Why I Dumped 51,963 Twitter Users Overnight
Twitter. Is it really of any use or is it just another fad which accomplishes nothing more than distracting you from what you need to be doing?
I am still undecided but I want to determine whether Twitter can be used productively or not.
I have not discussed using Twitter much on this blog apart from an unsuccessful attempt at marketing with it last summer which achieved nothing more than pissing people off and now I think it’s time for a change.
Last night, I dumped all 51,963 Twitter users I was following and instead I am going to focus on a handful of users who I think can be useful to me in terms of networking and traffic generation.
Sound a bit cold? Perhaps a bit cynical?
Maybe it is but those 50,000 or so people who I followed and who followed me in return, wasn’t doing anything for me.
I have not enjoyed huge swarthes of traffic from Twitter and there has been next to no interaction.
Following so many people makes it difficult to keep a track of who I really want to follow and I have no time to create separate lists.
I used to use Seesmic Desktop but keeping it open all day to monitor certain users tweets is distracting.
So, I just stopped using Twitter and until today, I became an insiginficant Twitter user, albeit one with a higher following than most.
It’s time to start afresh.
By following a smaller number of people, I will be able to get involved with their content and become useful to them by retweeting their stuff.
Hopefully, in time they will notice my generosity and reciprocate.
My following is not restricted to the big guns – if anyone reading this follows me and gets involved with my tweets then I will follow you back and return the favour.
It’s just my days of following for the sake of following are over.
I recorded a video of me dumping 50k+ Twitter users and I will record another in a few months time if my new approach to Twitter has been successful or not.
Now it’s over to you – are you using Twitter?
If so, how are you using it and is it proving successful?
Leave your thoughts and own experiences in the comments below!
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42 comments… read them below or add one
I’ve been using Google’s new setup called Buzz. It’s a thousand times better than Twitter. The level of interaction is much deeper and people actually have conversations and discussions with it.
I think Twitter is dying. Too many spammers took hold of it to the point where people stopped paying attention. Now it’s just a bunch of bots talking to each other.
Great post. I’d love to see how the experiment goes.
Matt
Matt Wolfe´s last blog ..Where Have I Been?
Hey Matt,
I set up a Google profile late last year but have not used Buzz yet.
I don’t know whether Twitter is “dying” as such but it is definitely a lot more difficult to get noticed than perhaps a year ago.
I’ll give Twitter another shot and see if it can be useful, if not, then I’ll probably ditch it for good.
David
This blog is proof that you intend to use Twitter to spam, there is no other good reason for you to follow 50K people.
The reason you dumped everyone you were following is because you want to appear popular. Sadly, this is what all the others spammers on twitter do too, so it’s nothing “new” lol. The comment above by Matt is correct, there is too much spam on Twitter, I admit my own share, but you have more than your share.
Hi Whane,
I don’t intend to use Twitter to “spam”, it’s another outpost where I want to try and drive traffic back to the blog.
I don’t want to “appear” popular on Twitter either, actually being popular would be much better!
I lost 12,000 followers overnight and I wouldn’t care if the overall following dropped significantly further if it meant removing the redundant spam accounts and people not interested in my output.
David
David,
Twitter can be more than just about getting traffic back to your blog. I’m not on twitter all the time. I do post when I write an article. I do learn about a lot of other people and their ideas about topics I am interested in. I do research through twitter. I learn through twitter. If my message reaches people I know, or who share common interests, great.
Ocassionlly I use Twttrblogs. When I do with a few tweets and posts I easily can generate a couple of thousand views. Neither places do I have big followings.
Perhaps “reframing” your perspective of twitter as a tool could help. Mary
Hi David,
I agree with you, twitter has become over run with user accounts setup with the primary purpose of promoting affiliate products.
I do however think that twitter is a good place to help promote a website for SEO. With the number of applications and website directories poping up as resources for twitter, I have seen a surge in backlinks to url’s I have tweeted. (not tiny urls)
However, this is completely against the purpose of Twitter in the first place. I think managing your twitter following is key to its success. There has been too much emphasis and peer pressure to acquire many followers. Its the quality not quantity as you have said.
I think Google Buzz has a bit of development to go through before it can rival Twitter. The main problem I have with Buzz is that I use my Gmail account to communicate with people who I dont want to have my main email address. Buzz instantly makes me “friends” with these people.
Austin Walters´s last blog ..Multiple Streams Of Income
Hi Austin,
Thanks for leaving a comment – you make a great point about the added SEO benefits (if not intentional) of using Twitter.
