Apr 17 2009
Follow Friday, or, #followfriday
It’s Friday and you’re about to see a mass of Tweets that have #followfriday in them. If you don’t know what Follow Friday Tweets are, it can be very confusing watching this Twitterstream of Tweets about other Tweeple.
Follow Fridays began on January 16th of this year, so it’s pretty new. @micah started it. Here’s the very first Follow Friday Tweet. The idea is to recommend Tweeple that you think your followers should follow. All you have to do is put the #followfriday hashtag into the Tweet. Here is a Follow Friday Tweet that I actually sent last week:
#followfriday @ScottGiorgini, for great motivation plus personal Twitter interaction.
You might also see Follow Friday Tweets that are just a clump of names, like:
#followfriday @susansoaps, @Lotay, @robynmcintyre, @PeterSantilli, @RobMcNealy, @RealtorRon
Which one is more convincing for you to follow? It is very important to give a reason to follow the person, otherwise it’s just a bunch of names that get lost in the mass of Follow Friday Tweets. Please give reasons! And don’t send 200 recommendations every week. That’s just going to annoy Tweeple. If you have a lot of people you want to recommend, and have good reasons for others to follow them, consider a blog post with your recommendations. I actually set up a blog page just for Twitter, and I add each week’s Follow Friday recommendations to it. This way past recommendations are still offered for those looking for a lot of good people to follow.
You might be wondering how to get people to recommend you. The best way, of course, is to be so popular that your followers recommend you naturally. You get “popular” by interacting with your followers, by reTweeting their Tweets (sending their Tweets as a new Tweet, giving them credit), and by posting interesting Tweets. The more valuable your Tweets are to your followers, the more they will be inclined to recommend you to their followers.
Recommending others increases your chances of getting recommended, too. Nothing gets the attention of a Twitter user more than you Tweeting a Follow Friday recommendation about them (with a sincere reason). Don’t do it just to get them to recommend you, though. Do it as a true value for your followers. If you send insincere Follow Friday recommendations, and your followers decide your recommendations are terrible, they become worthless fast and your Twitter reputation suffers.
When you see #followfriday Tweets, consider following those Tweeple. They’re most likely interesting and valuable. It’s a great way to find new people to follow. Also, it’s a great idea to follow the people who make the recommendations, because it shows they are sincere Tweeple who interact and know the people their following. To me, the people who do Follow Friday recommendations are the best of Twitter.
If you’re not following enough people to get many Follow Friday recommendations, you can see the general stream of Follow Friday Tweets by searching for #followfriday using Twitter search or something like it. Here’s a URL:
http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23followfriday
A new site is in beta that is focused on Follow Fridays: http://followfridays.com/. I’m going to give it a try today.
Think about who you follow, and if they’re worth recommending. Then recommend them (with the #followfriday hashtag and a reason to follow them, of course). It’ll increase your Twitter Karma, it will build your relationships, and it will feel good writing compliments. Then you, too, can be part of the Follow Friday Twitterstream!
