I was talking with the friend Christian Heilmann the other day, and he was highlighting the fact that it’s important today to have a Twitter manifesto, or a place where followers can refer about what you do, what you won’t do, and what can happen if they follow you on Twitter. Since I’m always transparent on how I manage my online life, I thought it was a good idea to do one too, so here it is.
What I’m doing on Twitter
- Aside from my blog, Twitter is one of my favorite social media, so I use it a lot. That means that I tweet a lot, and often.
- I tweet about anything, and everything: technical stuff, stuff I read, musics I like, videos I enjoyed, venues where I am, stupid thoughts, RT from others…
- I use it as a personal account, so it’s not filtered: that means it’s 100% me, like with everything I do.
- Twitter is also a source of great informations for me, so I’m reading a lot of what I see, so I’m filtering a lot my following.
- For me, Twitter is also about communicating with others, so I once in a while, have a good discussion over Twitter (that means a lot of tweets, back, and forth).
What I won’t do on Twitter
- I won’t automatically follow you back if you follow me.
- I’m not following a lot of people as I prefer to get quality content than too much noise. Even if I know you in person, that doesn’t mean I’ll follow you.
- My tweets aren’t, and will never be any official statements or neither an official channel from my employer.
- I’m not a marketing channel, so even if I tweet about something my employer did, it’s because I found it was awesome. Same for any company, even about competitors.
- I won’t promote your stuff if you ask me too on Twitter. I’m always happy to help other with my network, and reach, but I won’t just promote something for the sake of promoting it. Send me an email, give me some meat, and we’ll see: it needs to fit me, and I won’t promote something I don’t know or don’t believe in. At the end, bloggers (or people on Twitter) aren’t cheap labor…
It’s your choice
At the end, you have the choice to follow me or not. I use Twitter in a way that make sense for me, so if you think I tweet too much, if you are upset because I don’t follow you or unfollowed you, or if you don’t like my personal tweets, you have the power to unfollow me. That sounds rude or pretentious, but trusts me, it’s just a conclusion I came with a couple of years ago: you cannot please everyone, and I won’t change to please other.
I have the intention to update this manifesto once in a while. Do you have a Twitter manifesto? Do you think it’s important to have one? Share your thoughts!