That’s another reason I’ll stick with it for a while at least, I just hope my tweets don’t get lost among the tons of affiliate spam!
David
I totally agree with this. It’s quality not quantity. I experience the same thing. Why do people not engage when it is clearly labelled social media. I’m not sure Twitter will last that long, like Facebook, but then again, even Facebook has a problem with the lack of engagement on it…
Nice blog…
Will be following your experiment closely…
chris g´s last blog ..Who are the better cooks? Men innit….
Hi Chris,
Thanks for the kind words about my blog.
I agree that Twitter and Facebook have interaction problems. They start off with good intentions but then just become vehicles for people to broadcast.
David
Hi David,
Gangsta Jeffreys did the same thing a few months ago. I (jokingly)told him to write an e-book called “Why I Dumped 30,000 Di*kh*ads From My Twitter Account.”
Jokes aside…
Early last year Twitter was very good but then in came the spammers and those who I call the porn-heads. I tried to help the situation by ranting and raving about the amount of porn that was on there. But it was a lost cause. One particular avatar just kept getting relentlessly spammed. I used to waste so much time deleting the “Brittney bot” – sometimes up to a dozen times a day. But then BACK she or it would come.
Then there were all the fools who had nothing better to tweet than “what colored M&M are you?” or the equally moronic, “What Michael Jackson song are you?” or that other garbage about “What Mafia family are you?” Duh! I used to unfollow all those knuckleheads.
Anyway, David, I have been thinking about doing the same thing. I just don’t have time to waste with people who tweet such daftness.
The whole Twitter experience reminds me of that Pink song: “This used to be a fun house, but now it’s full of evil clowns…”
GazzMan
TEMPLE
Gary Simpson´s last blog ..Internet Marketing – Alex Jeffreys Las Vegas Seminars – January 2010
Hey Gazz,
I used to get loads of those “Britney Bots” and also gave up trying to keep up with deleting them. It seemed Twitter was becoming a porno paradise with all the accounts being set up with no disclaimers or attempt to protect minors from the content.
Those DM messages are ridiculous as well, who comes up with such inane crap? Dire…
David
I could not agree more. All of the above comments have valid points and it is a shame that iresponsible people spoil it for the many. However if used correctly, twitter CAN be used to promote ones brand and build customer loyalty. A lot of fortune 500 companies use twitter, some of which use twitter successfuly.
PS
You can still have more than one twitter account.
Mark Leonard´s last blog ..101 Twitter Tips
Hey Mark,
The fact so many huge corporations use Twitter suggests to me it is not going anywhere.
Maybe it is time to look to them on how to use Twitter effectively?
David
Hi, David,
I purchased a Twitter software nearly two weeks and have nearly 12,000 followers already. I set up in the Internet Marketing niche, like a dummy, and quite a few of my followers are recognized among the so-called gurus. Are they ever going to purchase anything from me? No way! And the rest of my followers are probably just following me so I’ll follow them in some kind of popularity contest. That does me no good as I try to add to my list.
I’m going to keep at it a while longer to see if I can build anything like a responsive list from it. If not…and I absolutely do not spam my followers…I’ll direct my efforts elsewhere.
My best to you!
Hi Rick,
Been there and done that!
I am still hoping to increase my following but it will be done on a much slower scale, if at all. I’d rather one or two people follow me each day with the intention of interacting with me, retweeting my content etc, than playing the “numbers game” like before.
David
I agree, twitter was just jumped on as a source of free traffic which,IMO, is low quality in terms of conversions.
It’s OK if your giving a lot of free stuff but, free stuff is another over tired hobby for IM’s..
You can see the trend now is towards high end products like 1 on 1 training..video boss is an example I guess..:)
Gordon.
Gordon Clark´s last blog ..Outsourcing Can Be A Shortcut To Making Money
I’m very concerned about the amount of spam on Twitter as well. It’s a “Social” network and it’s never social to have someone in my face 24/7 trying to convince me they have built a better mousetrap. Isn’t that what Craiglist is for?!! Twitter was intended to give people a way to communicate and interact simply. I’m flattered that people choose to follow me and I want to keep them – so I don’t sell them. I leave them a deep thought to ponder over, or some words of wisdom I’ve come by. Hopefully that improves their life just a little bit. That is what Twitter is supposed to be all about.
Kevin´s last blog ..Twitter Business Magic PLR
Hi David,
I started playing with twitter a year ago as an experiment and now have roughly the same number of followers as you (had).
