If you tweet away, I will follow

Today is Friday, which for Twitter users like me, can mean only one thing...

Every Friday, Twitter users recommend other users that you should follow.  FollowFriday has kind of become the Twitter version of peer pressure – in other words, I recommended you, why didn't you recommend me?

Among my fellow Twitter addicts, it has come to be viewed either as a beloved tradition of social media community building, or a hated annoyance.  It is almost as deeply polarizing as Pepsi vs. Coke or Soccer vs. Football (by the way, just for the official record, I love FollowFriday and I am firmly in the Pepsi and Football camps – and by Football, I mean American Football).

If you are curious how it got started, then check out the Interview with Micah Baldwin, Father of FollowFriday on TwiTip.

In this blog post, I want to provide you with some examples of what I do on FollowFriday, and how I manage to actually follow (or do I?) so many people (586 and counting).

FollowFriday Example # 1 – The List

Perhaps the most common example of a FollowFriday tweet is to simply list as many users as you can within the 140 characters:

FollowFriday Example # 2 – The Tweet-Out

An alternative FollowFriday tweet is to send a detailed Tweet-Out (the Twitter version of a Shout-Out) to a single user:

FollowFriday Example # 3 – The Twitter Roll

Yet another alternative FollowFriday tweet is to send a link to a Twitter Roll (the Twitter version of a Blog Roll):

To add your Twitter link so we can follow you, please click here:  OCDQ Twitter Roll

Give a Hoot, Use HootSuite

Most of my FollowFriday tweets are actually scheduled.  In part, I do this because I follow people from all around the world and by the time I finally crawl out of bed on Friday, many of my tweeps have already started their weekend.  And let's face it, the other reason that I schedule my FollowFriday tweets has a lot to do with why obsessive-compulsive is in the name of my blog. 

For scheduling tweets, I like using HootSuite:

Please note that the limitation of 140 characters has necessitated the abbreviation #FF instead of the #followfriday “standard.”

The Tweet-rix

Unless you only follow a few people, it is a tremendous challenge to actually follow every user you follow.  To be perfectly honest, I do not follow everyone I follow – no, I wasn't just channeling Yogi Berra (I am a Boston Red Sox fan!).  To borrow an analogy from Phil Simon, trying to watch your entire Twitter stream (i.e. The Tweet-rix) is like being an operator on The Matrix.

My primary Twitter application is TweetDeck:

Not that I am all about me, but I do pay the most attention to Mentions and Direct Messages.  Next, since I am primarily interested in data quality, I use an embedded search to follow any tweets that use the #dataquality hashtag or mention the phrase “data quality.”  TweetDeck is one of many clients allowing you to create Groups of users to help organize The Tweet-rix. 

To further prove my Sci-Fi geek status, I created a group called TweetDeck Actual, which is an homage to BattleStar Galactica, where saying “This is Galactica Actual” confirms an open communications channel has been established with the Galactica. 

I rotate the users I follow in and out of TweetDeck Actual on a regular basis in order to provide for a narrowly focused variety of trenchant tweets.  (By the way, I learned the word trenchant from a Jill Dyché tweet).

The Search for Tweets

You do not need to actually have a Twitter account in order to follow tweets.  There are several search engines designed specifically for Twitter.  And according to recent rumors, tweets will be coming soon to a Google near you.

Here are a just a few ways to search Twitter for data quality content:

• Search for Data Quality on Twitter (via search.twitter.com)
• Search for Data Quality on Twitter (via tweetag.com)
• Search for Data Quality on Twitter (via tweettrail.com)
• Search for Data Quality on Twitter (via topsy.com)

Conclusion

With apologies to fellow fans of U2 (one of my all-time favorite bands):

If you tweet away, tweet away
I tweet away, tweet away
I will follow
If you tweet away, tweet away
I tweet away, tweet away
I will follow
I will follow

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