8:40 AM
Hey Shecky
I always wondered how people managed thousands of followers on twitter, and then it dawned on me, they don’t engage.
At best I can manage 40 to 50 personal contacts online at a time where I actually engage with them.
The question is how to be successful on twitter and I am guessing it comes down to creating meaningful discussions rather than just blasting out marketing messages to the unknown.