I Purged My Twitter Acount
I’ve now been on Twitter since May 2007.
When I wrote Twitter power, I had about 5000 followers.
Fast forward to late 2009. I hit 83,000 followers, but that’s nothing compared to the hundreds of thousands or millions of followers that some members have acquired.
It’s been an interesting ride, but a number of things have happened that have caused me to reevaluate my Twitter strategy.
Just as Twitter is a dynamic site that evolves and changes as it grows, how we use Twitter must also remain fluid.
Let me be clear about one thing.
Twitter is here for the long haul, and it is more important than ever for businesses to be using the service. It’s even more important for them to use it in a way that builds relationships and enhances brands.
With that said, I want to share a bit about my journey with you, as well as explain my recent decision to completely purge everyone I am following and start over.
I started using Twitter because I was fascinated by the concept of micro-blogging. It’s one thing to blog with no limitations on length. It’s another to be limited to 140 characters. How exactly DOES one answer the question “What are you doing?”
In fact, my first tweet was probably similar to the majority of confused Twittedr users.
“Trying to figure out this Twitter thing.”
I like to check out new social media sites, so I only gave Twitter a cursory glance and didn’t revisit it until November 2007. That’s when I “got it.”
Twitter wasn’t about what I was doing. Twitter was about who I am and how I relate to others.
Twitter wasn’t about how many people are following me (even though it is fun to track milestone numbers).
And Twitter wasn’t something to build my life around.
Twitter was just an extension of my life. It’s another way to be myself and interact with the world and people around me.
To this day, when people ask me how often they should tweet, I tell them that I “tweet like I eat.” That is, when I am hungry or have food in front of me.
It’s as natural as breathing. It’s just living my life.
I may disappear for days and I may go on a streak of @replies. I don’t build my life around Twitter. I weave in and out as fits my own goals and lifestyle.
Not everyone takes the same approach.
Over the past couple years, I’ve seen it all.
Some people are focused on acquiring followers, even to the point of using autofollow software. Essentially the idea is that when you follow random people a lot of them will follow you back.
I actually went through a brief spell of testing this myself and found that a number of people who use TweetLater (now Social Oomph) to autofollow others back do indeed increase their follower count.
I do not endorse this method. Nor do I endorse software used to artificially grow your following. It’s not organic and goes against the very principles of social interaction that Twitter is based upon.
Others look at how many followers you have in a competitive sense.
You come across all kinds of characters on Twitter. These are real people that live in the real world. You’re bound to find some … um… strange people?
There was one guy that I followed for a time whose tweets began to creep me out. You know what I mean. There are some people that you just don’t want to keep too close.
He began comparing his follower numbers with mine and started calling me out because how was it possible that I was the Twitter expert and he had more followers. Great shades of high school!
He was obviously artificially inflating his numbers by following as many people as Twitter would allow. You can usually tell if this is the case because these people will be following more people than are following them.
Anyhow, I unfollowed this person and he then began calling me out for doing so. It was really just a bit too much crazy for me.
So I blocked him.
Of course, he then began whining that I blocked him as though I was some sort of evil person that the Twitter police should come and arrest. It only served to reinforce my decision to block.
The lesson is this…
Just as you should set healthy boundaries in real life, you have permission to set healthy boundaries on Twitter.
Boundaries exist to keep good stuff in and bad stuff out. Life is complicated enough without having to deal with people who don’t have boundaries.
Anyhow, moving on…
My publisher at John Wiley & Sons asked me if I would write Twitter Power in September of 2008.
I said yes and handed them a manuscript by December 1st.
The book came out in February 2009 and has gone on to become the best-selling book on Twitter in the world, even being translated into Portugese, Korean and Chinese, with more on the way.
The second edition manuscript has been submitted and is now in the editing process. It is due out in the spring 2010.
I’m grateful for the fantastic reviews and following that the book has attracted. As a result, I regularly get asked to speak at conferences and workshops, as well as lead a number of teleseminars and webinars on the subject.
And during this time, my follower count has increased to approximately 83,000. I was following approximately 70,000 people.
