Twitter "Dropping the Hammer"?

Did they get a notice from Twitter that they were "locked down" or were they just unable to follow more people? If the latter, are you sure they didn't hit a limit? You can follow 10% more people than follow you. Once you hit that 10%, you won't be able to follow more until you gain followers or drop unfollowers.

I really don't get Twitter. Seems like a huge new fad and a big popularity contest. Everyone is competing like mad to get the most followers. Why? I have no idea?

I guess if you want to see Shaq tweet about his new diet or follow some other celebrity then it's useful.

Personally, I have more important things to do.

I'm waiting for Twitter to die sooner or later.

From what I understand, they haven't been able to monetize the service. They're living off borrowed funds.

Sooner or later, I see them introducing paid plans for people with 1000+ followers. Or enormous amounts of advertising.

Twitter seems to be suffering from terminal marketeritis.

It seems that a good social idea has been hi-jacked and converted to a marketing platform with all sorts of twittering going on about the latest, greatest worm fest. Aren't the same sort of comments being made about several of the bigger social sites?

Ask Ashton if his twitter account has been locked down. He has over 1 million followers!

I think its just a bunch of crap like back in the day when you'd receive an spam mail saying that if you did not do something or other that msn messenger or yahoo chat will no longer be free, or the recent Myspace crap that said your account will be deleted if you do not log in immediately and show activity.

I have heard of people being banned, but my twitter life time lasted about a week, I never really saw the overall appeal of it, besides being more limited than facebook and myspace.

It's what I call CB-radio syndrome. Remember them? The minute a new way of communicating becomes a fad, everyone moves over to that side of the ferry. Then the ferry tips over.

It's like bars/pubs/taverns -- the public latches on to one, then it becomes all the rage, then it goes out of business.

I say, if it doesn't result in *actual* transactions, it's a fad to be avoided. Getting attention is but one aspect of successful marketing. (Merely) getting attention does not (necessarily) guarantee success (read: transactions)!

-- TW

Honestly I think it will just turn into another spam site until twitter cleans it up. At that point it probably will become so cumbersome to promote anything on it that people will stop using it.

I have a friend who constantly wants to chat on Yahoo Messenger, and I've had to tell them to leave me alone except for certain times - mainly when I initiate it. Ha! It seems like once you start chatting on IM, there's no way to stop the conversation.

Well, Twitter seems a lot like that to me too. If you want to actually follow a conversation, you have to spend a lot of time on the site. How the heck can you get anything else done?

I just haven't been able to get all "turned on" about it either.

I check in every so often, and post something, but you can't let it take control.

Have you checked out this?

Twitter Support :: I can't follow people: follow limits

Good Luck!

I'm thinking it's because there are tools out there that automate your "follower-building." Like twollow.com.

Anyone can use a tool like this, build a list on autopilot, and start selling to them.

Twitter has plans to introduce advertising...they said it at one time... I just don't think the advertisers will get the ROI they would expect from the traffic.

The one thing with twitter is...successful marketing via twitter is done from marketers that use twitter just like they do their normal opt-in lists. You have to think of Twitter more as an opt-in then a place to just spam away for sales.

Me I don't really like twitter either....heh But I know it can be useful for the people that make their money from lists only and their whole business model is based on lists. Those people dominate on twitter.

Good thing that twitter didn't drop the hammer before everyone that wants to spam the bejeezus out of twitter built up 20 profiles with 5,000+ followers each. Morons.

I just read where they are limiting follows to a max of 1,000 a day.

I don't know what's up with Twitter.. but I lost my account for a few days. The password mysteriously changed and Twitter couldn't send the password reset email to me (but it could directly email me?)
It's straightened out now.. thanks to A LOT of emailing to them.

So what would define a spammer on twitter?

Certainly someone who sets up an account and posts the same message / link repeatedly .. But then there is a gray area with semi auto post accounts that do post relevant content to whatever niche they choose, but also the occasional affiliate link will show up .. Is this spam ??

Is twitter only supposed to be used to let people know what you had for dinner (grilled chicken breast) ?

There is a reason it is so hard to explain to someone exactly what twitter is .. Everyone uses it differently.. You build your own experience on twitter

So if people choose to use it as there news source, they can follow some account that posts google alerts on a certain topic... everyone's happy

Any tool used properly can be effective.

Any tool used badly -- no matter how great the tool is -- is ineffective.