I’ve also spent a lot of time talking to clients and contacts about how they use twitter successfully – in particular to win new business (they’re all professionals like consultants, lawyers etc. so for them new business = new clients rather than people buying products).
The short story is that for most people, the best way to use twitter is to use it to build deeper relationships with a smaller number of people. In a way it’s essentially an extension of using text messages to your mates (like it was originally intended).
While having a lot of followers can work in some ways (I get about 10% of the traffic to my website from twitter – but it’s only to view specific blog posts rather than sell products) it makes it very difficult to build those deeper relationships. Even with tools like tweetdeck you get buried in spam messages or even just friendly “hi, thanks for following” messages.
I do manage to maintain conversations – but probably not as deep (and hence as valuable) as the people who interact with far fewer people.
One further note. Clickthrough rates on links in tweets are dropping. All the stats, and my personal experience, shows that people are clicking through links less and less. So the “follow loads of people and get them to click on my links and come to my website” strategy is becoming less and less effective.
Ian
Ian Brodie´s last blog ..Is it better to be Truthful, or Interesting?
Hi Ian,
I agree that traffic from your own Twitter followers is becoming less and less but I think where you could get decent traffic is if your content was retweeted numerous times.
To do that, you need to develop relationships with people who are influential in your niche and themselces have a strong, responsive following to click through those retweeted links.
On popular blogs, especially in the IM niche, the Tweetmeme plugin shows some posts being retweeted several hundred times – in those situations, they must be driving significant traffic back to the blog post?
David
Hi David,
Good point. My stuff gets retweeted a lot for my niche – but it’s only about 20-40 times. That’s more than almost anyone else in my field – but it doesn’t result in a ton of extra traffic.
Ian
Ian Brodie´s last blog ..Help Me Improve the Get Clients Blog!
I agree. When I see someone who has 50,000 followers is following me I don’t even respond. They couldn’t possibly follow what I have to say through 50,000 other tweets.
I keep the number of followers manageable, send them messages that I have something for sale and get some responses. Twitter’s worth the time for me. I don’t know how good twitter would be if I had thousands of followers from all kinds of niches, but a few thousand followers from my niche is fine.
David,
I noticed I was unfollowed as well LoL.. Anyway David, I know you want to rebuild your twitter account to a smaller group but actually there is a web where you can remove spammers, people who doesn’t engage etc..It will help you to notice who are actually engaging and who isn’t. Helps you to filter your followers.
I follow tons of people too, what gets me connected to people is my list. I list them so I can filter conversation of friends anytime at all. You are following 62 people and I’m sure you can list all these 62 people in list.
If you feel there need to engage more you can always use DM. I’m using it efficiently and people know whenever they DM me I will reply to them.
If you want to connect deeper there is always facebook for those who use them.
As for clicks, try updating your tweets more often. It lets people know you’re online and active and they will check your twitter more often. I tried not tweeting for 2 days and when I posted a tweet, clicks drop compared to when I am active.
Cheers
Aaron
Cheers
Aaron
I still love twitter. I have some great conversations on there and I have never worried about follower count. If you add value to the conversation you will get followers over time. One tool I actually just used and found amazing was http://thetwitcleaner.com/
I think it could really bring back the usefulness of twitter if people start using that a lot.
Adam Teece´s last blog ..1/18/10
Hi David
When I do a new blog post it is tweeted on twitter and does bring some visitors to my blog but maybe not as many as I would like.
Twitter has changed over the last year so is maybe not as responsive as it used to be. All the people who use automatic follower links to add followers have not helped. I get some people following me who have ZERO tweets and expect to be followed back, these people I totally ignore.
Richard
Richard´s last blog ..David Walker Webinar Module 6 – Part 3
I recently talked to a lawyer aquaintance of mine who decided to get into the trump deal just to try marketing online. When I asked him what type of marketing skills he was taught and how he was promoting his new business he said he had 6 twitter accounts and had set up everything on auto pilot. I knew he felt pretty pumped, proud of himself and was feeling pretty kewl. I didn’t say anything. This was 6 months ago.
Last week my lawyer freind called me with a new deal called “narc that license plate” I was rolling with laughter inside but remained sober and business like on the phone. I asked him what happened to his trump dealio because his tweets had disappeared. He told me that twitter had deleted ALL OF HIS ACCOUNTS because he had duplicate information blasting from all of his accounts at the same time.