That’s when I really became aware of two things.
1) My stream had become unmanageable. There was no way in the world to keep up with the natural flow of the people I was following. Direct Messages had become laced with spam and I never looked at them. And I lived by the @reply to see tweets that were directly addressed to me.
2) There are tons of spam accounts that exist only to be followed so they can broadcast direct marketing messages to you. Just how many, I didn’t know.
I realized it was time to clean up my act.
So this week I began searching for options to do maintenance on my account. What would that mean?
The first thought was that I would manually begin unfollowing people I didn’t really know, or that I suspected to be spam accounts.
I realized this would take an unreasonable amount of time and manpower. It wouldn’t work.
So what if I could just unfollow the spam accounts? How would I go about finding those?
I found this page which had some suggested Twitter follower management tools.
Most of them couldn’t process the large number of followers I had and timed out before loading them into their interface. Fail.
I ended up at Social Too, and saw that they offered a complete following wipe for $25.
I thought about it for thirty seconds and decided what the heck. Let’s just start over.
Most of the Twitter spam accounts use a follow-back service. So if I unfollow them, they will unfollow me automatically.
And thus began “the great Twitter purge of 2009”.
I paid my $25, pushed the button, and began to watch the number of people I was following drop like a rock.
By morning, I was following no one. Zip. Zilch. Zero. Nada. Zed. Bupkis.
And my follower count has plummeted from 83,000 to 72,000.
I fully expect it to continue falling as people realize they have been unfollowed.
I’m just fine with it because my new Twitter strategy is this.
1) I will follow who I want to follow because I want to follow them. That means I will follow friends, family, associates, those I find personally interesting and those who interact with me.
2) Don’t follow me if you aren’t interested in following me. My tweets will just clutter your stream.
It’s amazing how many people got hacked off because I unfollowed them. It’s almost an entitlement mentality. “GASP! I deserve to be followed by you!”
And not everyone who follows me is going to agree with me!
I am not shy about sharing my opinions on political, religious and societal matters.
Follow me and you’ll discover that I am a conservative Christian (not one of THOSE!)
You’ll also find out that I have been saying global warming is a hoax for quite some time.
You may be shocked when you realize that I love sugary foods even though they aren’t good for you.
I am honest about who I am and not afraid to be real with others.
Yes, I have had people unfollow me because of a view they don’t like.
Ok, buh-bye.
They have called me out publicly for not being politically correct.
No one is forcing you to follow me. Don’t let the virtual door hit you on the way out.
Now please don’t misunderstand me.
That doesn’t mean I WANT you to unfollow me. It just means that you don’t have to if you don’t want to. My feelings will not be hurt!
I am a nice guy and very social. If you have ever met me in person you know that what you see is what you get. I don’t pretend to be something I’m not. I greet everyone with a smile. 🙂
But you know what?
I’m not going to have anyone dictate to me how I do or don’t use Twitter.
Use Twitter how you want.
Personally, I believe that purging accounts that have spun out of control is a good thing. It is very freeing from my perspective.
As I result, I believe I will be getting more, and giving more, on Twitter.
Please leave your comments below and feel free to tweet this article!
Hi Joel,
I agree with all you have said. Even as a diabetic, Type II, I still like sugary foods. I have learned when to eat them and when to pass. Thank goodness it is the starches which affect my blood sugar levels more than do straight sugars. Lucky me!
I only have a little over 1000 followers on Twitter. I also quite auto-following everyone a couple of months back. I check their profiles and if they are interesting, don’t keep retweeting the same message and only selling, and/or are into something I am also into, I follow them. I also rarely follow someone who is brand new to Twitter i.e. has only one or three tweets.
I am too cheap to spend the $25 to purge everyone. Still, I find it hard to keep up with some of the people I really want to read. I think I will have to learn to really use Tweetdeck or maybe some lists to organize my followers better. Right now, working to find a way to drive some traffic to my jewelry sites occupies most of my time.
