As much as many of us like to think that we’re highly organized and efficient when it comes to our use of Twitter, there is in fact a lot we can do to make our lives easier.
In the last couple of weeks I’ve adopted some fairly radical measures to streamline and improve my use of Twitter, which I’ll share with you here.
1 – Cut the Number of People You Follow
The temptation when you first start using Twitter is to embark on a ‘follow rampage’. You add the news sites you read, the bloggers you respect, friends, family, colleagues, business contacts and in turn many of the people that follow or are followed by these accounts.
This seems like a great idea at first, but you find you soon reach a tipping point – in my own case, by following close to 2000 people, Twitter had become nothing more than a never-ending deluge of noise, with useful and informative Tweets getting lost amongst the junk. Even by setting up userlists in Seesmic Desktop (the desktop app I use), I was finding it ever harder to keep up.
A couple of weeks back I made the decision to cut back on who I followed. It was time to ‘purge’.
Before hitting the unfollow option in earnest, I realised it would be a wise idea to set myself some criteria for who I should keep:
- Is the person i’m following bringing any real value to me? The million dollar question. It’s very easy to follow someone just because everyone else is, or because you they have a job that gives the assumption that their tweets will be useful. Often this couldn’t be further from the truth.
- Is the person i’m following tweeting unique information and links or are they mainly retweeting stuff i’m already getting from other sources?
- Does the person i’m following follow me and if they do, do they ever communicate with me or retweet what I put out there?
I’m sure there’s plenty of further criteria of your own that you could add, but this is what suited me personally.
Next, I realised that as I was currently following so many people, it would take me many hours to go through everyone using Twitter on its own. Thankfully there’s some great tools available to help you. I used Your Twitter Karma, so i’ll describe the process I went through in using this tool specifically.
When you log in to Your Twitter Karma (be patient – it can take a few minutes to load your details) you’re presented with a huge list of Twitter users. Under each itemised Twitter account it tells you whether you follow that person, whether they follow you, or whether you both follow each other. Clicking on the avatar brings up that person’s Twitter profile, so you can refresh your memory as to who they are, what they do, and whether their tweets are of value to you.
Next comes the evil part! The purge…
Select the users that you wish to stop following, by clicking the checkbox next to their avatar. This can be quite a time-consuming process, but it’s well worth it in the long run. When you’ve selected everyone you want to unfollow, click the ‘bulk unfollow’ button at the bottom of the page.
All done! Now check your Twitter profile to check that your follow count has dropped to what you expect. Be prepared that your follower count may also drop slightly, as some people use auto-follow / auto-unfollow tools that will drop you if you drop them.
2 – Effectively Manage the Remaining People You Follow
In my case, once I’d purged my account I was left with around 200 people I was still following – a drop of over 2000! In return about 200 people stopped following me.
Once I’d got over what I’d done, it was time to effectively manage who I was left with.
This next step is very easy to undertake. Most desktop Twitter applications (such as Seesmic Desktop and TweetDeck) allow you to set up usergroups, whereby you can classify the people you follow into distinct groups, such as ‘friends’, ‘collegues’, ‘business’, ‘celebrities’ etc. In future when you get a new tweet for someone you have allocated to a group it will appear in the appropriate group column. This way you can find and read it with far less difficulty.
Twitter now also allows you to set up lists as well, so you can group together people in a similar way.
3 – Be Prepared to Fall in Love With Twitter All Over Again
I know that what I’ve described sound quite radical, but believe me, if Twitter has become an out of control stream of tweets that you can’t keep up with, it really is your only option.
Now i’ve drastically cut the number of people I follow down to the bare bones, I’ve rediscovered my love for this great tool.
Additionally, whereas before I wouldn’t have dreamed of using Twitter on my iPhone, now I can login to the likes of Tweetie and thumb my way through tweet after tweet of valuable information (and the odd piece of celebrity gossip!).
The value is back!
Please note: Undertake the steps I’ve outlined at your own risk. I can not be held responsible for anything that may happen to your Twitter account as a result of following what you read here. Also be warned that it is not advisable to bulk-unfollow Twitter accounts then bulk-follow new accounts, as Twitter may deem you to be mis-using their service and suspend your account without notice.
