Twitter tools – How much is too much?

My research assistant/archivist sent me this interesting report about Twitter tools…

That being said, I am not sure about pursuing more complexity or automation of tweets. Twitter seems to be strengthening their position against those methods of use. I assume you’ve had a look at twitter rules (http://twitter.zendesk.com/forums/26257/entries/18311)-
– here is an excerpt from http://help.twitter.com/forums/10713/entries/42646
Best Practices
The Twitter Rules explain what behaviors are permitted on Twitter. In addition to these rules, we’ve included some tips below to keep your content relevant (and listed in Twitter search). We caution against aggressive behaviors and suggest that you stay away from:
* Repeatedly posting duplicate or near-duplicate content (links or tweets)
* Abusing trending topics or hashtags (topic words with a # sign)
* Sending automated tweets or replies
* Using bots or applications to post similar messages based on keywords
* Posting similar messages over multiple accounts
* Aggressively following and un-following people
Twitter may automatically remove accounts engaging in these behaviors from search (or even suspend in some cases) in order to ensure the best experience for everyone.
Ken, most of the things in the list above are things that socialoomph was created to do. Even hootsuite can be used to do some of them. I wonder if Twitter will at some point simply ban all twitter accounts that use these applications… do you think they might?
-Nina

“…I am not sure about pursuing more complexity or automation of tweets.

Twitter seems to be strengthening their position against those methods of use.

Here are the current rules:

http://twitter.zendesk.com/forums/26257/entries/18311

Here’s an excerpt:

http://help.twitter.com/forums/10713/entries/42646

Best Practices

The Twitter Rules explain what behaviors are permitted on Twitter. In addition to these rules, we’ve included some tips below to keep your content relevant (and listed in Twitter search). We caution against aggressive behaviors and suggest that you stay away from:

* Repeatedly posting duplicate or near-duplicate content (links or tweets)

* Abusing trending topics or hashtags (topic words with a # sign)

* Sending automated tweets or replies

* Using bots or applications to post similar messages based on keywords

* Posting similar messages over multiple accounts

* Aggressively following and un-following people

Twitter may automatically remove accounts engaging in these behaviors from search (or even suspend in some cases) in order to ensure the best experience for everyone.

Ken, most of the things in the list above are things that socialoomph was created to do. Even hootsuite can be used to do some of them. I wonder if Twitter will at some point simply ban all twitter accounts that use these applications… do you think they might?

My answer:

Maybe not in the near future, but in the long run, if Twitter perceives this behavior as hurting their business, they might take a closer look at Twitter accounts using these tools and if their algorithm finds even innocent behavior that looks suspect they might, like Google, start pushing the delete button on accounts.

The fact that they are continuously clarifying their guidelines means they are seeing certain behaviors as problematic.

I think the answer is not to get so Twitter-obsessed that you need all kinds of crazy tools to use it.

Spend the vast majority of your promotion time marketing, not networking.

Marketing will kick up all the networking opportunities you can handle and make you money.

Networking, in contrast, may or may not lead to marketing results. Something you do to enhance your marketing, not a substitute for it. It’s the gravy of marketing. Not the meat.

– Ken McCarthy

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