Automating Twitter: Is It A Crime? [Poll]

Sometimes, I use Twitter to interact with others.

Sometimes, I use Twitter as a news feed.

Sometimes, I use Twitter as a broadcast tool.

Different goals, different techniques.

I automate some of the messages I send, especially when I want to say something at a time when I know people are likely to be reading but when I won’t be online directly. I also try to avoid overtweeting when possible, so if that means I automatedly stagger five tweets instead of blasting them all at once, so be it.

How people choose to use the tool is less relevant than whether their use is achieving their goals. And if someone is using a tool in a way that devalues your own experience, just unfollow.

The advice I give is simple: Automate your tasks, not your conversations.

Great article (as usual!) and great comments.

I think scheduling/repeating tweets is needed but is something you need to do carefully.

One aspect with scheduling tweets which is not mentioned often is that sometimes scheduled tweets come out at the same time as a major news event (eg the Chilean earthquake)…such tweets can look a little insensitive then.

Joel

Interesting post once again. I enjoyed the comments just as much and agree with much of what has been said. Like anything there is for and against. Personally I do both….automate and communicate. I love having conversations on twitter and enjoy retweeting quotes and interesting links. So for me automating works well & I understand if someone else does the same, after all it is as Guy Kwasaki says….a tool, as are all the other means of social media. However, I do love the fun and quick pace of twitter and it is by far my most favourite place to be….ergo why I am still up at 11pm
Thanks again for helpful and interesting posts.
Cindy

I think it’s up to each company to decide for themselves how to utilize Twitter. Twitter is a noisy place and it’s hard to keep up with all of the activity. Social media experts and those with social media in their titles can spend more time on Twitter because that’s how they get paid. But for many companies, it’s just another marketing channel.

I think there’s a place for automation on Twitter depending upon a company’s social media strategy and resources.

Just adding my voice to the “some kinds of automation are ok” camp.

Twitter is great because of personal contact with interesting people, so anything to reduce that personal feeling reduces what I like about Twitter.

I schedule my tweets, and don’t see anything wrong with that because it’s still my voice. The fact is that I’m saying something that I think my followers want to hear, so I say it at a time when they’re listening. I’m thinking about THEM.

Automated DMs are worse than useless. It’s kind of like answering the phone to hear an automated message telling you that you’re answering the phone. I still get just a teeny bit excited when I get a DM, only to find out that no one’s on the other end of the line.

It’s a waste of my time, and gives me a slight sense of disappointment. Is that what the person is going for?

More so to automatically send someone else’s tweets without even reading them. If someone thinks that a person ALWAYS tweets good stuff, they should tell their followers to follow that person.

Would you automatically email those third-party tweets to your friends? If not, then maybe you don’t think they’re really that interesting.

Anyway, thanks for the thought-provoking post and all the great comments!

There’s a big disconnect here with the anti-automation folks. Twitter isn’t a conversation.

It is possible to have limited discussions with people on it, but that’s about it. It’s a channel that’s best for broadcast and for pointing people to interesting content. It’s also an excellent place to connect.

But for robust conversations? Not really.

This authentic argument also crops up all the time. Brands aren’t authentic. They aren’t people. They aren’t twittering from the heart. They are tweeting from guidelines and policies put in place by their marketing and communications departments.

Automated tweets can be effective for brands and people that want to broadcast specific content at specific times. That doesn’t mean it should be automated all the time. It’s a tool that used correctly can be effective for managing the account. There should also be a mix of interaction and information exchange.

But this isn’t an either or proposition. You can use the online channels with what fits and works best for you or your brand.

I think it all depends. I use automated tweets sometimes when I’m tweeting for a cause. Nobody can be online 24/7. I use Twaitter for some of my tweets I want repeated, whether it’s helping a dog in need or important information I want everybody to notice.

I do not like autodms that say “Thanks for following me, I look forward to following your tweets.”  I find the to be very disingenious.  In other words, you will send this out to everybody, with no regard to who they are.  So, Charles Manson (he could be on Twitter) would get the same response as me.  I find that no answer is better than a fake autodm.

I have only just started using automation, mainly due to spending so much time on Twitter and Facebook that I haven’t been getting much work done!  I only automate a few tweets a day, and then when I’m around I tweet as normal… 

It’s almost a necessary evil for the effective marketer.  Because of it’s sheer nature, and abundance of content, strategic placement of Twitter postings is critical to getting “seen.”  In managing this, automatic feeders are quite instrumental.

I think it is OK in the case that you clearly articulate that you are automating.  People feel betrayed when they reach out and respond to something only to find out that the individual is offline and not “listening.” This can be a self-deflating thing IMO.

Auto DMs are terrible.  In terms of auto-updating, I don’t think it’s always bad.  If you’re still monitoring those updates, the replies, the retweets, etc. (in other words, if you’re still being social about it), then it’s not bad.  I don’t care for linking across social media channels, at least not on every single update.

I don’t like automated “Thanks for following messages.” Nor do I appreciate DM’s automated to direct me to a product or service except as an answer to something I asked. If you are going to DM, make it personal. I only automate to schedule posts in case I can’t do spontaneous tweets.

Said sometimes because it can be really annoying to readers if they’re getting bombarded with messages.

Automate = PEDs (Cheating)