So now that – that’s said, I agree with Doug…I already made the decision to follow! When I choose to follow someone I have gone to their profile, I read their bio, I visited the website and I reviewed their tweet stream. I don’t NEED a “thank you” either personal or auto. Which also means I dont thank ppl for following me, I give them the respect to make decisions based on real conversations with me. And I will reach out to followers and to the ppl I am following. I answer all @replys and thank ppl for RT’s.

In order to stop most of the auto welcomes I use the opt-out feature available with TweetLater, what a relief! Now instead of wasting my time reading them and then unfollowing each one cause I’m ticked, now I can focus my time on the real reason I am there….relationship building, conversations and connecting with my community. Now I unfollow those that I reach out to that dont reply back.

Thanks again,
Charlotte

When I first started on Twitter, I would (not auto, but personal) DM all of my new followers with something personal that I discovered from their bio, Web site, or blog. I did this, MYSELF, until I broke the 1,000 mark. Now I still manually follow people back, but I agree with Ed, I don’t send an auto DM that says I acknowledge that you’re following me.

You have lost your mind!

I always liken Twitter to a networking event. Having auto DM is like saying to every person you meet, “Check out my Twitter one minute videos on my blog!” If you did that in real life, as soon as they introduced themselves, how would you feel?

When I first started on Twitter, I would auto DM all of my new followers with something personal that I discovered from their bio, Web site, or blog. I did this, MYSELF, until I broke the 1,000 mark. Now I still manually follow people back, but I agree with Ed, I don’t send an auto DM that says I acknowledge that you’re following me.

If you think about Twitter as a networking event and how you talk to people IRL, you’ll find ways to connect and engage with new people daily without using ‘bots to help you.

I use an “Ask First, Follow Later” process. I always interview (personally) every person I am considering following, BEFORE I follow them. I tell them that I would like to follow them, but first I need their assurance that I will not receive an auto DM from them. Almost all of the responses are extremely positive. On a few occasions, the person has chosen to stop using auto DM.

Sometimes the person just ignores my question, and then I forget that I had asked them. This is probably best for both of us.

Carl Ingalls

So, my counter-arguments against your pro-autoDM stances:

1. You like to send autoDMs to new followers, but think you must send impersonal thank-yous, and welcomes because you have such a large following on Twitter.

I think you can show appreciation for new followers by continuing to tweet in the manner consistent to before they followed you. Good, non-repetitive content in your public tweets is thanks enough! AutoDMs fail; DMs feel at least more personal.

AutoDMs are:

a. Empty content; are obvious, like “duh, I know why I’m following you”
b. Provide no new information; are repetitive
c. Assume followers have no clue why they followed you
d. Noise-y
e. Spam-y; smell like marketing slights-of-hand
f. Annoying
g. A waste of time to read

2. You use autoDMs to post links to free videos for new Twitter users to your new followers.

But, Adrian, you tweet those URLs all the time, so why DM or autoDM them? Your new followers will see them in due course. You tend to tweet those URLs to free videos at least once a day. If they want more info, they can DM you for it.

3. You think autoDMs are okay because it’s not like you’re trying to sell or market anything.

But you are! You are selling something. You’re selling your reputation. You’re marketing yourself. Those free videos feature YOU. They are embedded at YOUR “Marketing Strategy and the Law: Social Media Edition” website. When you autoDM the free video links, it’s like, just in case you didn’t notice, look at MY website. Look at ME. The autoDMs are obvious and repetitive.

So, in sum, autoDMS are major FAIL! 

P.S. I do agree with Doug Cornelius that there are a few exceptions, but for corporate bodies such as the Boston Police. Followers can expect impersonal tweets from them and impersonal autoDMs for their followers can make sense. But for individual persons, AutoDMS fail, with one exception.

Mistaken Identity

If you’re @palfrey and are getting thousands of follows from folks believing you’re @jpalfrey (John Palfrey of Born Digital fame) and are majorly annoyed, I could see the efficiency of autoDM’ing new followers: NO, I AM NOT JOHN PALFREY! You want @jpalfrey. Or if you tell folks who’ve mistaken you for some else on Twitter, you can autoDM: No, I am not THAT @adriandayton. But you can always prevent followers from mistaking you for someone else by adding the clarification in your Twitter bio/profile.

Just say NO to autoDMs! 