I saw a tweet from @RohitBhargava this afternoon that gave me pause:
Rohit’s definitely on the money in that often the people who offer the most value on Twitter are the ones who actually interact, engage and respond. I love getting replies from followers and discovering new people that way.
But I don’t think I want to automate any sort of follow-back. I’m actually not in favor of automating much of anything on Twitter, but I’m especially wary of trying to auto follow-back those who reply to me, because unfortunately, reply spam is quickly becoming the hottest form of spam on Twitter.
I’ve been seeing too many unsolicited “click my junk” replies. Sometimes these can be cleverly disguised to look like they’re tweets that were genuinely intended for me until I click over to the sender’s Twitter page to see an entire stream of identical messages aimed at different users. Check out @ShapiroHealth:
At least with reply spam it’s pretty easy to view the user’s page and see pretty quickly whether they’re worth your time or not (unlike spam direct messages). @ShapiroHealth is clearly not, but this account has more than 800 followers! I’m sure that most are due to auto-follows, because honestly, what value does this account provide?
Auto-following just allows more opportunity for spammers to game the system. I understand the reasons why many people employ an auto-follow strategy and follow-back anyone who follows them, but it’s not what works for me. Like Rohit, I’d love to be sure I’m following back all the people who are reaching out to me and interacting through replies. But I think I’ll continue to make my own decisions instead of automating follow-backs to @ replies and giving the spammers an easy target.
What are your thoughts? Would you use an auto follow-back service for @ replies? Have you noticed more reply spam? Do you ignore it, block it, respond? Let me know in the comments.
I’ve definitely seen more of it. I don’t plan to auto follow @replies or auto anything on my personal account for that matter. I agree with you that it would only encourage spammers.
I think the only reason spammers haven’t turned to @replies on a regular basis yet is because they are in the public eye, and it’s very easy to point them out to others, destroying their reputation immediately.
I’m still not popular enough on Twitter to see much of these @replies directed toward me. However, I do see it happening quite a bit among the people that follow me. I see that I have a new follower, I click on over to their profile, and it’s full of either nothing but @replies or retweets.
As a general rule of thumb, I generally don’t bother following anyone back that is following more people than they have followers. However, it’s gotten to the point (like you said, most likely partially due to automation) that quite a few of these spammers with profiles full of @ replies and retweets have more followers than people they are following.
Just check out @adstand if you don’t believe me.
@David – I don’t get why spammers use this tactic as, like you said, it’s pretty easy to see what they’re doing as @ replies are on their public page. Unless they just don’t care?
@crymala – Having a page filled with @replies and retweets isn’t necessarily a bad thing – often that can be a sign of people who are really engaged and interacting. I actually WANT to see a healthy number of @replies and retweets on a page if I am going to follow someone. It means that they’re sharing good information and that they’re talking to people and not just broadcasting their own stuff (like the @adstand example you gave). What I don’t want to see though, is a page full of automated retweets or a list of @replies that are all identical to each each other. For me, the point of Twitter is learning and conversation, and if it’s a spammer or bot behind the account, I’m not likely to get much of either.
Thanks for weighing in!
Auto is not in my vocabulary. Or whatever the term is for technology. When I was a novice (I’m still an amateur) I did the WeFollow, etc. and it didn’t bring any quality adds. I rarely follow anyone who advertises those tools and I never auto-follow anyone. People have to prove to me that they’re worth following. I don’t want to sound pompous, who am I to say “prove your worth” to anyone, but a 1 simple @ reply doesn’t mean anything.
People that I don’t recognize who send me a message or @ reply to me, I’ll check out their profile and their past few tweets and if it seems of interest, I’ll keep an eye on them.
I get most of my followers through chats and by reading recommendations from those in my community. That brings enough for me. Besides, I’m not trying to build numbers. I’m trying to build a community.
Kasey – Chats are a great way to find people who you’re interested in and have good things to say – I’ve also found some of my favorite people through chats. Building a community versus building a following is a good way to ensure that you’ll find people who are valuable. I can’t imagine an automated service of any sort being sophisticated enough to determine what an individual person finds valuable.
Auto-anything reeks of the inauthentic, and therefore I avoid it. These are tools for spreading your personal value. I guess that means spammers are speaking for themselves!
On a similar note, I’m not a fan of automated DMs when you follow someone. A business that I chose to follow sent me a DM at 1:06am one time (when I had started following them that afternoon), which then sent a text message to my cell phone. Based on the content of the message, I’m pretty sure it was a delayed auto response. These messages seem very unauthentic to me especially since most of them ask you to add them on Facebook or some other site instead of genuinely thanking you or opening a discussion.
@Cassie – Whew, don’t get me started on auto-DMs! Especially the “click my link!” ones. You’d think with all the blog posts and content out there talking about how annoying and hated auto DMs are, that people would know not to do this! I haven’t noticed them as much lately, but I’ve also been much more selective in who I choose to follow lately, as well. I hope this practice will eventually be a thing of the past.