Every day on Twitter, I get countless anonymous direct messages from people I don’t know, who are pitching links and facebook pages and ebooks that don’t matter to me. Most of these are set up to be sent automatically, periodically, so that the sender doesn’t have to do any real work of actually getting to know someone and really communicating.
Of course you have to wade through the Twitter spam in case there’s a legitimate message buried in there.
I noticed a DM today that stood out:
I look forward to meaningfully connect on social media!
I appreciate the kind sentiment, but “meaningfully connecting” and “social media” do not go together, especially on Twitter, and especially with strangers.
Here’s why:
- Everybody is pitching something.
- Almost nobody is buying anything.
- So basically, pitchers are pitching pitchers.
- Further, and worse, nobody’s really reading much of anything. If you’re following even 2,000 people (a very low number these days) you can’t possibly read everything all of them tweet.
It happens this way because it’s easy.
Building actual relationships takes work.
Getting to know someone in real life takes work.
You have to understand who they are, what they do, what’s important to them, and then try to help them. That takes time, effort and thinking. Sorry, but Twitter kind of doesn’t.
Twitter has its value to some constituencies: celebrities can use it to directly connect with their fans, so can athletes. Companies can use it effectively to listen, and to address customer service concerns. But social media experts and “pitchers” are pretty much pitching into a void.
Alex, you make some good points but in the end I think you are confusing the value of Twitter with the proper (or otherwise) use of it. If you use a hammer only to punch holes in otherwise perfectly good walls, does that make the hammer a bad tool? No, it’s misuse.
Twitter can be used to build relationships and networks and lead to more meaningful communication, often through other channels at that point. If one is using it only for cold, blind “pitching,” that’s a misuse of the tool. I get many of those same kinds of pitches through email; doesn’t mean email is a bad tool, it’s just misused by some.
And true social media experts never pitch into a void, because they know better. But thanks for raising the issues.
Thanks for your thoughtful comment, Tom.
Twitter probably CAN be used to build meaningful relationships, as you suggest, but I would argue that the vast majority of Twitter users don’t use it well for that purpose. Just check your DM inbox, and you’ll see what I’m saying. Anybody who sends me an auto-DM disqualifies themselves from any “meaningful connection.”
Alex, no question abuse is common, and couldn’t agree more about auto-DMs. Personalized DMs can be very effective on the other hand, properly used. But your points are well taken .
Thanks, Tom. I appreciate your thoughts. And thanks for reading!
This is an excellent article that makes some very salient points. Thanks Alex! 🙂