Apparently Twitter is combating the spam issue, possibly too late. I also think the surge for online “opportunities” that went hand in hand with the economy dump were teaching people to use twitter and nothing else, so hoards of inexperienced people spammed the hell out of it. I think with every new application the pendelum swings really far to one side then eventually finds a level of equalization.
I use twitter for automatic updates that may or may not drive people to my posts, articles or squidoo lenses with occasional personal tweets just to keep it real but don’t spend alot of time like I used to when I was a twitter addict.
Very interesting experiment that you’ve undertaken David. I’ll be interested to see how this goes!
Jan Morgan´s last blog ..Online Marketing Is Revolutionizing The Way We Think
Hi Jan,
Thank you for leaving such a detailed comment.
It seems whatever new website where people congregate appears, it gets spammed to hell and back. I don’t think that will never happen – forums, chat rooms, blogs, Myspace, Twitter and now Facebook.
I have a few services linked up to Twitter which will automatically publish a tweet, such as Aweber and Youtube but I’ll ensure the majority of my tweets are from me personally or high quality retweets.
David
Hey David,
I did the same thing a few months back, but still don’t use twitter that much. It was funny, I had loads of abuse from people just for unfollowing them!
That was exactly the reason I did it in the first place to get away from all the crap on there, oh and the spammers … LOL
Talk soon mate,
Paul
Paul Wilson´s last blog ..Vegas Jan 2010
Hey Paul,
Having been online for a long time now, it seems you can’t do right for doing wrong most of the time and are open to abuse – give stuff away, don’t give enough stuff away, send too many emails, don’t keep in touch often enough, following too many people, then unfollowing THEM etc. etc.
It doesn’t help either, that every clown with an internet connection becomes a keyboard warrior if they feel “hard done by” for whatever reason.
David
Hi David,
You weren’t kidding about dumping your followers then?
I must admit I have a Twitter account because I was advised to set one up but I never check it or use it apart from having my blog posts automatically posted on there.
I’ve got lots of followers considering I haven’t actually personally followed anyone since I first set it up, so I guess people are just finding me through the blog posts and via friends of friends, etc.
I don’t think anyone can possibly build a relationship with a huge amount of followers, and if they do find the time to do so, there must be something sadly lacking in his or her life.
Shame!
Thanks for the interview by the way.
Take care
Jean
Jean Shaw´s last blog ..Stop Slogging And Start Blogging With David Walker
Hi Jean,
Nope, I gave my Twitter list the ultimate spring clean and will now only see tweets from people I want to interact with – keeping it simple, rather than messing about with lists etc.
If someone wants me to follow them, then they will have to at least try and interact with me!
RE: the interview, it was my pleasure and I hope your readers enjoy it!
David
Nice post David, and the blog looks better now.
I went a slightly different route, have only selectively followed a few people and then followed back selectively those who follow me. In 12 months I only have around 3200 followers which is fine,
I do get visits to my blog and capture page from twitter, and some, but not a lot of business.
The list feature is very useful for following those people in different niches that I want to follow.
I’ll stick with it, but I do find the spammers, porn and dirty picture vendors are getting more active.
Peter Wright´s last blog ..Boost your motivation
In keeping with the theme of dumping things, I have just purged my inbox of every single email. The inbox consisted of nearly 3000 unread emails from Internet Marketing lists that I am on – You know the ones, the ones you won’t delete because your certain you will have time to read them later, then a year later they are still sat there unread.
What made me laugh was the email’s with the subject “Free Gift – Quick before I take it down”, I checked the link and its still live even after a year.
I can completely waste a Sunday reading over these email’s and by the end of the day realise I have learned nothing new today, just the same old rubbish written in a different way.
Austin
Austin Walters´s last blog ..Multiple Streams Of Income
I had about 8k followers till about 4 months ago which I dumped when I decided I was wasting my time being followed by “Internet Marketing Coaches” and “Porn Stars”. As you say Twitter wasn’t built for that but thats what it seems to have become, a place for ad blasting, fiscticous ads, spamming and being a pain the RS.
I feel unless they tgihten up on this – i.e limit automated messaging/following then its going to cease to be of any value to anyone.
Peter Davies´s last blog ..Video Marketing Product Review
Hey David,
The jury is still out with me on twitter. I started of with the idea of getting a large following to try and drive traffic; all the spam has made that kind of pointless but I don’t think it’s dead!
BUT even though there’s a ton of cr*p out there I’m still pleased I got involved as I’ve met a bunch of decent people.