@topicturtle
Mark, I just did the same thing a few days ago. I cut a few thousand and still need to trim more. And, obviously, my follower count dropped as well. I used http://www.Refollow.com and used the sorting features, which is great for cutting the spam-type profiles. It certainly does help make Twitter of more value.
@RebeccaZwar
This is a great tip. It’s so easy to get overwhelmed by Twitter. In fact, there are moments when I think “Hey, whatever happened to so-and-so” because their great tweets have been completely overrun by the other 2000 people I follow and I haven’t seen them in a while. Groups/userlists can help, but it’s easy to miss people you want to keep an eye on if they don’t tweet as frequently. I’ve used Refollow as well, and it’s a good tool, but I’m going to check out Your Twitter Karma as well. Thanks for the tip!
@finolaprescott
I’ve stopped following obvious bulk followers unless they fit pretty much the criteria you’ve outlined but haven’t done a purge yet, am still considering what I really want and can get out of twitter.
I know I tend also not to choose to follow people who have a very low following count vis their follower count though so it will be interesting to find out how your choice affects the numbers that now choose to follow you. I suspect it depends most on your celebrity status, then on the value of your tweets and lastly on your interaction, but it’d be interesting to hear back from you and Eric in a month or so.
@JohnAguiar
That’s the great thing about twitter, use it how ever you choose to. and with the List feature it def makes it alot easier to follow and see who you want when you want.
There is still a benefit to having a big following, it just depends on what you REALLY want out of Twitter.
Great Post.
@rsouzanet
i totally agree with you! You have just read my mind. I’ve been doing this lately and it really works.
@FreebyrdDesign
I made a similar mistake when I first began Tweeting; I had not been on here long when I realized that I was swamped in verbal diarrhea and finding any meaningful tweet was time consuming and frustrating.
Using the list feature in Twitter has provided the all tools I needed to separate professional tweets from those of my friends and family; however my following/follower numbers are still low, that may changing as I acquire some higher numbers.
@billymitchell1
Mark, When you are followed by what seems to be a “bulk follower” or someone with 50,000 followers already that is obviously marketing a money-making scheme, do you block them in addition to not following back?
I usually block anyone (or any autobot) that looks like a spammer.
Do you simply ignore new followers you choose not to follow back or do you also block them as part of your purge process?
If you do a bit of both, do you use any special app to help you make your decision or just take them one case at time?
@loneplacebo
That’s why we have UnfollowFriday.
@ariherzog
There’s another reason why you might want to unfollow tweeps — as I’ve done — and that is because of twitter.com lists. Unlike those seesmic/tweetdeck groups which require you follow someone to group them, lists don’t require following.
As such, I currently follow about 35 by stream and 500+ by list.
@shamakern
I have been using twitter karma as well, it works great. And I agree, if the good and useful posts get buried in the spam, twitter is no fun anymore. I find that all those who post half a dozen, obviously automated tweets in a row need to be unfollowed along with all those who do not interact with hardly anyone. I love to see twitterers who really interact with others.
@JustTooBusy
Not a new concept and something many have done and talked about but a useful one IF you find your Twitterstream becoming overwhelming. After all the point of Twitter is to be ’social’ and engage once past a certain point it can become a chore rather than a pleasure.
However, tools like TweetDeck and now Twitter Lists are specifically designed to help manage a larger number of people. Again Twitter is social and why block yourself from anyone who can enrich your social/business experience and exposure – unless they are spammers of course!
Happy purging – if you fancy it!
@dadhakumar
It gives lot of useful information to manage the Twitter account effectively.
@seospain
Nice tips Mark! Wasn’t aware of Your Twitter Karma but have now tried it out and is a really useful tool. I agree that if you follow too many people just in order to attract more followers yourself that this can backfire on you and make your stream very muddy.
@reneehendricks
I highly recommend Twit Cleaner (http://is.gd/5G664) to help clean out your Twitter follows. I used it the other day and have cut down on the bs noise on my feed.
@foxygknits
I also use Twit Cleaner and highly recommend it.
@Don;t have one yet
How do you delete Tweets from other people?