As for global warming, I also agree with you. What always gets to me is that those who are pushing it seem to forget that we have no idea of how the climate of this earth changes over eons. We only know what we have studies, for a very short time at that. I think it is absolute pompous egotism for us to then presume to be able to predict what will happen in the future.
Pulling a John Chow.You know your going to get some slack for doing it, just like he did.
http://www.2gypt.com/gold
Hi Joel
Spot on. Excellent article, and you’re absolutely right.
It’s so easy to get caught up in numbers when it should be good relations that matter.
So grateful for stating your case so clearly. Keep up the good work.
Seasonal greetings to you and your family – and the great team at WorldVillage, Infomedia etc. 🙂
From the very beginning, I knew it wasn’t about numbers, but quality. Just like real life. You’ll love it. The people you follow will be a community of information and knowledge. Sure beats “Good night Tweeple. See you tomorrow,” one of the saddest comments I’ve ever read.
Hi Joel,
Great article.
I have a question. Do you “truly” see Twitter as a viable marketing and promotional tool for young, start-up companies eager to build their brands?
We definitely have solid examples of Twitter bringing us in contact with people that we would have otherwise never met, but to what extent does this translate into actual brand building and sales for small businesses?
In the context of brand building, does it not make sense to accumulate as many targeted followers as possible?
Thanks in advance for any reply you can muster.
Great post, Joel! I’ve been meaning to read this for awhile (been crazy busy), and I am glad I did. Someone had to say it, and you said it perfectly! Merry Christmas to you and your family.
David Track
http://MLMSocial.com
Joel I think you’re right!
Too many people play the I’ll follow you if you follow me game on twitter, I certainly do. Right now my twitter account is approximately 13,500 followers, and I’m following 14,500 people. However, in truth I only follow 30 of 40 people who I really respect within the business via tweetdeck, and often either read, retweet or comment on their tweets as they come in.
It’s the same with Facebook, I have hundreds of Facebook friends but in fact only monitor a further 20 or 30 individuals who interest me, and that I have some in common with.
So why do I do it?
For me I suppose much of it comes down to social proof! If you have thousands of followers and friends then wow! …you must be popular and worth looking at!
Also, the more social bookmarking I do, the more traffic I seem to drive to my site.
My Google analytics tell me that a respectable percentage of my traffic comes via twitter or Facebook! So recently I tried a little experiment. I asked my twitter followers to go to a particular link and tell me what they thought of the article I had written. Surprisingly, the results were interesting, although quite a low percentage when compared to my number of followers, I can get between 50 and 200 people to my site per request and that’s really worth doing.
In the future however, I also may purge my account, or more likely start a second account and ask followers who have an original interest in me and my topic to switch their focus to this account, and in return I will only follow the people who really interest me.
Thank you for sharing these resources! My # following got a little out of control when I started following the lists I am on. Now I know not to automatically follow every list. 🙂
I am really enjoying Twitter Power! Excited to hear the 2nd edition will be out this spring.
~Kylene
Your example has encouraged me to do the same thing with my email lists. What a relief – and thanks for giving me permission to do it!!
Best Wishes, George
Over the past few months, I’ve received followers’ request from people I didn’t know of — porn sites, marketing enthusiasts, the likes.
I ignored all requests, of course.
Today, the autofollow thingy got to a whole new level — 41 requests at the same time. Thank God for being in ‘protected’ status, although it may seem like I was being a virtual snob for letting people request to follow me.
The thing is, I use Twitter to get information. Communicating with friends are secondary. Because of Twitter, I’ve become a lill’ bit more informed, so to speak, compared to friends. Hurray to 140s.
Numbers don’t matter. What matters more is the right type of people that you follow.
[Your next book: Twitter Personality. Maybe?]
I am not a big fan of twitter. I think many people get caught up in the number of followers they have instead of if they are actually adding value to people’s lives.
However, a recent experience has shown me the power of perception. If you have a large number of followers in a certain niche it can give others, some not all, the perception that you are an expert in what you do.