I still think twitter has it’s place and using lists means you can filter out most of the rubbish.
I will be doing some un-following but not on a mass scale – that seems to get you just as much hassle like Paul experienced and like you have recently with the guy that is trying to ‘Out Your Evil Plan’…a plan sooo secret…he ‘found out’ about it from a video you made!! PMSL
Take care mate,
Rob
Rob Bradley´s last blog ..Blog Wars: Wordpress Strikes Back
Hi Rob,
Thanks for the comment – yeah, I’ve had plenty of hassle since unfollowing everyone. It’s not like I ever paid any attention to almost 100% of the tweets anyway, so people are not losing my attention by me unfollowing them.
I think it has its place and I am going to use it a lot more for networking rather than traffic, which was my previous objective.
David
I personaly do not think twitter is or about to die but I do agree that things have to change from the current state. Its a tool and should be used wisely, be that just for having a little chit chat with your followers or as a way to let them know what you are upto business wise.
Twitter as a marketing tool? Now that one I have to agree that the jury is still out on determining if it is indeed a viable tool for such purpose!
And yes, peer presure is rife at the moment on how many followers you rack up – but the question remains, is it the quantity or the quality of followers that matters? I’ll settle for quality any day
Zulfikar | Blog Installation Service´s last blog ..What To Do If Your Facebook Or Twitter Account Is Hacked
I wrote a post titled Why it’s a terrible idea to unfollow everyone on Twitter Where I outline several reasons why this is a poor strategy.
The biggest problem is you will still have a large number of followers and you will be following few. This means you will be largely sending out one way signals into the Twittersphere. This seems a bit selfish or self serving. If you want to focus on a select group of people you can use tools like tweet deck to create groups, otherwise if you want to start over from scratch then it would be more ethical to close down your Twitter account and open a new one and start from zero.
Gerald Weber´s last blog ..How To Do Keyword Research With EBay
Hi Gerald,
Thanks for coming over and leaving me a comment.
I take your points about Tweetdeck but I couldn’t use it after I got more than 10,000 followers – it just crashed my PC. I tried using Seesmic Desktop, which worked great, but having it open all the time so you don’t miss anything is distracting and I need to focus on my business.
Maybe it is a little self-serving but it’s no different to what 99% of the “celebrity tweeters” do. They have hundreds of thousands, even millions of followers who they just broadcast to with very little real interaction.
If I tweet out and people respond, then I am open to interaction. I am never going to miss an @reply, whether I am following that person or not. I can always re-follow someone who shows some interest in me and me in them.
David
Hi David,
I bought the “TweetTank” about 6 weeks ago thinking I could build quality relationships a little faster and do a little affiliate marketing as well.
Presently hovering at 2k people w/2 accounts. Problem is most of these folks are all auto tweeting 24/7, it’s mostly affiliate products being slammed at me – funny enough – lots of them for Tweet Tank!
Will Twittering hit the “balanced side of the pendulum”…..maybe in a year or??, at this point there’s sooo many programs out there stating: “Use Twitter to make your 5k a month+” – hard to say, though it may hit the wall pretty fast.
Also, like Austin above, I have over 6 thousand emails from 200 lists and spend at least 15-20 minutes daily, dumping hundreds thinking there are some great things I may just need in the future….ha!
It’s a true thinning out process – AND I’m getting 100+ new emails daily.
How does one deal with this when SO much SEEMS good?
Interested to see how your experiment goes.
Powerpaul
Rebuilding the site, so: twitter.com/thePowerpaul
Hi Paul,
I got sick of the junk that came with following 50,000 people – it was relentless.
Plus, my DM folder was unusable because of all the spam in there so if anyone sent me a private message there was a good chance I’d miss it.
Now, by following less than 100 people so far, everything is a lot clearer and better organised and I am actually enjoying using Twitter again.
David
Hi David,
Keith Purkiss recommended your Blog to me and I like what I’ve seen!
I have been having my own doubts about Twitter, firstly because it just sounds daft, and secondly because I didn’t see any response to any affiliate links that I put out there myself (with only 2500 followers). I have other friends who have seen useful results after using Twittollower, but I just don’t have the time of funds to evaluate it properly at the moment so I’ll come back to it later and also see what results you come up with in your project.
Thanks for the post, I’ll be back to look for more now i have you bokmarked!
Yours
John, York, UK
John´s last blog ..Welcome – to a faintly military view of Internet Marketing!