The Twitter Auto Message: A Rant You need to Hear
23. Jan, 2010 
13 Comments
I don’t know how many times I can go on about this…
But I feel as if I have to, for the better of the Twitter community as a whole. Don’t sent your opportunity via auto message, just don’t do it! It is a horrible way to send a first impression and it’s a sure fire way to make sure your new follower disgusted with you or simply ignore you. Sending links is okay, I’ll repeat that; sending links is ok. But you can’t send links to some catch page or to your turn key funnel system. Links that are okay to send are ones strictly based on the purpose of being social.
Social networking is about being social!
I say that all the time but it is seriously overlooked. Think of social media as a party, you don’t want to be the jackass as the party handing out your business card to everyone you meet. You need to interact and get to know your new contacts before you lay any type of sales pitch on them. In my honest opinion you should never sell or pitch anything on social media. Social media should be a doorway to your blog or website and not a stomping ground for business pitches.
Here is an example of my auto message that gets sent out to every new follower I get, it works wonders in terms of starting off the new relationship on the right foot and sending the right first impression:
Hi thanks for the follow! Give me a second to say hi in person via video! I promise it’s not spam!-http://bit.ly/cTRT5
Remember your first impression can dictate the rest of that relationship and can determine right then and there whether this person is a potential new business partner or someone who will ignore you.
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I especially like the graphic with the twitter birds and the spam. Nice succinct post introducing another good twitter essentials video. Keep them coming.
Greg thanks for your continued support buddy. I’m glad you enjoyed my rant
I love this post. You are completely dead on. I’m still relatively new to twitter, but I agree. When I get an automatic message from someone, and it just leads me to a sales pitch, I do get rather disgruntled.
Your link, on the other hand, really did make me feel like there was a door of communication being opened. Like you say, That really is the point of twitter and other social networking sites: Being social!
Nate, this post was truly helpful. I can relate to your rant, yet there was a lot I took away as a lesson learned, as well. I really appreciate you taking the time to share your thoughts will all of us.
~Jessica
Jessica, as much as you appreciate me sharing my wisdom – I appreciate twice as much you taking the time to share your thoughts. Comments like yours are what keep me going and keep this blog a float. Glad it touched bases with you!
hey Nate,
Once again, your dead on!
I get Twitter DM’s directly sent to my phone. I like to know when someone is trying to contact me…but the thing that bugs me the most is when I get all of these DM’s that are tryin to sell me on something, Just last night I got 32 DM’s on crap like that and It got really irritating.
I retweeted this post because I think everyone on twitter who has the auto responder needs to know this what not to do.
You’re right Tony – every one should know this lol. It would certainly make Twitter a much better place. And hey you got 32 dms, I get like 300 spam dms every day! Lol this is why I made this rant.
Thanks for the comment.
oh wow, 300! lol
I’m not too keen on anything automated, but I guess I can’t complain as I’ve found some great people via auto follow. It’s a necessary evil I guess. It’s a bit of a letdown though when you think someone has discovered you and followed you based on your merits, only to discover it was all automated. I don’t like any automated DMs even if they’re not a sales pitch. They’re just a waste of time! I have been ramping up my Twitter efforts lately, and have been astounded by the number of people (including well-known companies) who send DM sales pitches instantly. Definitely a huge turn-off!
Would it be appropriate to have a link to your blog in your auto-follow message if it is prefaced with something like, “if you want to know what I’m about…”?
I would love to see a post that is a list of all the 3rd party twitter programs one should have. Have you already done this?
Possible tip: in your vid instead of writing “create with nate” why not put “createwithnate.com”? Brand, brand, brand.
Glad to see one of us is working toward the internet domination goal…
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It would be appropriate so long as it takes you to an about me page and not some sales page. I do have a post like that, and am working on a new post regarding one site that does it all for Twitter. As for CreateWithNate, what is the difference? Between Createwithnate and createwithnate.com there is no difference in terms of branding there.
Thanks for your comment!
Hey Nate, I couldn’t agree more. If Twitter spammers continue this way, Twitter itself will end up being another “myspace” full of crap that puts off Legitimate users.
I know right!? That is a slight fear of mine but I know that Twitter’s usefulness, uniqueness and overall awesomeness will prevail!