Social Media is No Place for Robot Behavior | chrisbrogan.com

Social Media is No Place for Robot Behavior | chrisbrogan.com:


I’m sick of robots. Truly. Your automated direct message back thanking me for following you does three things exceptionally well:

1. Irks me because it’s a robot.
2. Annoys me because you ask me to click your junk.
3. Tempts me to go back and unfollow you on principle.

tweetdeck You don’t need to use robots to thank me and click on your stupid website. If you’re too busy to be an actual human on a social network, don’t join another social network. It’s okay. We understand.

I’ve run into a couple of these recently, and it took me a bit to realize what it was. Given how bad a reputation this kind of auto-responder has in the e-mail marketing world, I’m amazed people are adopting them into Twitter.

Please stop.

I’ll go a step further than Chris. If I get auto-DMed, I will immediately unfollow you. Period. I will also follow you if it turns out your twitter feed is nothing more than self-marketing, nothing more than an alternative to the RSS feed, or contains nothing interesting to read. But if you start our “relationship” on twitter with a sales pitch, I’ll treat you like any other telemarketer and not bother giving you the time to prove to me you’re worth my attention.

Don’t be lazy. That’s what these auto-DMs are. You’re better off with absolute silence than this stuff. Really.

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