I had an interesting conversation on Twitter yesterday that prompted me to write this post because there is an important Twitter and life lesson to be learned from it.
Tadeusz Szewczyk aka Tad Chef aka @onreact_com who has an SEO blog and writes for the Search Marketing Firm SEOoptimize sent me these Tweets that included a link to his post on Twitter Netiquette:
While I DO agree with most of his points in that post, there is one very good reason why my Twitter feed is not Burger King so everyone can’t have it “their way”:
You can’t please 16,578 people and counting so you should not even try!
One of the major problems in our relationships and world peace is that almost all people expect everyone else to do everything “their way” – not realizing how many very different ways others see the world.
As more and more people realize that everyone can NOT have things their way, life will be more pleasant. We all need to be far more tolerant and easy-going – especially about small stuff – and as the saying goes, “It’s all small stuff”.
We need to realize we can NOT have what we personally would prefer because:
- For every person that thinks something is too much there are just as many who think something is not enough – like Tweets or links
- Believe it or not no one can read your mind
Most people are NOT intentionally doing things to annoy you. The majority are totally self-focused and everything they do is what they feel is best FOR THEM.
“You wouldn’t worry so much about what others think of you
if you realized how seldom they do.” ~ Eleanor Roosevelt ~
Those who are doing what is best for the many like me still can not do things “your way” because:
- We need to focus on what is best for all of our followers and not just you.
- We can’t read your mind so we could not do what you feel is best for you even if that was our greatest desire.
- Even if you send us a great post on Twitterquette we can’t be sure exactly which of your points was what caused you to send it to us.
- There are NO hard and fast rules for ANYTHING – and that includes Twitter.
- While having rules might make those who want to control what everyone else does feel better, just like laws they can and will be disregarded by many.
The only way to not offend anyone is to do nothing – and hide to make sure no one notices you’re doing nothing because if they do there will be those who complain because of that.
Few realize that there is no consensus on best practices for much of anything. That is especially true if they tend to choose peers and friends who are much like themselves.
One of my close collaborators and Social Media expert Kristi Hines wrote a point-by-point rebuttal in the comments of Tad’s Twitterquette post that is worth reading because it includes some excellent advanced strategies and insights on using Twitter.
That is why I often do polls like my Spam or Not Spam poll that shows why using crowd-sourcing for Akismet will never work. I bet most bloggers think “everyone knows what spam is”. Guess again!
Bloggers definition of spam ranges from “any comment I don’t like” to “any comment from someone I don’t already know” to “any comment that links to a business” to “I might approve something IF I like it”.
You might notice that I often use “we” instead of “I”? That is because many of us collaborate and brainstorm best practices live every day in chat or Skype. I do not go by only my opinion on things. I bounce them off my most trusted collaborators.
Here are some comments from chat changed to protect the innocent and not reveal who said what:
- Ah, so you should probably just change your entire Twitter engagement then so he doesn’t have to see something he doesn’t want to see…LOL
- Seriously, one follower… got to make them happy…
- GrowMap:That’s kind of what I was thinking…hmmm…like I knew what it was he didn’t like (he tweeted a post to me asking me to stop “shouting” at him)
- Um, totally don’t understand what that means…Unless he’s not a fan of caps and he took offense to the GREAT ADVICE tweet…that would be silly [NOTE from GrowMap: I’ve started calling attention to key tweets by adding RECOMMENDED: or MUST READ: or GREAT ADVICE at the beginning of them – and received thanks from several for doing that so they don’t miss those.]
- Oh, maybe #7… he doesn’t like reality… That must be the problem…
- GrowMap: That was what I thought at first – but then I realized he more likely meant I tweet too much OR he doesn’t like to see bad news and I’ve tweeted too much reality for his tastes lately
- Maybe he wants to live in fairy bubble land where only fluffy bunnies hop merrily around a grassy field
- Damn you for spreading reality into his world of sunshine!
- GrowMap:You’re cracking me up
- It’s my comedy hour of the day 🙂
- I guess everyone has their different offense-o-meter
- No acceptance of uniqueness
- GrowMap:People actually think that each and every person on the planet should do things exactly how they want them – and expect that we could read their mind and know that is
- Well, at least this guy knows what the real problem on Twitter is… not everyone is following his rules. Good to know!
- No kidding… I quite like people who share lots of links a day. And their older articles I might have missed.
Each of us must decide how best to accomplish what needs to be done. If we wish to be effective we may choose to heed some advice from people like Scobleizer. I highly recommend reading his very entertaining post about breaking Twitter rules.
Twitter netiquette rules are GUIDELINES
NOT worth getting all stressed out over!
Also believe the good advice offered by Guy Kawasaki in his posts How to Avoid Twitter Cluelessness and How to Pick Up Followers on Twitter. Read his How to Change the World post to better understand WHY we need to be effective and influential wherever we are active including Twitter.
Yes, I do believe we must always be aware of what we are doing and how it affects others. Yes, I do believe we should do our best to limit flooding the Twitter timelines of followers who don’t use it the way I do when we can.

TWITTER TOOLS NEEDED:
We need tools like CoTweet, HootSuite, Simplify360, MarketMeSuite and others to provide us with a better way by automating our activities into rolling updates that put a time delay between tweets that we can adjust from minutes to hours to maybe even days.
We could use a way to tweet and RT the same tweet from multiple accounts and have the tool randomly change when those tweets are sent through.
ATTN: DEVELOPERS: We need these specific Social Media tools. If you have a tool we should see or are willing to build one, our group of Social Media Influencers are willing to alpha and beta test, provide detailed feedback and promote it for you in exchange for use of the tool.
