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Seven Things that Influence Whether or Not I Engage with Someone on Twitter

Are you a bone marrow donor?  Have you read the post about my cousin Katie?  If not, please click here to read it now.

I spend a lot of time focusing on the people who follow me on Twitter.  They’ve given me the gift of their attention, so it would be disrespectful to do otherwise.

Everyday, at least once, I peruse my new followers to see who they are, and to engage a bit with each of them.  Below are a few observations about that, and some tips on what might cause someone like me to engage more with someone like you.

1.  Twitter is social which by definition means it’s about human interaction.  If you don’t look like a human, it’s unlikely I’m going to feel compelled to interact with you.

• Your avatar should be a picture of YOU.  Not your company icon or some random photo.
• Preferably, your Twitter username should be YOUR name, or a nickname, as opposed to your company name or something generic.
• At least ONE of these these things need to be about YOU.  Let me show you some examples:

GOOD:

GOOD:

GOOD:

BAD:

From these, I know at least one thing personal about @micah, @davemcclure and @pistachio.  But, I’m not sure who this person @breakingnoose is, so as a result I’m not really inclined to try to engage with them.

2.  Along those lines, let’s talk about your bio:

• Use your real name, or at least pseudonym.  If you don’t want everyone to know you’re Samuel Clemens, then go by Mark Twain.  But, remember, Mark Twain was Mark Twain to everyone…he was the person, just using a different name.
• This is especially important if your Twitter username isn’t your name, or at least a human name.  For example, @pistachio puts her real name in her bio.
• In your bio, you MUST have a link to a web page. Ideally, it would be a web page about you–a blog, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google Profile, etc.  A company is okay too…just something that is going to tell me something more about you.  If there is no link, then my engag-o-meter sinks quickly.
• As far as your actual bio text goes, I don’t pay that close of attention, although I prefer a sentence as oppose to a listing of buzzwords.  “Social media marketing productivity coach guru ninja rockstar,” is pretty bogus and you know it too.  Be authentic.

GOOD:

BAD:

3.  Say something.  I’m more inclined to respond to someone who tweets their thoughts as opposed to simply retweets what other people say.  This is not a strict rule.  Retweeting does give me some insight into who you respect and what thoughts you value.  Same goes for people who tweet quotes and links.  However, just like in real life, people who don’t occasionally have an original thought aren’t very interesting.  Again, make it personal and human.

4.  By looking at a) one page of tweets, b) your bio, and c) your background image I can tell if you use Twitter to engage with others or simply to promote yourself.  I’ve written before how the fact that Twitter is yet another broadcast medium isn’t very interesting to me.  What makes Twitter transformational is the two-way conversation that it enables, and I find people who use it that way interesting.

5.  Speaking of background images, to me this is one of the easiest ways to tell if you’re a self-promoter.  If you have spent a lot of time making a beautiful background that promotes all your virtues then I feel like you’re in it more for you and less for the community.

6.  Tweet reguarly.  If you only tweet once ever few weeks or months, that tells me you’re not really engaged with the community.  Now, that’s completely fair because you may be a listener.  But, if you are only a listener, then you’re also a lurker and that’s sort of creepy.  To a degree, you have to be part of the conversation.

7.  Unlock your profile.  If your tweets are protected, it’s really hard to engage with you.  If you link your bio to a web page about you, then it gets easier, but lots of times people who protect their tweets don’t do that.  That just sends me a message that says, “I’m not interested in letting you know me,” which is fine, but understand the implications of that.

Are any of these hard-and-fast rules?  No.  But, as I participate in the community, these are things that I’ve noticed influence whether or not I engage with you.

links for 2009-10-09

• Startup Metrics
  (tags: Startup)
• Pomp & Surkanstance: Source code recycling

Lending a Book to a Friend with the Kindle (or How Kindle Harms Virality)

If I buy a book on the Kindle, can I lend it to a friend?  My understanding is that I cannot.  (Well, I could lend my whole Kindle, but not just the book.)

If I were an author, I’m not sure I would like this because it eliminates the viral nature of books.  As an author, or any content creator, there is a lot of value in virality.  To simply have your name “out there” as a meme in the a community, hive or culture has a lot of value–as part of the conversation at a cocktail party, so to speak.

Think of this case: have you ever been lent a book that you enjoyed reading, then suggested to someone else that they read the book?  I have.  In other words, I became an evangelist for the author.  I think this is worth as much, if not more, than few dollars they would have earned from the book.

Or, what about books checked out from the library?

And, second-hand bookstores.  In a pure sense, the author not the seller, should be earning the dollars when a book is resold.  However, Mr. Market factors that loss into the original price of the book.  In other words, pricing has reached an equilibrium taking into account the viral benefits of the secondary market.

There are lots of technical ways Kindle could solve this problem, but let me suggest just one.  It’s not the best solution, but it’s easy: for each Kindle book that I buy and download I get to “share it” with exactly one other person.

From an implementation point of view, the act of “sharing” is simply by giving a unique promo code to a friend.  The code can be used only once and only for a specific book.  Online promo codes are well established, so this shouldn’t be hard.  And, there are many easy ways that they could be shared from device-to-device, by e-mail, etc.

Anyhow, all I’m saying is that there’s a lot of value to viralty.  This about it this way: in a perfect world, content creators would get paid each time their work is used.  However, just because they’re not getting paid cash doesn’t mean they’re not getting value from their work.

#helpsavekatieslife

Let’s cut to the chase, gang: my cousin Katie has cancer.

It is not the good kind of cancer, if such a thing exists.  It’s the bad kind where your chances are grim.  A year ago she underwent treatment, they gave it some awfully low percentage chance, but luckly it went into remission.  Sadly, less than a year later, it has returned.

Long-story short: Kate needs to find a bone marrow donor.  There is a bone marrow donor registry at Marrow.org, but of the 12 million people currently on the registry not a single person is a match to Katie.

We are tying to round up as many people as possible to register. All you need to do to register is go to http://www.marrow.org.

Do it now, not in 5 minutes, not tonight, not this weekend, but now.  Every day counts and Katie’s life depends on a kind and generous friend or stranger who is willing to make a difference.

You can read more about Katie’s story here: http://www.kancerclub.com