If you respect the people you interact with and the community you foster there, it can be an incredible source of targeted attention for your content and offers, or a great tool for things like customer service tasks and market research. This has been proven by many, many businesses and individuals on the site.

If you're using it in a "spam" way or pitching people before you've created value, then you won't be able to foster any community or positive response.

It's one more tool in the toolbox, and "fad" or not, if you use it wisely, it will have a positive impact on your business.

The thing about Twitter is, like Myspace, it's hugely popular for whatever silly reason, so the marketers think it's a golden opportunity to exploit the hell out of it ... There's already automation to follow people by keyword, etc. and automation to remove those who aren't following back and automation to schedule tweets and on and on. Twitter will eventually come down hard on this, like Myspace did.

I have heard many claims about Twitter marketing but have yet to see some bonafide screenshots of how they turned Twitter into profit. Twitter users historically hate Twitter spam. You might get a few here and there to convert, but show me the proof ... in dollars and cents and verified that it came from Twitter.

Nope, it's not dropped the hammer yet!

I'm managing around 10 different twitter accounts right now, if you use the service how it's meant to be used you'll be fine. I'd recommend people limit the following to 400-500 a day, but it's really up to you guys.

ps. Just to add SIS is 100%, you've got to think.... do your tweets pass the "who cares" test? (for those that want to find out more about this, I recommend Twitter Power, by Joel Comm)

Twitter automatically disallows following when you reach a limit. But they do not lock your account for following too many people at once. I follow, unfollow, and re-follow regularly to build my followers list and it works as far as I can tell.

http://twittercounter.com/NicheRichMkting

I immediately unfollow those who send out lame marketing messages.

Personally I have not caught the Twitter bug, yet. And, from reading this thread I probably will not. It doesn't seem to me that the Twitter folks are not too brite. If someone can't figure out how to monetize the amount of traffic they must have, they obviously don't know much about internet marketing. It is no wonder so many people have a poor opinion of them.

Or, am I being too harsh.

Thanks for the info everyone. It looks like there were some changes to the API and that's what I was hearing about.

Primarily it looks like they want you to have more followers than friends after a certain point.

Here's my opinion on Twitter from the eyes of a newbie. It's probably a fad, but it's nowhere near as useless as some seem to think. I've only made a few updates and still had some cool exchanges with people via direct message. I've also seen some really cool links and tips.

Some people are spamming it, but out of the few hundred I've followed most seem genuine.

My honest opinion is that it's going to be a pain to monetize for Twitter, but it will have to soon or it will fail long-term. For marketers, I think it can be used responsibly as a great way to list build- just don't overdo it and be genuine.

Obviously it's working for the big names that continue to use it.

I'm surprised by the number of people within this thread that don't care for Twitter. I can't say I've yet gotten business from it, but I can say that I've found an invaluable amount of information and tools from it.

I'm fairly recent to Twitter, but my advice is to follow people that are providing great information. There is a reason Guy Kawasaki is so popular on Twitter. He gets it. Most of his tweets have great information, with the occasional entertainment. He's been taken to task recently because of his promotion of his site, but after being introduced to his site (alltop.com), I found some more terrific information.

I think from the perspective of being an information resource, it's a gold mine. As far as getting your follower's attention so that they will buy one's product or service, I don't know yet. But, I am working it to find out.

Remember: There was a time that not many thought the internet was good for much, either.

A few have some good info, but it's kind of transparent when your followers call themselves "ColonCleanse" and "FourexMagic" and ... well, you get the drift. When I see all those weird scammy names following me I know exactly what to expect from them.

What's with all the "spammer" labels.

Last I checked, Twitter is a 100% Opt-In system.

YOU chose who you follow. If you don't like what you're reading in your timeline, YOU made poor choices.

I was on the fence/unsure about Twitter, but recently took the plunge and started digging into it... fascinating system.

Because of the open API, there are tons' of cool tools that are being created. As for its usefulness, thats pretty easy:

Twitter (like email lists, blogs, etc.) is a version of "One to Many" communication. You make a tweet, and your whole list can theoretically read it. If that tweet contains a link to a site/offer then you have a chance to convert a tweet into a lead, etc.

I personally think of Twitter as a variation on a mailing list, but with a different market segment and additional list-building options.

For example, you can easily see who is following a Guru in a niche, and choose to follow/pickup his followers. If you know what to look for, you can build a highly responsive list that will check out whatever links you send.