We are all still developing best practices and have varying degrees of expertise using Twitter. The link section below will assist anyone at any level to greatly increase their Twitter skills and influence.

TWITTER BEST PRACTICES:
- How to Get Started on Twitter
- Use Twitter Lists so you can find what you want and still follow those who follow you – and why you should
- How to Use Twitterfeed for a consistent Twitter presence
- Strategy for getting more Twitter followers interested in YOUR niche
- Better Twitter Retweets
- Twitter Tools for Managing Multiple Twitter Accounts
- Geo-targeting Twitter – also see How to Use Twellow
- CRITICAL for BLOGGERS: Put Your Twitter UserName on your BLOG!!!!
NEW:I pulled all those together in one post: Twitter Best Practices
People who are influencers on Twitter and who write blogs can create a better world for us all. If you’re serious about being influential I encourage you to contact me and to follow the other influencers I linked to in my Small Business Advice post.
If you are offering services to small businesses and would like recommendations contact me and see my post on priorities for Small Business Internet Marketing.
TIP to get the most out of my posts: I use links throughout my post to offer additional information. Anything underlined in blue text is a link. Point at the links and you will see a pop-up also called a mouse-over that contains additional information on what is at each link. As you read, use right-click > open in a new tab so you can read all the information of interest to you from each post.
Gail Gardner
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I also feel that initially tweeting is best but if my clients want more information the characters are insufficient to convey all the points so from there I move to either calls or emails. It has been that way since I first started using twitter and I’m habituated with this so I’m not sure whether I’ll even use other twitter tools or not 🙂
Does anyone else find the 140 character limit hard to achieve? I have clients that ask me questions all the time on twitter and I have to figure out how to cut it down to 140 characters! I typically go over hand have to revise. Also, doing business on twitter, does anyone else find it hard to take the conversation out of twitter and into email? I would prefer the initial meeting in Twitter and then move on to longer explanations in email or phone conversations. But there are many who prefer to stay in Twitter. Any thoughts?
Hello,
What I do is encourage them to take the conversation to Skype or IM so I can give answers that are never going to fit on Twitter. If they insist on staying on Twitter you’ll probably have to use DM instead of @ messages to avoid filling up your Twitter stream and annoying your other followers. Sometimes I answer publicly if I feel many others will be interested – other times I take it private.
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I love the use 0f Twitter, it has helped generate a lot of traffic to my website and make a lot of connections and opportunities. I would like to embrace twitter for creating a such a great app for mobile phones too!
True, the more people that follow you the greater the “expectation pool” will be and you can’t please everyone.
If the comments were made because you used caps to make it clear that the Tweet were RECOMMENDED: or MUST READ: or GREAT ADVICE, may be using brackets [] around [RECOMMENDED] or even lowercase [recommended] might help.
Hi Leo,
It is hard enough to fit something intelligible into 140 characters without adding two extras. You can’t please everyone so you have to just do the best you can.
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There were many good points made by the commenter’s above.
I am amazed at the seeming disappearance over the past few years of the word “tolerance”. Why is it that so many of us will “no longer put-up with” anything that doesn’t personally suit us? Why should we even begin to think that everything in this world needs to suit us? Or is geared for our liking?
What in the world makes us think it should be?
Lack of tolerance towards others as well as frustration at this brave new world we are all coming to terms with seems to be driving people beyond “tweetiquette” so tolerance towards everyone else is needed even more than ever!
Hi Jan,
I guess it has been the “me” generation too long. The strange thing to me is that almost nothing is to anyone’s liking so I don’t know how they got that way. There are many serious issues that I would want to change before I would care about anything trivial like how someone else Tweets.
Everyone needs a big dose of more tolerance!
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Far too many people are worried about EVERYONE liking them; it’s not gonna happen. Just honestly be yourself, whatever that happens to be, and people will fall where they may. 😉
Dennis Edell would love you to read ..Should Guest Bloggers be Responsible for Their Own SEO
LOL…absolutely true Dennis. Anyone who wants me to change to be more to their liking will have a very long wait. In my very young days I tried that once and I found out that the more I changed the more he wanted me to change and no matter how much it would have never been enough.
Not a good idea.
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Great points. And you’re exactly right. We should stop caring about what others think about us because chances are they’re sooo self absorbed and wondering about their salvation, happiness, fulfilment, etc.
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WOW what an insightful twitter lesson this has been! Your conversation concerning “don’t shout” quite hilarious! Breaking twitter rules was for certain worth clicking, a very entertaining read, thank you!
The best point of all PUT your Twitter name on your blog!!! OMG thank you for saying it!!! I hate to RT a post without @whomever. This is frequently the case with many of the food blogs I visit. I mean I love my foodie blog friends but why have a twitter button if you don’t use Twitter.
Maybe it bugs me so because I like Twitter and try to stay up with my RTs and conversations there.
Have a great weekend!
Hi Kathy,
That is why I wrote that post – so I could send it to all the bloggers – and there are many very experienced bloggers who are active on Social Media but never thought to put their username on their blog.
Now you can just send them a link to that post like I do – or ask me and I will. Even if they don’t realize how important it is I want them to benefit from their @username being in the reviews I – and others – do for them.
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Some great point you brought up. I actually had one lady get angry at me in person saying I spammed her. I said, “Did I send you a direct message or @ reply?” “No,” she said, “But I kept seeing your messages and don’t want to see them.”
I think a lot of people don’t understand how to use Twitter, and a lot of frustration stems from that.
These are really great points about the twitter and you presented the anatomy of twitter in this post.
Everyone is different and that should be celebrated! I use to twitter to reach out to clients, meet other people I wouldn’t other wise be able to meet around the world. I like to embrace twitter and understand that each of us is different and that is a really good thing!