When I first started my Twitter account, I did a little research about how to go about following and getting others to follow me. Like you explained in this post, some thought you should follow everyone that followed you and vice versa…
… Working with business owners for years, helping them get rid of Email Spam, all I could see is opening myself to Twitter Spam, using automated follow tools.
So, I went with the organic way, if I think I will enjoy your tweets, I follow you, if I think I can help you or learn from you, I follow you, it’s that simple.
Hi Joel,
I too had a similar awakening. I couldn’t really follow who was on first as the story goes. It was then that I started taking a hard look at my followers and noticed that there was a large number of people who hadn’t post anything for months.
So I un_followed them but they were still in my followers list. I tried everything, even sent Dm asking if there was anyone home!
So my question is how do you remove all of the dead wood in you twitter account?
Thanks
Don
Hi Joel,
Great article, I read every word, and thank you very much!
I only entered the mobile and internet marketing business at the beginning of August, and whaau, did I learn quickly, it was a rude introduction and I soon realized how careful one must be for all the rehashed rubbish out there. Some Big Name Guru sold me old stuff from between 2003 and 2007, scary stuff but I learned very quickly.
Only after that did I join Twitter and Facebook and I am 48! Couple of weeks ago, after some of the bad experiences, I decided to select only a few honest people to be mentors and to learn from in future, and that was the right decision and I only follow and subscribe to whom I think I can learn from from what I want to achieve online in future.
So I want to thank you again for this article as a newbie, and by Following You I learned so it was the right thing to do.
Hopefully you won’t pull the plug on me, but if you do I will understand.
Kind regards,
Herman
Hi … I keep in touch with persons that have more closely related values as I have. That’s how Mark Hansen and I met — we have similar interests and I almost literally beg borrowed and stole to get to the West Coast. Sadly I missed Bob Allen as he had his very serious accident during that conference and wasn’t expected to live … Bob has been in my prayers ever since .. I even left a copy of my book with Mark for Bob and wrote amoung others on a T-shirt that he was in my prayers and we would meet … I write this only to note and affirm what I think I hear you saying. People are the most important consideration on this planet with children being the most important!
I can’t keep up with everyone –I often would like to! I have met very very important people both famous and rich … too many are unhappy and a few are gone now and I loved them truly and wished I spent more time with them … we are not in any contest on this earth but to enjoy each other more … those that most closely think as we do … not that we are so special or “us” that are perfect or it is only right or wrong but to keep checks on ourselves by those we value — We want those close to us to tell us when we may need a course correction.
In this life I have found there are very few I have found to be life long friends .. Both those that accept me for who I am and I too them.
As I have thus far failed to finally say is we are not or should not be in competition with each other but rather “Who are you” which I have asked 1000’s of people … not so much for me to know them but for them to start to know themselves! (PART OF MY BRANDING)
There’s more but I felt your thoughts were honest and hold value for me … that’s why I still keep in touch “so to speak” =)I hope that others aside from the comments really get it!
Please take care and I am still smiling about your tatoo! I think your daughter’s giggles were precious!
Thanks Rick =)
PS I follow 44 and 62 follow me .. not sure of some I FOLLOW AND DON’T KNOW!?? I’ll check later … I started out being selective I guess and will come in last … seems I have heard something like that before … the last shall be first and the first shall be last ,,,?
Paranoid
One day…
For now, I use Twitter lists to segment and find the tweets that matter most. I get what you are saying though, Joel!
Hello Joel,
I am using Twitter since years but this time I want to connect some experts especially designers but problem is I don’t understand how can I connect them because I don’t know about their business niche so here I want some help regarding this.
Acount? I know, it’s too late to change it now, and I love your article, but still, it jumped out at me.
I manually purged all of my accounts. Not a total reboot like you did, but rather an evaluation of … every … single … contact. It took about a month.
Facebook was the most fun because (1) watching the numbers move down faster than McDonald’s numbers used to move up. LinkedIn was the most challenging because (1) almost 30,000 connections and (2) again, manually. Twitter was easy. I tend to keep it clean.
The moral of my story is pretty obvious. Don’t let your feed get cluttered in the first place.