Still on the fence whether you should sign up? Or resurrect your account (because when you tried using Twitter, it was just too much to bother investing time in)?
To leverage the time I spend on Twitter, I’ve set some guidelines for myself:
- Only follow individuals who share their first and last names on their profile.
- If someone follows me, I don’t need to follow back automatically. (Though I do usually follow back)
- Consider connecting with a person outside of Twitter (preferably via email), if they do not respond to (or struggle to keep track of) direct messages.
- Minimise Tweets, and focus more on direct messaging.
- No using external apps (particularly auto responders).
- Limit people I am following.
Of course, as with guidelines, they are a starting point — and don’t have to be set in stone. If there are times I think I have to deviate from it, having that specific guideline in mind just helps me give that action a second (or third!) thought.
One example is following @SomeKernels author of ‘Some Kernels of Truth‘ (deviation from guideline #1):
Would love to hear how you make the most of your time on Twitter! Do you have guidelines too (even if they are just mental notes! I actually hadn’t written out my guidelines until this post!)? Use the comment section below or send me a message directly. 🙂
Leigh's Notes 
Hey, Interesting points although I can’t stand it when people DM me especially saying ‘Thank you for following me’ I feel like UNfollowing them.
I find I follow-for-follow more and more these days to get a stable follower number and occasionally do a cull using an app that helps me find those cheeky un-followers and non-Tweeters (dead accounts). I need to up-date my Online_Academic blog about the Twitter ‘spring clean’.
I put everyone in lists so I follow who I like and if I want to see what a particular group of specialists are doing I just go to the list. I don’t sit and look at my feed, it’s pointless.
I have a different set of rules for Tweeting, more about functionality and not making mistakes. 🙂
https://onlineacademic.wordpress.com/twitter-for-academics/twitter-for-academics-part-four-my-twelve-rules-of-tweeting/
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Ah! I better stick to connecting with you via email then? 🙂 (I do drop a couple of DMs to thank someone for following me, then start getting to know them —- all done manually…no automated ones!)
Appreciate you sharing your tweeting rules.
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Thank you for sharing this link with me. It gives me some more things to think about as I learn to use Twitter as a writer’s tool. There is a little, scared part of me that is afraid of making etiquette blunders as a Twitter noob. For example: “follow back those who follow.” I fear creating offense, but I really don’t want to follow accounts that don’t interest me. I’ve decided to be wholly selfish for now while I’m learning, and if I cause offense – oh well!
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You’re welcome Katie! Glad you’ve found your starting point. 🙂
For further reading…I found this: http://www.inc.com/jeff-haden/twitter-etiquette-must-you-follow-back.html
in which Jeff notes: “There is no right way to use Twitter. It’s just a tool.”
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He makes some good points. Thanks for sharing!
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Thanks for breaking your first rule for me! 🙂 I don’t use my full name because it’s somewhat distinctive and I enjoy being able to discuss certain topics with some privacy. It’s a quirk of mine, I guess… 🙂 As for your other Twitter guidelines, I agree with all of them, except I find most of the direct messages I get to be spammy. So I avoid using that feature myself, although I remain open to receiving/filtering them. Great post!
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