I recently signed up to Twitter, and have been using it a little here and there (just often enough to notice the problems everyone complains about). One of the reasons I signed up is because people who I follow each week through blogs and podcasts are also using Twitter, often to talk about things that don’t quite merit a blog post. For example Chris Garrett tweeted an article he was reading on why 60% of NBA players go broke after retiring, which was interesting to me but not something Chris would necessarily write a post about.

I’m not a big name in any of the topics I write about here, and certainly not on Twitter. It makes sense to me that I would follow those I am interested in, and maybe over time a few of them and some others would follow me as well and that would become a measure of how well I am doing here with Crane Factory.

So it is with some surprise that I receive this email in my inbox today:

Ty_Coughlin_ (Ty_Coughlin_) is now following your updates on Twitter.

Check out Ty_Coughlin_’s profile here: http://twitter.com/Ty_Coughlin_

You may follow Ty_Coughlin_ as well by clicking on the “follow” button.

Ty Coughlin, who is he and why does he want to follow me? I looked at his Twitter page and immediately remembered, Ty has been advertising his “Reverse Funnel System” over at John Chow’s blog for a while. Which only makes me ask again, why does he want to follow me? Another look at his Twitter page answers that for me.

Is this person following me on Twitter because they are interested in me?

Having just signed up to Twitter Ty seems to be following as many people as possible straight away. At least 49 either auto-followed in return or chose to follow him as well. Being one of 2165 being followed does not suggest there is a lot of interest in me by Ty.

Is this person following me on Twitter because they think I am interested in them?

If a blogger or WordPress enthusiast started following me and I looked at their Twitter page and saw things I was interested in, I would likely follow them in return. This is the very basis of social interaction on the web, bringing together like minded people who can share with each other and benefit from the interaction.

Ty sells a get rich quick investment scheme. That doesn’t interest me in the slightest, and I’m not sure what on my website would give off that impression.

So why is this person following me on Twitter?

When I show up as one of 2165 people being followed by a user, and that user has no apparent interest in me or anything that I would be interested in, I figure the sales pitch is not far behind.

When someone who clearly shares an interest or area of expertise chooses to follow you then you have gained both an interested, and interesting, social interaction in the process.

Tagged as: Social, Twitter