Of course, the same GIGO rules apply - its not a magic bullet. But the ability to feed in Facebook statuses, links, blog posts, etc. makes it a very convenient communications channel for your content.

I am actually putting together a report on what I have learned about Twitter, how to use it for marketing, and how I have build up 1600+ followers in a week (and the way to keep it going). Good stuff!

I like to test out new ways to communicate as well, but what I see in store for the future of Twitter marketing is different. Following people is already automated if you choose it to be. Unfollowing is also automated. With these handy tools available, marketers will flock to Twitter and everyone will have a few thousand or followers and numerous accounts. You'll be sitting there looking at your Twitter screen and instead of seeing some lively, amusing, and sometimes funny tweets, you'll be seeing an endless stream of marketing messages, which people will just unfollow eventually and become a whole lot more selective about who they follow ... if they are there to use it as an actual social network rather than a streaming billboard.

Right now I have a few hundred direct messages from people I've never communicated with saying "I make money tweeting" ... "Make money with Twitter" and on and on. Most of them are about making money with Twitter. I did find one that said ... hey, thanks for following. I hope you enjoy my tweets.

I'm follow a pretty large number of people and I don't recall ever seeing a vigara tweet. And there are none in my DM list.

Last week I signed on to some thing or another that actually automatically adds a handful of follows a day for me and I still don't see any problems. Prior to that I added anyone who had something interesting to me in their time line.

And who really cares is Britny or Amy or whoever the current hot little celeb is had 1m followers? Who's following someone else has no effect on MY experience with twitter.

I honestly think a LOT of the complaining about twitter ammounts to nothing more than sour grapes (and in some cases sour puss) syndrome.

What would I have to be sour about? I'm not smitten with Twitter so seeing the marketing takeover doesn't bother me either way. It's the people who really enjoy Twitter as a social platform that will be bothered, but of course, they won't see that crap anyway ... they'll just unfollow. With over 100 direct messages that all say practically the same thing ... see how much money I make on Twitter, and see how I make a million bucks in my pjs and blah blah blah, does anyone actually think I'd take the time to read any of that or check out their pitch?

If they used Twitter marketing in a smarter way ... they would try to build relationships with it and build reputation ... but no .... they just blurt out their lame little pitches to deaf ears over and over again.

I'm pretty sure the twitter bubble will burst for marketers. People think it's cool right now to have 40000 followers, and it's a big fad. Soon people will start to realize that it's not that cool and it's just a bunch of spam and they will start to seriously whittle down their follow lists.

Most of these people with 40000 followers use tweetdeck or the like to actually follow only 10 people or so. This will be more and more common as more and more spammers come on and give up since nobody cares about their constant link Spit.

Twitter is about building relationships and networking, not squawking garishly on a megaphone in the middle of a crowd. Soon people will start to realize this.

I agree that Twitter is a very useful tool for networking, building relationships and keeping tabs on your industry. I have had great things come from using Twitter for my business and amazing connections that I would not have made otherwise.

It is people that use it just to force their crappy product links out or the "wanna know how I get 2000 followers a day, check out xyz", especially with those automatic tools, and try to get hundreds of random people (which I might add is a waste in time) that should be banned. It is understandable that they "don't get it".. frankly, I prefer them to lose interest and move on and leave the resource and not ruin it for others that benefit from it.

Twitter is constantly evolving and trying to adapt to what happening on the net. As of late twitter is getting a lot of media attention. Personally, I don't see how twitter truly increases business unless you are in a certain niche.

Hi LB:

There is a person that may be the reason for what you are eluding to having come to fruition. Somebody emailed me the beginning of the week they had their account pulled without ever a negative post or a plug for anything they do. They used one of the Twitter software paid programs on building followers/following.

Not only is the creator of the software selling the product in high volumes but encourages every person to sign up for the affiliate program and make a Tweet on how to get followers as well as a welcome message that plugs the product.

What bothers me about people having their accounts pulled is while some will tell you it is a free service and not as if they got banned after paying 1000 dollars, time and energy is money. If they cultivated a good following and mixed excellent information with the good rule of thumb 1 out of 10 Tweets plugging something, this cost them time, effort, and money.

I have decided from the start that I wouldn't use any methods other than my own to get follower and to follow. I wouldn't want any account that doesn't spread messages of hate, violence, or unethical activity to be taken away without warning.

If Tom and Terri Twitter are reading how about at least 1 warning to those that break a rule before you pull the plug.

Thanks for your time and post!