1 | Franco

May 7th, 2009 at 1:34 pm

Hey thanks Wayne! You know you bring an excellent point.

There are many people out there hyping up the use of “tools” to get you a million ‘friends’ or ‘followers’ on autopilot while you sleep… And while automation and leverage is ok, many people try to do as you say and abuse the tools by blatant spamming.

NOBODY will ever take you seriously doing that. And at some point they get ‘on’ to you and can ban your account. I’ve seen it happening more and more with youtube, google etc and it WILL become more prevalent with twitter, facebook and the rest as we go.

I actually like to see who it is I’m following and I stay away from being outright spammy and it’s really helped. While you don’t have to analyze each person for an hour, just take a look and click to see what they’re all about…

It’s really helped. Twitter and Facebook have been growing organically for me now after I put in some effort to follow and relate with real people… now they build on their own as others network and the ‘web’ of people grows.

http://www.TweetDeck.com and http://www.TweetLater.com a nice tools but please use them ‘Socially Responsible’ so you don’t become a ‘lemming’ - lol - And remember, just because you see many people doing something… it doesn’t mean it’s right or even effective. Most people learn those ‘get rich quick’ Twitter and Facebook etc ‘tactics’ from marketers who don’t have a clue or don’t care… and

It sounds good… so they think they have to do it…

No true at all, as Wayne clearly explains here.

Have fun out there!

2 | Jodie

May 8th, 2009 at 12:06 am

What a thoroughly enjoyable read Wayne, this is powerful yet fundamental understandings of human interaction. Less about ‘me, me, me’ we are actually here to connect with people of like mind, not sell every person who crosses our path on something. I just thought of the old adage that an employee will remain loyal and hardworking when they receive appreciation over a payrise. “money can’t buy you love” ha… I could go on!

3 | traffic

May 8th, 2009 at 7:12 pm

Jodie,
Thanks for your reply and certainly for your kind words.
You said, “money can’t buy you love” … I can vouch for that… many of the firms getting bailout money right now aren’t very loved by anyone nowadays. HA

4 | traffic

May 8th, 2009 at 7:27 pm

Franco,
I appreciate you mentioning TweetLater and TweetDeck. Both are good and I use a version of greatly enhanced TweetLater called PostLater.

I want to clarify that I am NOT against all tools. I use a number of tools myself to help me be more efficient… in fact I’m about ready to release a tool to help with brand and image building using the Social Web and I call it SocialBuzzMe. I refer to it as ETHICAL AUTOMATION. I think, if you use any tool or automation, your INTENT must be considered.

People who only want followers without the intent of interacting miss the real value of Twitter compared to traditional media. Twitter is a more pure type of attention given the fact that it is very personal. Let me give you an example:

I signed up to be an affiliate with ZAPPOS. I did the required filing out of information and wated and wated for an approval… nothing. I wanted longer to see if there was a disapproval… nothing. I, fortunately am followed on Twitter by the CEO of Zappos, so I made a comment to him. What happened next couldve never happened via email - he sent me a DM with his personal email address asking me for complete details and he would get things “right.” I scooted right past the gatekeeper… whisted past a spam filter and got his direct attention.

POWERFUL

I think the real uses of Twitter and many other micro-blogging and other type Social Web sites are there to use, and benefit from, for those willing to use them the right way. Twitter, for most of its users, is really best conceived as a new promotional vehicle that is used to drive someone somewhere else in order to build awareness of a personal brand, etc. But the gas that drives the vehicle? In my opinion is relationship building.

As always, love your posts Franco.

5 | Bob DeCecco

May 12th, 2009 at 3:49 am

Wayne, GREAT POST! You couldn’t be more right. As a matter of fact, I will be discussing on an upcoming post to our blog about how to turn the marketing funnel UPSIDE DOWN…picture that visual I will be discussing why I believe that the funnel is being used in the wrong direction…it gets to the heart of your approach as to how to best utilize the tools we all have available at our fingertips. Look for the post coming soon!

6 | Susan Ross

May 19th, 2009 at 3:57 pm

Thanks for the post Wayne. I totally get what you are saying about following the wrong people. Well, now I get it. I was having a really hard time grasping the concept of why twitter was so special. It felt like everytime I logged on, I had to see 50 messages that were just pure spam and I didn’t really care to see. I had to scroll and scroll to get to any decent conversations. There was no personal touch, no building of relationships and just frustrating. I actually took about 2 weeks away from it just because I was annoyed! And then I decided to try to clean it up a bit. I am feeleing alittle better about using twitter now and look forward to building more relationships!

7 | traffic

May 20th, 2009 at 2:41 am

Susan,
You’re very welcome. I think the power (and abuses) of Twitter are really just beginning. Learning what you did will translate and be usable to “the next big thing”…whatever will be Twitter’s replacement.