The Net Etiquette Of Twitter

Net Etiquette rules for Twittering

• Check your spelling, grammar, or punctuation in your tweets. Most Twitters will not follow a person who does not post a bio. Do not be quick to follow someone who constantly makes elementary mistakes in their tweets. Your followers deserve that extra effort and a spell check.

• Just because someone follows you,  you do NOT  have to follow them back.  Net Etiquette advises that you follow people who interest you. Most Twitters who do not have profiles and bio are not worth following. If you want to use your Twitter effectively you will delete followers who obviously are selling something (sex, teeth whiteners, and increase you tweets) eventually these followers detract your ability to use Twitter effectively.  Since your followers are available to all, it is wise to choose your followers carefully. Your followers do reflect who you are.

• If you must tweet the same link more than once, at least change the lead in sentence.

• Think “What Can you Share”?  Not “What Are You Doing?” No one wants to hear when you are eating, when you are going to sleep, and when you having personal issues.   It is acceptable to talk about an exceptional  lunch, and even post a picture of it, there are plenty of foodies who find this makes Twitter interesting and fun.   A guiding rule when tweeting is tweet things that would interest you if tweeted by others.

• RT or Retweeting is more important than forwarding a tweet.  It truly contributes to the entire concept of the Twitter community as promoting people, sharing, and distributing is what twitter is all about. Retweeting can make or break your Twitter experience.  If someone tweets something that interests you and you think it would interest your followers, you retweet it for your followers.  Thus giving that person’s tweet credit, so people can see the tweet and then choose to follow that person.  The original person who tweeted might have 80 followers so only 80 people are exposed to the tweet and you might have 4,000 followers and by retweeting it you are helping the original person.  RT is a powerful way of sharing  as you increase that person’s exposure and distribute the tweet you felt was interesting.  The Golden Rule of ethics applies here.

• Be Polite, mind your manners.  The Internet sticks and Twitter is now Google indexed.